Achievement motivation in college women revisited: Implications for women,men, and the gathering of coconuts

An attempt was made to replicate the findings of French and Lesser (1964) within one university on the effects of value-appropriate arousal conditions on achievement motivation scores and motivation performance relationships in women. The findings of this study do not uphold those previously reported. There were no significant differences on either achievement motivation scores or task performance under value-appropriate versus -inappropriate arousal conditions. In the present study there were two innovations — performance criteria were extended to include academic performance, and scoring procedures were developed to give equal weight to achievement imagery in areas defined as traditionally feminine. The principle findings concern the importance of the scoring procedures. Intellectual (classic) N Ach does not relate to value orientation, task performance, or grade point average. Women's Role N Ach, however, is significantly related to task performance and to grade point average. This motivation-performance relationship exists despite differences in value orientation among women. It is suggested that when scoring procedures allow subjects, male or female, to express achievement strivings in areas of value to them, then performance may be morc sensitive to motivational variables.This article is based on research supported by Grant 1 RO1 HD-02403-01 from the National Institute of Mental Health to Lynette K. Friedrich and John S. Harding and by funds from the College Committee on Research, New York State College of Human Ecology, Cornell University, to Lynette K. Friedrich. The author is deeply indebted to Dr. John Harding for faculty support in securing the grant and for his invaluable participation as consultant. Dr. Doris B. Rosen and Dr. Elizabeth Anisfeld made significant contributions to the study. In addition, the assistance of Serena Weaver, Helen Grebow, Bruce Ambler, and Jansis Smithels is gratefully acknowledged. Further acknowledgment is made to Dr. Elizabeth G. French for her advice and generous cooperation.     

Need for achievement and women's careers over 14 years: evidence for occupational structure effects

Previous research has demonstrated that achievement-motivated people perform better under working conditions of challenge, autonomy, and rapid feedback. These achievement-congenial conditions characterize entrepreneurial business and, among those occupations traditionally filled by women, teaching. Achievement motivation was measured in 117 women as college seniors and again 14 years later. Senior-year achievement motivation predicted later employment in teaching (including college). Career-involved women who had been highly achievement-motivated in college valued status mobility and working with people and reported job satisfaction from competition with a standard of excellence; however, women in different career situations differed in the relations between their achievement motivation in college and their later work values, job perceptions, and sources of satisfaction. Women highly achievement-motivated in adulthood valued achievement-congenial working conditions and status mobility and described job satisfaction from competition with a standard of excellence, especially if they were supervisors. Professors and businesswomen showed larger increases in achievement motivation over 14 years than did women otherwise employed. Thus, achievement motivation predicts women's career outcomes when their values and work situations, along with sex-differentiated occupational structures, are considered. Occupational structure effects on motives over time are discussed.     

A comparison of projective and objective fear-of-success and sex-role orientation measures as predictors of women's performance on masculine and feminine tasks

This study compared projective and objective measures of fear of success (FOS) with each other and with a measure of sex-role orientation as alternative predictors of 309 college women's achievement behavior on masculine and feminine tasks. Neither the sex role nor the FOS measures predicted substantial performance differences on the masculine or feminine tasks, although the objective FOS scales and the Bem Sex Role Inventory did predict subjects' stated investment in the task and attributions for success in a manner generally consistent with FOS theory. In addition, the objective FOS scales showed strong relationships with achievement motivation and sex-role orientation, while TAT (Thematic Apperception Test) FOS was unrelated to either of these variables. The results provide partial support that objective FOS scales tap actual avoidance tendencies characteristic of traditionally feminine women, while the TAT measure reflects, at most, an ambivalence over success which may be equally characteristic of high achieving, nontraditional women and low achieving, traditional women.The research reported here was supported by Grant 1 R03 MH 28835-01 from the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare.     

Women's motives to achieve and to nurture in different life stages

This research investigated the influence of different life stages on motives to achieve and to nurture in 60 women ages 31 to 37 years. The influence of motivational patterns and sex-role orientations on employment was also investigated. Findings tended to support the expectation that children and their welfare were a more central concern to women with a child under 4 years than to those whose youngest child was between 6 and 9 years. The women's achievement concerns followed an inverse pattern. Mothers with high achievement motivation were more likely to have a job than were mothers with low achievement motivation. Among employed mothers, there was a significant positive correlation between sex-role orientation and the number of hours worked each week.This research was partially supported by a grant from the City University of New York Doctoral Program in Psychology.     

