ABSTRACT
A cohort model or natural groups design (Shaughnessy & Zechmeister, 1994), was adopted for this investigation. Data was collected from all pre-service teachers at a single university in their fi nal year of study before qualifying. A comparison sample was drawn from a single year cohort of experienced teachers undertaking further educational studies at Masters level. These samples were selected for four reasons. The fi rst was practicality: I had access to both groups. The second was that the sampling method, using all students from a cohort, was likely to be more representative of the variation in motivation across and between both groups. Third, the universities selected for the pre-service and experienced cohorts contained both primary (elementary) and secondary teachers, allowing valid comparisons. The fourth reason was that all participants were currently education students at a university. Therefore any variance in anxiety that might be attributed to study would be equally distributed between the groups. The minimum criterion for experience was set at fi ve years in the teaching profession, which all the Masters students had achieved. Early career attrition data suggests that teachers who last beyond fi ve years are likely to stay teaching for long periods (Brookfi eld, 1995), and that therefore the differences between the two groups should have emerged.
