Promoting autonomy-supportive teachers’ behaviour is important for teaching students
to take responsibility for their performance and for increasing their level of enjoyment
in physical education (PE). Based on self-determination theory, our research aimed
to identify the antecedents of PE teachers’ motivational strategies that can facilitate
students’ psychological needs satisfaction and positive outcomes during PE classes.
A total of 376 primary and secondary school PE teachers completed our cross-sectional-design
questionnaires in four Central European countries (Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, and
Serbia). Measures included perceived job pressures, opportunities for professional
development, perceptions of students’ self-determination in PE, teachers’ psychological
need satisfaction in their job, teachers’ self-determination at work, and teachers’
provision of autonomy support, structure, and involvement strategies. Jamovi software
for structural equation modelling and the path analysis method was used for statistical
analysis. Following post hoc modification, the hypothesized model showed a good fit
to our model (χ 2 (17) = 64.60, p = 0.00; CMIN/ df = 3.80; CFI = 0.92; TLI = 0.81;
SRMR = 0.05; RMSEA = 0.08). Results indicated that teachers’ opportunities for professional
development had a significant positive relationship with their need satisfaction at
work, which was positively linked with their motivation to teach. Job pressure was
negatively associated with basic psychological need satisfaction. Teachers’ perception
of students’ autonomous motivation was positively linked with their own autonomous
and controlled motivation, and was also directly and positively linked to their use
of involvement and autonomy-supportive teaching strategies.