Sex-role orientation,achievement motivation,and causal attributions of college females

Female undergraduates were asked to state causal attributions for success or failure outcomes. Students worked in pairs so that one half of them cooperated with either a male or a female partner, while the other half competed with a male or female opponent. All female subjects were pretested on achievement motivation and sex-role orientation. Women who espoused the traditional feminine role were more self-derogating in causal attribution than nontraditional women. Achievement-oriented women, like their male counterparts, were more self-enhancing following failure. However, following competitive success against male opponents, women who scored high in achievement motivation were less self-enhancing than those who scored low.This article is part of a larger study originally prepared as the author's doctoral dissertation at Hofstra University, 1975. The author is indebted to Claire Ernhart, the dissertation chairperson, and to the committee members, Alfred Cohn and Dianne Krooth, for their guidance and support.     

长沙市大学生成就动机取向特点的研究

本研究从大学生学校类型、年级、性别三个维度,探讨长沙市大学生成就动机取向的特点。从湖南省长沙市三所大学中(湖南师范大学、湖南大学、中南大学)随机抽取300名大学生,每个学校各100名作为研究对象。研究结果表明:(1)长沙市大学生的个我取向成就动机明显高于社会取向成就动机;(2)长沙市不同学校类型的大学生成就动机取向无明显差异;(3)不同年级大学生的成就动机取向无明显差异;(4)长沙市大学生成就动机取向的性别差异显著。     

Sex-role orientation and achievement context as determinants of the motive to avoid success

Seventy-two female high school students with cumulative GPAs of 3.0 or above were administered the Wellesley Role Orientation Scale and four verbal cues used to measure success-avoidant imagery in response to feminine competitive achievement in a variety of contexts. Results indicated that the arousal of success-avoidant imagery was partially a function of the role orientation (traditional vs. nontraditional) of the students and the context within which the success was presented. As hypothesized, nontraditionally oriented students generated fewer success-avoidant responses across cues than either moderate or traditionally oriented students. However, differences in the proportion of imagery across cues was carried by the differential responses of the nontraditional students, suggesting that the inhibition of achievement behavior among women may be differentially moderated as a function of the salience of the achievement context and their definitions of sex-role-appropriate success.     

Sex-role orientation and fear of success: Clarifying an unclear relationship

Inconsistencies in research concerning the relationship between fear of success (FOS) and sex-role orientation may be due to the use of sex-role inventories considering masculinity and femininity as endpoints of a bipolar continuum. The Bem Sex-Role Inventory (BSRI; Bem, 1974), which treats masculinity and femininity as separate dimensions, was administered to 218 female undergraduates in addition to measures of FOS, achievement motivation, and performance. It was predicted that women who were androgynous (high feminine and high masculine) would evidence less FOS than women who were high masculine or high feminine. It was also predicted that women who embraced masculine characteristics (androgynous or sex-reversed) would be higher in both achievement motivation and performance than low masculine women. Both predictions were confirmed. Sex-reversed women were highest in FOS.This research was conducted with the support of a David Ross Grant from the Purdue Research Foundation to Dr. Kay Deaux and the author. Thanks are extended to William A. Fisher, Dr. Kay Deaux, and Dr. Elizabeth Farris for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article. All correspondence should be addressed to Brenda Major, Department of Psychology, State University of New York at Buffalo, 4230 Ridge Lea Road, Buffalo, New York 14226.     

Edna Heidbreder: Systematic and Cognitive Psychologist

After completing her undergraduate degree at Knox College in 1911, Edna Heidbreder was a high school teacher of history for several years. She began her graduate work at the University of Wisconsin where she received a master's degree in philosophy in 1918. Undertaking doctoral work in psychology at Columbia she completed her Ph.D. in 1924 and was offered a position in the Psychology Department at the University of Minnesota. There she remained until 1934 when she accepted a position in the Department of Psychology at Wellesley College which she held until her retirement in 1955. Two lines of interest persisted throughout her career: her work in cognition and systematic psychology. Her book Seven Psychologies published in 1933 has received praise in reviews spanning four decades. Heidbreder views the women of her generation as working during a period when there was a lull in women's rights activism. She believes that most women during that period felt that the best way to improve their situation was to prove that they could be competent professionals as the women pioneers had claimed women could. She believes that today women remain at a disadvantage compared to men in psychology primarily because of the pervasive stereotypes in our society which make it difficult for men to take the intellectual interests and abilities of women seriously.     

