Achievement motives and goals: a developmental analysis

Achievement motivation represents the energization and direction of competence-based behavior. Despite the ubiquity and importance of achievement motivation across the life span, developmental research in this area is quite sparse. In this chapter, we discuss developmental considerations and provide an overview of the developmentally relevant research that has been conducted on achievement motivation. Our review focuses specifically on the two most prominent constructs that have emerged in the achievement motivation literature in the past century: Motive dispositions (the need for achievement and fear of failure) and goals (mastery-approach, performance-approach, mastery-avoidance, and performance-avoidance achievement goals). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)(chapter)