Multidimensional Fear of Failure Measurement: The Performance Failure Appraisal Inventory

The Performance Failure Appraisal Inventory (PFAI) is a multidimensional measure of cognitive-motivational-relational appraisals associated with fear of failure (FF). College students ( N = 544) completed the PFAI and a variety of other measures. Calibration sample analyses reduced the PFAI to 25 items measuring five appraisals in a higher-order factor structure that demonstrated tight cross-validity in the second half of the sample. The five aversive consequences of failure assessed by the PFAI included (a) experiencing shame and embarrassment, (b) devaluing one's self-estimate, (c) having an uncertain future, (d) important others losing interest, and (e) upsetting important others. A five-item short form also demonstrated tight cross-validity. FF was associated with (a) high levels of worry, somatic anxiety, cognitive disruption, and sport anxiety, and (b) low levels of optimism. General FF was unrelated to either perceived competence or fear of success.     

失败恐惧的影响因素及其对学业成绩的影响

该研究力图探讨教养及气质因素与失败恐惧的关系,以及失败恐惧对学业成绩的影响及其机制。对427名高一学生施测失败表现评估量表、父母教养方式评价量表、行为抑制/行为激活量表、防御性期望和反思量表、自我阻碍量表,并收集被试期末考试成绩。相关分析、回归分析、路径分析等表明,失败恐惧与教养、气质因素均有密切关系;其对学业成绩具有间接的消极影响。     

Fear of Success,Need Achievement,and Fear of Failure: A factor analytic study

Several tests of Fear of Success (FOS), Fear of Failure (FOF), and Need Achievement (nAch), plus Taylor's Manifest Anxiety Scale and a social desirability scale were administered to 104 males and 101 females. FOS, FOF, and nAch did not show factor validity. Results for predictive validity were also poor. Anxiety defined the first factor in the factor analysis. All first-factor tests negatively predicted female grade point average and American College Test scores. All the first-factor tests showed sex differences, with females scoring higher. A clarifying role for anxiety in the study of sex differences in achievement is indicated.     

失败恐惧研究述评

失败恐惧（Fear of Failure,简写为FF）作为一种消极的情绪体验,近年来越来越多地受到研究者的关注。文章主要介绍了失败恐惧概念结构的演变、测量工具由单维到多维的发展过程、失败恐惧特质形成和预防的心理动力学探讨以及多维测量工具在失败恐惧干预方法中的作用。在此基础上,文章对未来研究进行了展望,比如失败恐惧是否存在跨文化、跨领域的差异,我国经济转型时期失败恐惧研究具有怎样的现实意义等     

Imagining Fear: Attachment,Threat, and Psychic Experience

Attachment theory is today considered an integral part of contemporary psychoanalytic theory and practice, and yet the theoretical and clinical implications of Bowlby’s emphasis on fear and the search for safety have been largely overlooked. From Bowlby’s perspective, the dynamic relationship between the experience of threat and attachment shapes the development and maintenance of essential relationships, the organization of psychic structure, and the nature of defenses and adaptation. This element of attachment theory—which alerts us to the ways in which the infant or child is compelled to seek safety when in a state of fearful arousal—is particularly relevant to the clinical situation. It helps us imagine moments of fearful arousal in our patients’ pasts, attend to their manifestations in the present, and understand current suffering in light of the long-term sequelae of adaptations that were crucial to survival. Finally, it helps us find language that brings alive or mentalizes these aspects of the patient’s early experience such that transformation is possible.     

Failure Causes Fear: The Effect of Self-Esteem Threat on Death-Anxiety

ABSTRACT

According to terror management theory (TMT; Greenberg, Pyszczynski, 1986 Greenberg, J., Pyszczynski, T. and Solomon, S. 1986. “The causes and consequences of a need for self-esteem: A terror management theory”. In Public self and private self, Edited by: Baumeister, R. F. 189–212. New York, NY: Springer-Verlag. doi:10.1007/978-1-4613-9564-5_10[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), self-esteem protects people from anxiety associated with the knowledge of certain mortality. A number of studies provide evidence consistent with this assertion, but no studies have experimentally examined the effect of threatened self-esteem on death-anxiety. In the current study, self-esteem was manipulated and death-anxiety measured. A self-esteem threat increased death-anxiety relative to a self-esteem boost and non-self threat control condition.     