Moved to action? Gender differences in perceived effort and motor performance after video-based achievement motive arousal

Achievement incentives in sports are assumed to trigger achievement motivation, which in turn increases performance. We used a within-subject-design to test achievement motive arousal (using an A-B-A design) using video clips. We hypothesized that an ACH-video clip arouses the achievement motive (PSE) stronger, leads to better performance in a skipping task and elicits stronger perceived effort and commitment for the task than the NEUTRAL- and NO-video conditions. We investigated gender differences. 184 students (92 women, age: M = 27.66 years, SD = 9.72) participated in a three-part web-survey. Neither main nor interaction effects of Video-Condition and Gender were found on motive arousal and skipping frequency. Significant interaction effects on skipping slope and perceived effort, however, showed that women are more engaged after the ACH-video than after the NEUTRAL-video and NO-video and here even outperformed men. Results are discussed in terms of why external “motivators” (e.g., videos) affect men and women differently.     

THE EFFECTS OF PERCEIVED JOB AVAILABILITY FOR WOMEN ON COLLEGE WOMEN'S ATTITUDES TOWARD PRESTIGIOUS MALE-DOMINATED OCCUPATIONS

This study investigated the effects of perceived job availability for women and sex role orientation on college women's evaluations of highly prestigious male-dominated occupations. In a mixed design, feminine, androgynous, and masculine women (as determined by the Personal Attributes Questionnaire) evaluated two professions described as providing good opportunities for women, two described as providing average opportunities, and two described as providing poor opportunities. Subjects were most likely to want to pursue occupations with good job availability for women and to expect the most intellectual stimulation and approval from others as a result of pursuing these occupations. In addition, sex role orientation was related to expectations concerning intellectual stimulation and approval from others but did not interact with level of job opportunity on any of the dependent measures.     

学习环境、成就目标定向对学业情绪和学业成就的影响:基于物理学科的研究

以733名中学生为被试,采用结构方程模型对物理环境目标结构、成就目标定向、物理学业情绪及物理学业成就的关系建构模型.结果发现:(1)物理环境掌握目标结构对积极高唤醒、积极低唤醒和消极高唤醒学业情绪皆有显著积极预测作用,而物理环境表现目标结构则只对消极高唤醒和消极低唤醒物理学业情绪有显著积极预测作用;(2)通过成就目标定向中介对物理学业情绪的影响效果,物理学业情绪在成就目标和物理学业成就之间起中介作用,但影响模式不同;(3)研究结果支持学业情绪控制-价值扩展模型.     

Achievement motivation,psychological reactance,and learned helplessness

Two experiments are reported in which the behavior of subjects classified as high or low on achievement motivation was studied following experience of uncontrollable, nonaversive outcomes, using a triadic design. In both experiments, subjects high on achievement motivation displayed facilitation, whereas subjects low on achievement motivation displayed slight interference or no effect. In the second experiment it was shown that the experimental treatment was successful in inducing the expectation of response-outcome independence without associated perceptions of failure. It differed in this respect from manipulations used in most reported studies of human helplessness. The results are discussed in relation to theories of achievement motivation, psychological reactance, and learned helplessness.The first experiment was conducted by the first author under the supervision of the second author in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the B.A. Honors degree in psychology at the University of Adelaide. The authors wish to thank J. M. Innes and E. E. Rump for their helpful comments.     

Is there any future in achievement motivation?

The cognitive elaboration of achievement motivation theory by Raynor is reviewed, and the implications of future orientation and psychological distance are examined. It is suggested that psychological distance is determined by at least the following factors: (a) the expectancy of reaching the goal (attainability of the goal), (b) the distance in time between the present state and the future goal, and (c) the individual's future time orientation considered as a personality trait. It is argued that only the first of these factors is included in Raynor's elaboration. The latter two are assumed to determine the Perceived Goal Distance in Time (PgD), and it is postulated that the arousal of motives increases as PgD decreases. It is concluded that each future goal must be weighted by the corresponding perceived goal distance coefficient.This study was carried out while the author was a visiting professor at Ruhr University, Bochum, under the support of an Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung grant.     

