Implicit and self-attributed achievement motives: concordance and predictive validity

As a complement to the literature on the discriminant validity of implicit and self-attributed motives, this study explored two issues that point to convergences: moderation of concordance between implicit and self-attributed achievement motives, and the role of the two types of motive as antecedents of achievement goals. Significant positive correlations were found between implicit and self-attributed need for achievement and between implicit and self-attributed fear of failure. Individuals higher in self-determination were more concordant in implicit and self-attributed need for achievement. Implicit and self-attributed achievement motives predicted achievement goals in a similar manner, and structural equation modeling yielded good fit for a conceptually parsimonious latent motive model. It is suggested that implicit and self-attributed motives converge in some respects (yet diverge in others), and implications for theory are discussed.     

Investigating the predictive validity of implicit and explicit measures of motivation on condom use, physical activity and healthy eating

The literature on health-related behaviours and motivation is replete with research involving explicit processes and their relations with intentions and behaviour. Recently, interest has been focused on the impact of implicit processes and measures on health-related behaviours. Dual-systems models have been proposed to provide a framework for understanding the effects of explicit or deliberative and implicit or impulsive processes on health behaviours. Informed by a dual-systems approach and self-determination theory, the aim of this study was to test the effects of implicit and explicit motivation on three health-related behaviours in a sample of undergraduate students (N?=?162). Implicit motives were hypothesised to predict behaviour independent of intentions while explicit motives would be mediated by intentions. Regression analyses indicated that implicit motivation predicted physical activity behaviour only. Across all behaviours, intention mediated the effects of explicit motivational variables from self-determination theory. This study provides limited support for dual-systems models and the role of implicit motivation in the prediction of health-related behaviour. Suggestions for future research into the role of implicit processes in motivation are outlined.     

Investigating the predictive validity of implicit and explicit measures of motivation on condom use,physical activity and healthy eating

The literature on health-related behaviours and motivation is replete with research involving explicit processes and their relations with intentions and behaviour. Recently, interest has been focused on the impact of implicit processes and measures on health-related behaviours. Dual-systems models have been proposed to provide a framework for understanding the effects of explicit or deliberative and implicit or impulsive processes on health behaviours. Informed by a dual-systems approach and self-determination theory, the aim of this study was to test the effects of implicit and explicit motivation on three health-related behaviours in a sample of undergraduate students (N?=?162). Implicit motives were hypothesised to predict behaviour independent of intentions while explicit motives would be mediated by intentions. Regression analyses indicated that implicit motivation predicted physical activity behaviour only. Across all behaviours, intention mediated the effects of explicit motivational variables from self-determination theory. This study provides limited support for dual-systems models and the role of implicit motivation in the prediction of health-related behaviour. Suggestions for future research into the role of implicit processes in motivation are outlined.     

基于自我决定视角的动机结构与主观幸福感的关系*

从自我决定的视角,探讨了内隐和外显成就动机的不一致性对主观幸福感产生影响的可能机制。分别以成就动机量表和内隐联想测验作为成就动机的外显和内隐测量方式,同时采用自我决定量表和总体幸福感指数量表对303名大学生进行了施测。结果表明:（1）大学生内隐成就动机和外显成就动机没有显著相关;（2）外显成就动机与主观幸福感呈显著正相关,内隐成就动机调节了外显成就动机与主观幸福感的关系;（3）不一致性成就动机结构对主观幸福感有显著的负向预测,自我决定在不一致性成就动机结构对主观幸福感的预测效应中起着部分中介作用。     

Achievement motive and sport participation

Three studies investigated the relationship between the achievement motive and sport participation. It was expected that both the implicit and the explicit achievement motives are positively associated with how frequently people engage in sport activities. The implicit achievement motive was assessed with indirect motive measures; the explicit achievement motive was either inferred from participants’ personal goals or measured with self-reports. Two hundred five athletes participated including college students enrolled in leisure sport programs offered at their university (Study 1), amateur athletes registered in sports clubs (Study 2), and elite tennis athletes (Study 3). The implicit achievement motive consistently predicted sport participation in all three studies. In contrast, the explicit achievement motive was uncorrelated with sport participation. The interaction between the two motives did not yield an effect on sport participation. The results indicate that the implicit, unconscious need to achieve facilitates regular engagement in sport activities, but the explicit, conscious orientation toward achievement does not. The enrichment of sports environments with incentives for the implicit achievement motive may thus attract more people to participate in sport activities.     

