Quadratic models may provide a useful set of models that detect combined effects of achievement goals on academic attainment

Abstract

There is a consensus of opinion among proponents of theories of achievement goals that people may choose to pursue two different types of goals: mastery goals that focus on developing competence through task mastery and learning and performance goals that focus on demonstrating competence by outperforming others (Ames and Archer, 1987; Dweck and Leggett, 1988; Nicholls, 1989; Ames, 1992; Pintrich, 2000). Research in educational contexts indicates that mastery goals are reliably associated with positive outcomes such as high intrinsic motivation, high task-interest, and use of deep learning strategies (Harackiewicz et al., 2000, 2008). However, performance goals exhibit a stronger relationship with high task performance than mastery goals (Senko et al., 2011; Van Yperen et al., 2015). This is more likely to be observed when tendencies to pursue mastery or performance goals are coupled with approach reactions rather than avoidance reactions (Senko et al., 2011).