Introduction to Special Section: Student Paper Competition

It is not unusual for researchers to complain about institutional review board (IRB) oversight, but social scientists have a unique set of objections to the work of ethics committees. In an effort to better understand the problems associated with ethics review of social, behavioral, and economic sciences (SBES) research, this article examines 3 different aspects of research ethics committees: (a) the composition of review boards; (b) the guidelines used by these boards to review SBES—and in particular, behavioral health—research; and (c) the actual deliberations of IRBs. The article concludes with recommendations for changes in the review process and with suggestions for filling the gaps in knowledge about the way IRBs work.     

Counselors With Disabilities: A Comment on the Special Feature

The aim of this comment is to focus more attention on the topic of counseling and disabilities. A literature review is presented on the question of whether clients perceive counselors with disabilities more positively or more negatively than they perceive counselors with no obvious physical disabilities. The results of the review provide tentative implications for counselors.     

The Complexity of the Relation between Fear of Failure and Procrastination

This study investigated the indirect and conditional relation between fear of failure and procrastination based on constructs from self-determination theory. Using structural equation modeling to analyze data from 300 university students, we found that the relation between fear of failure and procrastination was moderated by perceived competence. The relation was positively significant for students with low levels of competence and negatively significant for those with high level of competence. However, in the latter group, fear of failure negatively affected satisfaction of the need for autonomy, which in turn increased the likelihood of problematic delay on academic and everyday-life tasks. The results are discussed in relation to the complex interplay of motivational variables related to self-regulatory failure.     

Introduction to the Beck Commemorative Special Feature

My father, Aaron Beck (“Tim” to those closest to him), would have been proud of this special issue of Cognitive and Behavioral Practice, and so honored. Anyone who knew my father, knew he was a scientist at heart. His curiosity, intelligence, and humility made him a great scientist and a productive researcher. This introduction shares a personal perspective and context for his contributions, including his lifelong commitment to enhancing the evidence for cognitive and behavioral practice.     

Selection Test Anxiety: Exploring Tension and Fear of Failure Across the Sexes in Simulated Selection Scenarios

Standardized tests are commonly used to select individuals in both pre‐employment and educational settings. Nevertheless, research has yet to sufficiently explore the relationship between test anxiety (TA) and test performance in selection contexts. The goal of this study was to assess the dimensionality of TA, the relations between TA and test performance, and the impact of gender on TA within the realm of personnel selection. Test anxiety was found to be bi‐dimensional and negatively related to performance on a cognitively based selection instrument. Gender moderated the relation between TA and test performance, with stronger associations for males. This finding is consistent with the sex‐linked anxiety coping theory that is advanced here. Implications of this study and avenues for future research are discussed.     

The Pathoplastic Relationship Between Interpersonal Problems and Fear of Failure

ABSTRACT This study advances the understanding of fear of failure (FF), a dispositional avoidance-oriented achievement motive, by employing interpersonal classification techniques to groups of individuals who fear failure in order to examine the pathoplastic relations between FF and interpersonal problems. Shame-based FF is thought to be related to the self-regulation strategies of appeasement and aggression, and these strategies are hypothesized to be associated with the interpersonal problems of Nonassertiveness and Vindictiveness, respectively. Using 2 independent samples ( n s=60 and 38) reporting high FF, interpersonal profiles were examined for the groups in their entirety and for cluster solutions within the larger samples. Results demonstrated that individuals high in FF exhibited 1 of 2 prototypical interpersonal profiles associated with Domineering/Vindictive or Nonassertive/Exploitable problems that correspond with the hypothesized aggression and appeasement regulation strategies. Consistent with the concept of pathoplasticity, these differences were not better accounted for by demographic, affective, motivational, personality, or attachment style characteristics of the samples.