Is Self‐Determined Functioning a Universal Prerequisite for Motive–Goal Congruence? Examining the Domain of Achievement in Three Cultures

ABSTRACT Research has shown that capacity for accessing implicit motives promotes congruence between the implicit and the explicit motivational system: Individuals able to test a conscious goal for its fit with their implicit motivation commit themselves more fully to self‐congruent goals. However, it has not yet been shown whether this is a universal phenomenon or limited to Euro‐American cultures in which individual needs are less strictly constrained by the social environment than in other cultural contexts. Thus, the present study examined whether self‐determination interacts with the implicit achievement motive to predict how much importance individuals from Cameroon, Germany, and Hong Kong ascribe to achievement goals. Moreover, the importance ascribed to goals should indirectly predict life satisfaction via success in goal realization. Results showed that the associations described above are valid in all three cultural groups and are discussed in terms of their implications for the universal processes characterizing motivation.     

Achievement motivation in the social context: Implicit and explicit Hope of Success and Fear of Failure predict memory for and liking of successful and unsuccessful peers

The authors examined relations between implicit and explicit Hope of Success (HS) and Fear of Failure (FF) and memory and liking for successful and unsuccessful peers. Implicit motives were expected to predict memory and explicit motives to predict liking of peers. Results from 106 American and 79 Singaporean students supported the implicit–explicit motive distinction as well as a link between HS and the successful peer and between FF and the unsuccessful peer. In both samples, explicit HS predicts liking while implicit HS predicts memory about the successful peer, and implicit FF predicts memory about the unsuccessful peer. Findings indicate achievement motives affect interest in and reaction towards peers and provide evidence for differential validity of implicit and explicit motives.     

Why Citizen Kane was unhappy: Motive‐Goal Incongruence

Why do some people benefit more from successfully pursuing their goals than others? Motivational psychology has recently come up with an answer to this question: People differ in the extent to which their goals are aligned with their implicit motives. That is, on a conscious level, people may strive for, for example, achievement goals although on an unconscious level their implicit achievement motive is low. In such a case of motive–goal incongruence, pursuit and realization of achievement goals are associated with little or no well‐being. On the other hand, for people whose conscious goals and implicit motives are congruent, goal progress is strongly associated with well‐being. Legendary movie character Charles Foster Kane from Citizen Kane illustrates this dilemma: Constantly pursuing and realizing power goals, he does not succeed in satisfying his affiliation‐intimacy motive – and finally dies an unhappy man. The present article reviews what is known about the causes and effects of motive–goal congruence. In doing so, open questions are raised that future research ought to address.     

Goal Imagery: Bridging the Gap Between Implicit Motives and Explicit Goals

Two studies examined the role of goal imagery (i.e., the perception-like mental representation of the pursuit and attainment of a goal) in establishing congruence between individuals' implicit motives and their inclination to pursue explicit goals assigned to them. Study 1 found that after a goal-imagery exercise, implicit needs for power and affiliation predicted participants' affective arousal and their commitment to a social-interaction goal furnished with power- and affiliation-related incentives. In Study 2, implicit power motivation predicted the level of performance participants achieved in pursuit of a competitive performance goal after a goal-imagery exercise. Without goal imagery, however, participants' motivation to pursue an explicit goal was independent of their implicit motive dispositions in both studies.     

Directional discrepancy between implicit and explicit power motives is related to well-being among managers

This study investigates explicit –implicit motive discrepancies and their effect on well-being. Participants were 382 executive managers (107 females and 275 males). Female managers had higher explicit affiliation scores than males, whereas male managers had marginally significant higher explicit power scores than females. Males and females did not differ in their implicit motives. We expected a directional discrepancy on the power motive (explicit vs. implicit: “Striving for goals without gaining pleasure from doing so”) to predict impaired well-being. Results were consistent with this hypothesis, using polynomial regression analysis with response surface methods, instead of calculating motive difference scores. Discrepancies in the achievement and affiliation motives were not related to well-being. Results are discussed considering the specificity of motive discrepancies for selected groups, such as managers, and the importance of distinguishing between absolute versus directional motive discrepancy scores in motivation research.     

