Achievement goal theory includes both personal motivational features (achievement goals) and contextual features (goal structures). The theory holds that the prevailing goal structures in learning ...environments (such as the classroom) influence the achievement goals students adopt. This meta-analysis (k = 68, N = 47,975) examined the strength of the relationships between student ratings of goal structures (mastery-approach goal structures, mastery-avoidance goal structures, performance-approach goal structures, and performance-avoidance goal structures) and achievement goals (mastery-approach goals, mastery-avoidance goals, performance-approach goals, and performance-avoidance goals) as well as moderating variables. Results indicated that each achievement goal was most strongly related to its contextual counterpart. Educational level and world region moderated some of the relations, and for most combinations of goal structures and achievement goals, measures framing goal structures as a climate produced higher correlations than measures using the teacher as referent. Challenges and promising routes for future research and theory building are discussed.
Educational Impact and Implications Statement
This meta-analysis examined the relations between goal structures (students' ratings of their teachers' instruction and the classroom motivational climate) and students' personal achievement goals. The results suggest that students tend to adopt personal achievement goals that are aligned with the prevailing goal structures; for instance, if students perceive that teachers focus on learning and improvement, they pursue the type of personal achievement goals with the same focus. The largest effect was found for the relationship between the most detrimental type of achievement goal, which centers on avoiding poor performance, and the "matching" goal structure, indicating a need for educators to de-emphasize this type of goal structure. The results further revealed that how goal structures are defined and measured can strongly influence the findings obtained, as goal structure measures referring to the motivational climate within a class were generally more strongly related to personal achievement goals than goal structure measures referring to the teacher's instructional practices.
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Goal-setting theory states that challenging, specific, and concrete goals (i.e., subordinate goals) are powerful motivators and boost performance in goal pursuit more than vague or abstract goals ...(i.e., superordinate goals). Goal-setting theory predominantly focuses on single, short-term goals and less on broad, long-term challenges. This review article extends goal-setting theory and argues that superordinate goals also fulfill a crucial role in motivating behavior, particularly when addressing broad, long-term challenges. The purpose of this article is to shed light on the benefits of superordinate goals, which have received less attention in research, and to show theoretically that people pursue long-term goals more successfully when they focus on subordinate as well as superordinate goals than when they focus on either subordinate or superordinate goals alone.
The effects of ability performance goals, normative performance goals, and mastery goals on anxiety, interest, and performance were examined in a series of experiments. Challenging problem-solving ...tasks that would demonstrate the effects of each performance goal more clearly were designed. Groups of early adolescents (Study 1) and college students in Korea (Studies 2 and 3) participated in similar experiments to strengthen the generalizability of the findings. Across the 3 studies, students assigned to the ability-goal condition exhibited significantly higher anxiety and lower interest compared with those in the normative- and mastery-goal conditions, except that the anxiety between the 2 performance-goal conditions did not differ after experiencing failure in Study 3. The ability-goal students persisted for significantly less time than did those in the other 2 conditions (Study 1) and demonstrated significantly lower challenge appraisal and weaker reengagement intention compared with those in the normative-goal condition (Study 2). The effects of achievement goals on problem-solving performance varied across the studies.
Educational Impact and Implications Statement
This study suggests that students who pursue the goal of proving their ability to others while performing challenging problem-solving tasks are more vulnerable to anxiety and lack of interest compared with those whose goal is to perform better than others or to improve their competence. Although it was those students who strived to outperform others that received performance benefits, it was those who focused on learning new skills and developing their competence that demonstrated the highest level of persistence when engaging in a difficult problem-solving task. The results highlight the importance of providing a safe learning environment in which students can focus on learning and performing well without having to worry about how their ability will be evaluated.
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By analyzing the open-ended reasons for studying generated by 3 different groups of Korean middle school students, we aimed to provide partial answers to current issues in achievement goal research ...that are difficult to resolve solely with the use of survey ratings. We categorized student responses using the achievement goal frameworks of Midgley et al. (2000), Elliot and McGregor (2001), and Grant and Dweck (2003), as well as the social-academic goal framework of Dowson and McInerney (2003). The responses gained from interviews with the students (Study 2) supported our categorization. Grant and Dweck's normative (Study 1) and outcome goals (Study 2) and Midgley et al.'s performance-approach goals (Study 3) appeared most frequently when competence-oriented responses were considered, while Dowson and McInerney's social status goals were the most common for noncompetence responses. Grant and Dweck's framework as a whole accounted for the largest proportion of competence-oriented responses. However, when present-oriented achievement goals were analyzed independently, Midgley et al.'s mastery goals (Grant and Dweck's learning goals) accounted for the overwhelming majority of student responses. Grant and Dweck's ability validation goals were also especially prominent among students subjected to ability grouping (Study 3), demonstrating the effect of the immediate learning environment on the types of achievement goals that students pursue. Elliot and McGregor's mastery-avoidance goals were rare regardless of whether all achievement goals or only those in the immediate classroom context were examined. A majority of students also pursued only a single goal from within Elliot and McGregor's 2 × 2 framework.
