Applicants, Motivational Factors for University Admission

The National Entrance Exam in Iran, with 1.5 million participants, is a noticeable social phenomenon in recent years. An important aspect to interpreting and understanding this issue is psychological approach. This research investigated applicants motives as a psychological basis of public tendency toward higher education. Subjects were 1498 females and 804 males applicants sampled from Tehranian participants in National Entrance Exam(in 2004 year) who received their score results. the main statistical method for data analysis was Factor Analysis and Wilcoxon-Mann-Whitney tests. In this study, a questionaire with 30 items on the basis of six motives (obtained from interviews) was prepared. After pilot and data analysis variables the questionaire was reduced to 15 consisting five factors. The findings of this survey indicate that the principal motives for access to university were social prestige, social milieu of colleges, career prospects, academic interest and temporary solutions. In addition a comparison between female and male subjects revealed that, the three first motives were more important for girls and academic interest was more important for boys.