Wishes, Motives, Goals, and Personal Memories: Relations of Measures of Human Motivation

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to compare measures of explicit and implicit motives. One hundred and one participants completed six measures of motivation, including Thematic Apperceptive stories, autobiographical memories, three wishes, personal striving lists, the Personality Research Form, and self-ratings. Stories, memories, wishes, and strivings were content-analyzed using Winter's (1989) system. Although overall correlations did emerge among explicit measures within the same motive, there were numerous correlations among methodologically similar measures of different motives. In general, explicit measures did not correlate with thematic measures of the same motives. Although correlations among measures were similar for men and women, explicit measures of power converged with thematic measures of power only for men. Exploratory factor analysis identified three factors: explicit achievement, explicit affiliation, and power. Implicit achievement motivation loaded negatively on the affiliation factor. Implications for research on implicit and self-attributed motivation are discussed.     

Measuring motivations: Integrating content and method

Measuring single motives with multiple methods often yields low intercorrelations. This raises questions about the meaningfulness of the motive constructs and the validity of the methods. Seeking to explain these findings, theorists distinguish implicit from explicit methods and suggest that they tap somewhat different constructs. We propose an approach that argues for the coherence of the motive constructs across methods, while offering a refined conception of the implicit–explicit methodological distinction. Employing facet theory, we treat motives and methods as two facets that are crossed. Implicit and explicit methods serve as poles of a continuum on the methods facet. Based on this approach, we generate and test hypotheses concerning the structure of relations among motive indicators in multidimensional space. We test these hypotheses with ordinal MDS, reanalyzing multitrait–multimethod matrixes from five studies that examined affiliation, achievement, and power motives. Analyses reveal a correspondence between different indicators of the same motive, independent of assessment method. They also show that the implicit–explicit distinction is best viewed as ordering methods along a definable continuum.     

Wanting, having, and needing: integrating motive disposition theory and self-determination theory

Four studies explored the motivational and experiential dynamics of psychological needs, applying both self-determination theory and motive disposition theory. In all 4 studies, motive dispositions toward achievement and affiliation ("wanting" particular experiences) predicted corresponding feelings of competence and relatedness ("having" those experiences). Competence and relatedness in turn predicted well-being, again indicating that these 2 experiences may really be "needed." Illuminating how wanting gets to having, in Studies 2 and 3, participants reported greater self-concordance for motive-congruent goals, which, in longitudinal Study 3, predicted greater attainment of those goals and thus enhanced well-being. Study 4 replicated selected earlier results using an implicit as well as an explicit motive disposition measure. Supporting the presumed universality of competence and relatedness needs, in no studies did motive dispositions moderate the effects of corresponding need-satisfaction on well-being. Discussion focuses on a "sequential process" model of psychological needs that views needs as both motives that instigate and outcomes that reward behavior.     

The relationship between implicit and explicit motives, goal pursuit, and autobiographical memory content during a diary study

This online diary study investigated how motives interact with goal pursuit to predict daily autobiographical experiences. Participants (N = 141) completed measures of implicit and explicit achievement, provided daily memories and reports of their goal pursuit during a 3-week diary period. A stronger implicit achievement motive at the onset of the study was associated with more agentic (and fewer communal) autobiographical content. Goal progress was linked with using more agentic words, while goal attainability was related to using more communal words. Interactions between motives and goal pursuit on autobiographical memory suggests a trade-off: Favorable goal pursuit conditions may prompt people not motivated for achievement to shift their focus from agentic to communal themes, while individuals motivated for achievement maintain their priorities.     

The effect of motive-goal congruence on adolescents’ academic goal engagement and disengagement

Motivation and Emotion - Academic achievement is an important developmental goal during adolescence. Two independent factors involved in academic motivation are implicit motives and explicit goals....     