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Objective
Goal pursuit may involve setbacks likely to elicit negative emotions. To continue pursuing the goal, an individual may need to regulate those emotions. In this study, we compared the unique ...contributions of two emotion regulation styles, integrative emotion regulation (IER) and suppressive emotion regulation (SER), to goal pursuit processes. We tested the hypotheses that IER and SER would be differentially related to goal progress and goal‐related effort and goal‐related depressed mood would mediate those relations.
Method
255 Israeli participants completed five web questionnaires at two‐week intervals. We examined the mediation hypothesis using multilevel structural equation modeling.
Results
At the within‐person level, increases in IER predicted increases in goal progress at a given time point through increases in goal‐related effort, while increases in SER predicted decreases in goal progress through increases in goal‐related depressed mood. At the between‐persons level, participants with higher IER reported more goal progress; this effect was mediated by goal‐related effort. Participants with higher SER reported lower goal progress; this effect was mediated by higher goal‐related depressed mood. The findings held after controlling for such factors as participants' perceived goal competence, goal stress, sex, and age.
Conclusions
IER promotes goal pursuit, but SER impedes it.
Historically, the study of multiple goals has focused on the dynamics between two goals as the prototypical example of multiple goals. This focus on dyadic relations means that many issues central to ...the psychology of more than two goals are still unexplored. We argue that a deeper understanding of multiple-goal issues involves moving beyond two goals. Doing so not only reveals new insights about goal relations (e.g., how one dyadic relation affects another) but also introduces goal structure (how goals and goal relations are positioned relative to each other) as a variable in its own right worthy of study. In our review, we discuss current knowledge gaps, review methodologies both in terms of existing techniques and novel techniques we propose, and highlight new directions from moving beyond two goals—what new questions emerge and what dynamics, including intersectional issues (e.g., between goal properties and goal structure), become possible to explore.
Our understanding of multiple goals has been advanced through the lines of research that focus on their pursuit of academic achievement goals and of academic and social goals. These prior efforts, ...however, are not free from conceptual and methodological limitations. To further advance the field, we put this paper together with two purposes in mind. First, we propose a goal complex model as a new approach to studying the coordination, consequences, and social contexts of pursuing multiple goals. In doing so, we highlight the role of academic goals as the means towards pursuing social goals as the end goals. Second, we proffer a model that explains sociocultural influences on the development of social and academic goals as well as goal complexes. To this end, we highlight the role of parents, teachers, and classmates/peers in promoting students’ social and academic goals and in facilitating the formation of goal complexes through these key social agents’ influences on the students’ goal-related beliefs. Conceptual implications and methodological recommendations for future research on students’ multiple goals are discussed. Together, the goal complex approach and the sociocultural model we present in this paper provide the field with directions for future research that seeks to better understand students’ pursuit of multiple goals as they navigate complex sociocultural demands in their day-to-day tasks.
The authors present an empirical review of the literature concerning trait and state goal orientation (GO). Three dimensions of GO were examined: learning, prove performance, and avoid performance ...along with presumed antecedents and proximal and distal consequences of these dimensions. Antecedent variables included cognitive ability, implicit theory of intelligence, need for achievement, self-esteem, general self-efficacy, and the Big Five personality characteristics. Proximal consequences included state GO, task-specific self-efficacy, self-set goal level, learning strategies, feedback seeking, and state anxiety. Distal consequences included learning, academic performance, task performance, and job performance. Generally speaking, learning GO was positively correlated, avoid performance GO was negatively correlated, and prove performance GO was uncorrelated with these variables. Consistent with theory, state GO tended to have stronger relationships with the distal consequences than did trait GO. Finally, using a meta-correlation matrix, the authors found that trait GO predicted job performance above and beyond cognitive ability and personality. These results demonstrate the value of GO to organizational researchers.
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Objectives
This meta‐analysis quantified associations between goal disengagement and goal reengagement capacities with individuals' quality of life (i.e., well‐being and health).
Methods
Effect sizes ...(Fisher's Z′; N = 421) from 31 samples were coded on several characteristics (e.g., goal adjustment capacity, quality of life type/subtype, age, and depression risk status) and analyzed using meta‐analytic random effects models.
Results
Goal disengagement (r = 0.08, p < 0.01) and goal reengagement (r = 0.19, p < 0.01) were associated with greater quality of life. While goal disengagement more strongly predicted negative (r = −0.12, p < 0.01) versus positive (r = 0.02, p = 0.37) indicators of well‐being, goal reengagement was similarly associated with both (positive: r = 0.24, p < 0.01; negative: r = −0.17, p < 0.01). Finally, the association between goal disengagement and lower depressive symptoms (r = −0.11, p < 0.01) was reversed in samples at‐risk for depression (r = 0.08, p = 0.01), and goal disengagement more strongly predicted quality of life in older samples (B = 0.003, p < 0.01).
Conclusions
These findings support theory on the self‐regulatory functions of individuals' capacities to adjust to unattainable goals, document their distinct benefits, and identify key moderating factors.
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