Relationships of achievement motivation and sex-role identity to college women's career orientation

Two career orientation factors, Career Centeredness and Career Commitment, were predicted to relate differentially to women's achievement motivation and sex-role identity. Career Centeredness is an orientation which places a career above other life activities (e.g., recreation, family life, etc.) as a source of satisfaction whereas Career Commitment concerns the intention of steadily pursuing a career throughout life. The expectation that Career Centeredness would be more characteristic of masculine women and correlate higher with achievement motivation than would Career Commitment was generally supported. Results are discussed in terms of societal support for these two career orientations and of role conflict experienced by women with different sex-role identities.     

先前学业成就与学习动机、策略的关系:学业情绪的中介作用

采用整群抽样法抽取高中生670名,分别用学业情绪问卷、学习动机问卷和学习策略问卷来探讨学业情绪在先前学业成就与学习动机、学习策略之间的中介作用。以学业情绪的控制-价值理论和认知-动机模型为基础,运用偏差矫正百分位的非参数Bootstrap法对学业情绪的中介作用进行检验,结果发现:积极学业情绪在先前学业成就与学习策略、学习动机间起完全中介效应;消极学业情绪在先前学业成就与学习策略、学习动机间起部分中介效应。     

Personal Factors Related to Typicalness of Career and Success in Active Professional Women

Eighty women from the field? of medicine and law, in careers ranging from very atypical to very traditional for women, were compared on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (Vocabulary and Block Design subtests), Bern Sex-Role Inventory, Atkinson's measure of achievement motivation, and a childhood experiences questionnaire developed in conjunction with the study. Subjects in atypical, relative to those in typical careers were found to score higher 011 cognitive measures, psychological masculinity, and, in law, achievement motivation. Childhood experiences of women in atypical careers included: more traditionally masculine play patterns, greater unhappiness during adolescence, and less coercion by parents to fit a traditionally feminine stereotype.     

ACHIEVEMENT MOTIVATION OF WOMEN: EFFECTS OF ACHIEVEMENT AND AFFILIATION AROUSAL

Alternative propositions to female achievement motivation theory were investigated in this study. The subjects were 139 Brazilian women selected from a pool of 619 female college students previously classified by levels of achievement (Ach) and affiliative (Aff) needs. The subjects were assigned to three experimental conditions-neutral, affiliation arousal, and achievement arousal—and wrote stories that were analyzed by a projective measure (MPAM). A significant Achievement Level × Treatment Interaction revealed that achievement arousal increased the Ach scores of High Ach subjects but did not affect the scores of Low Ach subjects. Level of affiliative tendencies did not affect these results. Contrary to some of the speculations, achievement arousal did not inhibit the scores of High Ach-High Aff women. Overall, affiliation arousal did not produce the expected effects. However, within the affiliation-arousal condition, High Aff subjects obtained significantly higher scores than Low Aff subjects.     

The Psychosexual Identification of Preschool Boys

It was hypothesized that increases in level of arousal should lead to improvement in the performance of intellectual tasks and to decrements in the performance of creative tasks because of the effect of drive level on range of cue utilization and availability of remote associates. Subjects were given the Remote Associates Test (RAT) and a version of the WAIS Similarities subtest under low arousal (relaxed), medium arousal (stress), and high arousal (white noise) conditions. Trends were as predicted, but reached acceptable levels of significance only for the effects of high arousal on creative performance. Evidence for the validity of the RAT was provided by the finding that RAT and intellectual performance are affected in opposite ways by the same experimental manipulations. It is suggested that flexibility in changing level of arousal may be a determinant of both creativity and intelligence and that this common trait may explain the tendency of tests of the the two to correlate.     

The impact of sex,achievement domain,and conceptual orientation on causal attributions

Sex differences in achievement domain and achievement orientation were examined to better understand women's achievement. College students (84 women, 59 men) were asked to write brief accounts of a past success and a past failure and to provide causal attributions for each. More women recalled affiliative-process events, and proportionally more men recalled mastery-impact events. The relationship of topic domain and conceptual orientation to causal attributions was apparent only for accounts of failure. Topic domain and conceptual orientation interacted with sex to further influence stability attributions. When women conceptualized failure as a process, they emphasized attributions to effort and luck, while men accounted for the process failure by ability and task. When the failure was conceptualized in terms of final impact, the sex pattern of attributions was reversed.