Sociocultural antecedents of academic motivation and achievement: Role of values and achievement motives in achievement goals and academic performance

With a view to understand the influence of culture on achievement motivation, the study aimed to test the hypothesized mediating role of individual‐oriented and social‐oriented achievement motives in linking value orientations (e.g. achievement, security, conformity, hedonism) to achievement goals (i.e. mastery‐approach, mastery‐avoidance, performance‐approach, and performance‐avoidance goals) as predictors of English and mathematics achievements. These hypothesized relationships were tested in the one‐path analytic model with a sample of Indonesian high‐school students (n = 356; 46% girls, M age = 16.20 years). The findings showed that security and conformity values positively predicted social‐oriented achievement motive; self‐direction values positively predicted individual‐oriented achievement motive; and hedonism values negatively predicted both achievement motive orientations. Both individual‐oriented and social‐oriented achievement motives positively predicted mastery‐approach and performance‐approach goals. Interestingly, social‐oriented achievement motive also positively predicted mastery‐avoidance and performance‐avoidance goals, which in turn, negatively predicted English and mathematic achievement. There was also some evidence for the direct effects of values on performance‐approach goals and achievement. Taken together, the findings evinced the relevance of achievement goal constructs to Indonesian students and the psychometric properties of the Indonesian version of the Achievement Goals Questionnaire for further use in Indonesia. The study concludes that the meanings of academic motivation and achievement should be seen from a sociocultural perspective relevant to the context in which they are being studied.     

Convergent,Discriminant, and Incremental Validity of the Pictorial Attitude Implicit Association Test and the Picture Story Exercise as Measures of the Implicit Power Motive

The Pictorial Attitude Implicit Association Test (PA‐IAT) has recently been proposed as new measure of implicit motives. We report a study that provides the first evidence for the convergent validity of the PA‐IAT by showing that the PA‐IAT correlates significantly with a standard measure of implicit motives [i.e. the Picture Story Exercise (PSE)]. Discriminant validity of the PA‐IAT was verified in the sense that the PA‐IAT shared virtually no common variance with explicit motive measures. Our analyses revealed that the PA‐IAT and PSE can best be conceived as related but distinct measures. We further showed that the PA‐IAT had incremental validity in predicting performance on a memory recall task over and above the PSE. In general, our results confirm that the PA‐IAT is a valid measure of implicit motives and can serve as valid alternative to the PSE. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Enjoying influence on others: Congruently high implicit and explicit power motives are related to teachers’ well-being

The present study examined the associations of implicit and explicit power motives with the well-being of teachers. Teachers (N = 170) participated in an online assessment, which included measures for implicit motives (assessed by the operant motive test), explicit motives, and well-being. We expected congruently high power motives to be linked with the highest levels of well-being. We tested this assumption using polynomial regressions with response surface analysis. Results were consistent with our hypothesis. Additionally, there was an effect of directional motive incongruence (a combination of a low implicit and a high explicit power motive was associated with higher well-being than a high implicit/low explicit combination), which did not hold when controlling for emotional stability. Results for achievement were comparable, but weaker, and there was no effect for motive incongruence. No significant associations were found for motive (in)congruence in the affiliation domain. Our findings underline the importance of the power motive in understanding individual differences in teachers’ well-being.     

Achievement incentives determine the effects of achievement-motive incongruence on flow experience

Previous research has shown that incongruence between implicit and explicit achievement motives impairs flow experience. We examined this relationship in a more differentiated manner by arguing that achievement-motive incongruence only exerts negative effects when individuals act in situations in which achievement incentives are present and arouse conflict between the two motives. In non-achievement situations, no negative effects of achievement-motive incongruence on flow experience are expected. Study 1 and Study 2 showed that participants with incongruent implicit and explicit achievement motives reported less flow in achievement- as compared to non-achievement-oriented sport situations. In Study 3, we experimentally manipulated achievement and non-achievement situations. Again, motive incongruence impaired the experience of flow in achievement but not in non-achievement situations.