Internship performance and satisfaction in sports: Application of the proactive motivation model

Career-related internships are often promoted as important opportunities for college students to explore their career options and gain valuable experience (Brooks, Cornelius, Greenfield, & Joseph, 1995). Despite a reasonably large body of internships in the sport industry each year, little research has been conducted on college internship programs. The present study used the proactive motivation model (Parker, Bindl, & Strauss, 2010) as the framework for identifying the antecedents of internship performance and their satisfaction. A total of 306 college students majoring in sports were recruited as participants in the current study. The researcher gathered data from paper questionnaires and electronic surveys (e-surveys) with a two time-point design. The results indicated that self-efficacy mediated the relationship between proactive personality and internship performance as well as satisfaction. In terms of the current findings, the theoretical and practical implications of sport internship and proactivity literature are further discussed.

Graphical >abstractThe results of our study indicated that self-efficacy could mediate the relationship between proactive personality and internship performance as well as their satisfaction. The results support the proactive motivation model’s expectations and prove that proactive personality could influence individuals’ job performance and satisfaction through self-efficacy.Figure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload as PowerPoint slide