Motivational component profiles in university students learning histology: a comparative study between genders and different health science curricula

Background: The students' motivation to learn basic sciences in health science curricula is poorly understood. The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of different components of motivation (intrinsic motivation, self-determination, self-efficacy and extrinsic -career and grade-motivation) on learning human histology in health science curricula and their relationship with the final performance of the students in histology. Methods: Glynn Science Motivation Questionnaire II was used to compare students' motivation components to learn histology in 367 first-year male and female undergraduate students enrolled in medical, dentistry and pharmacy degree programs. Results: For intrinsic motivation, career motivation and self-efficacy, the highest values corresponded to medical students, whereas dentistry students showed the highest values for self-determination and grade motivation. Genders differences were found for career motivation in medicine, self-efficacy in dentistry, and intrinsic motivation, self-determination and grade motivation in pharmacy. Career motivation and self-efficacy components correlated with final performance in histology of the students corresponding to the three curricula. Conclusions: Our results show that the overall motivational profile for learning histology differs among medical, dentistry and pharmacy students. This finding is potentially useful to foster their learning process, because if they are metacognitively aware of their motivation they will be better equipped to self-regulate their science-learning behavior in histology. This information could be useful for instructors and education policy makers to enhance curricula not only on the cognitive component of learning but also to integrate students' levels and types of motivation into the processes of planning, delivery and evaluation of medical education.This research was supported by the Unidad de Innovación Docente, University of Granada, Spain through grants UGR11-294 and UGR11-303

Reshaping Neighborhood Parks for Biodiversity and People: A Case of Unsung Socio-Ecological Systems in Bangalore, India

Urban green spaces have recently gained a lot of attention, as they are known to provide various vital ecosystem services to the community. Bangalore, a south-Indian city, which was called the “Garden City” of India, has several large green spaces. It is only in recent years that small pocket green spaces such as neighborhood parks have been created. Although the importance of neighborhood parks is known, they are ignored and readily sacrificed for developmental projects, while the large heritage green spaces receive more attention and are conserved. The concept of the large spaces providing more services seems to have filtered into the minds of citizens, thus resulting in complete negligence towards the neighborhood parks. Cities are required to implement newer concepts which focus on small green spaces too, which could enhance the services they currently provide to the community. Thus integrating multiple concepts that not only focus on the ecological functioning but also the social needs of the community could help increase the stewardship which is currently lacking around neighborhood parks and much needed attention towards small green spaces. In this chapter, through an interdisciplinary approach, we suggest concepts that could help conserve smaller green spaces through better green space management in developing citie