Impact of verbal teacher immediacy on child development students' course motivation and perception of their instructor

The present study aims to examine the impact of a teacher's initial greeting before starting a lecture on students' course motivation and their perception of teacher immediacy. 54 students from the Child Development Department at Harran University, Turkey participated in the study. Investigators randomly assigned students into an experimental and a control group. Participants responded to a pre- and post-test of the Course Motivation Scale (CMS), and a post-test of the Teacher Immediacy Behavior Scale for Higher Education (TIBS). Following the post-tests, qualitative data was gathered by selecting ten random participants from each group for in-depth interviewing. Quantitative results yielded no significant difference for group means. However, qualitative data findings revealed several themes that showed the effect of experimental intervention, such as showing interest in students' personal problems, teachers' effort, and support for students, teachers' expectations of students, and teacher care for students. Implications and suggestions for future studies were also discussed.