The motivation and attitudes of students towards studying influence the way they learn, their performance at school and the objectives they set themselves. The study, based on a sample of 200 Italian eighth graders aims to explore students' metaphors of study. An integrated approach was performed analysing the data with an inductive, data-based, qualitative approach as well as a deductive, theory-based, quantitative approach. The results identified some key attributes of metaphors based on

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... semantic and figurative aspects. The most frequent categories that emerged are closely associated with classic constructs of the literature on academic motivation.