Abstract Societal engagement of scientists critically depends on their intrinsic motivation. Nevertheless, it remains unclear how motivational drivers influence effort and performance in engaging with four distinct stakeholder domains: academic, civil society, state-governmental, and economic. This article tests motivational drivers in a survey among 706 Dutch Life Scientists to study direct and indirect effects on effort and performance and finds that drivers differentially influence effort and performance in the four domains. Analysis supported the identification of a fourth category of drivers: ‘moral’—next to the well-recognised gold, ribbon, and puzzle drivers—and demonstrated their importance for performance in the civil society and state-governmental domains, two domains that have been underserved in previous studies. Pecuniary drivers influenced engagement with academic, as well as economic domains. In line with these findings, spreading responsibilities for engagement with different domains in line with the interests and motivations of individual scientists is recommended.