Explicit Achievement Motivation Research Articles

Linking Implicit Motives and Explicit Motives with Negotiation Performance

Recently, some scholars voiced out a demand, to give a second chance to the study of individual differences in negotiation performance. The current study aims to do so, whilst building on McClelland’s motives framework, and focusing on the Big Three classes of motives: achievement, affiliation and power. We hypothesized that achievement- and power-motivated individuals would exhibit high negotiation performance, whereas affiliation-motivated individuals would exhibit low negotiation performance. Further, we hypothesized that implicit motives explain additional variance in negotiation performance beyond explicit motives and traits. To test these hypotheses, in study 1, we collected data from 140 individuals (56 females) using self-report measures of negotiation performance. In study 2, we conducted a mixed-motive negotiation experiment with 84 participants (34 females). Results showed that explicit achievement and affiliation, and implicit power motives were positively related negotiation performance. Further, in study 2, we found that implicit achievement motive was positively associated with negotiation performance while explicit achievement motive was negatively related. We, also, found that implicit motives explain extra variance in negotiation performance beyond traits in study 2. We are among the few researchers who showed that motivational perspectives of personality should be taken into consideration when theorizing on antecedents of negotiation performance.

The Achievement Motive in the Brain: BOLD Responses to Pictures of Challenging Activities Predicted by Implicit Versus Explicit Achievement Motives.

The achievement motive refers to a preference for mastering challenges and competing with some standard of excellence. Along with affiliation and power motives, the achievement motive is typically considered to occur on the level of implicit versus explicit representations. Specifically, whereas implicit motives involve pictorial, emotional goal representations and facilitate corresponding action effortlessly, explicit motives involve propositional (“verbalized”) goal representations but need some effort to translate into action (McClelland et al., 1989). We used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate whether and to which degree the implicit and explicit achievement motives differentially predict blood-oxygen-level-dependent (BOLD) responses to pictures of individuals engaging in challenging activities. Whereas the implicit AM predicted activity in areas associated with emotion (orbitofrontal cortex) and visual processing (right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, premotor and occipital cortices), the explicit AM predicted activity in areas associated with cognitive self-control or verbal goal processing (dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex). The findings support the commonly assumed distinction between implicit and explicit motives with neuronal data. They also suggest that explicit motives require cognitive self-control to overcome potential lacks of motivation.

Explicit achievement motive strength determines effort-related myocardial beta-adrenergic activity if task difficulty is unclear but not if task difficulty is clear

Work on physiological and other behavioral correlates of motives often assumes that motives exert a direct effect on behavior once activated. Motivational intensity theory, however, suggests that this does not always apply. In the context of task engagement, motive strength should exert a direct effect on myocardial beta-adrenergic activity if task difficulty is unclear, but not if task difficulty is known. The presented study tested this prediction for the impact of the explicit achievement motive on myocardial beta-adrenergic activity—assessed as pre-ejection period (PEP) reactivity during task performance. Seventy-eight participants performed one of two versions of a mental arithmetic task. After having completed the achievement motive scale of the Personality Research Form, participants were either informed about the difficulty of the task or not before working on it. Participants' PEP reactivity during task performance provided evidence for the predicted moderating impact of clarity of task difficulty: PEP reactivity increased with increasing achievement motive strength if task difficulty was unclear, but not if it was clear. These findings demonstrate that the explicit achievement motive impact on myocardial beta-adrenergic activity is moderated by clarity of task difficulty and suggest that motive strength does not always translate into direct effects on physiology and behavior.

Clarity of task difficulty moderates the impact of the explicit achievement motive on physical effort in hand grip tasks.

Stable personality dispositions, like motives, are often assumed to exert a direct, stable impact on behavior. This also applies to the explicit achievement motive, which is supposed to influence the behavior that individuals select and how strongly they engage in it. Drawing on motivational intensity theory, we demonstrated in two studies that explicit achievement motive strength only predicted exerted force in a hand grip task if task difficulty was unclear. If task difficulty was clear, explicit achievement motive strength did not influence exerted force. Our findings suggest that the availability of information about the difficulty of motive satisfaction moderates the impact of the explicit achievement motive on behavior.

Entrepreneurs’ Implicit and Explicit Achievement Motives and Their Early International Commitment

Entrepreneurs’ new ventures pursue different strategies in international markets; some are more committed to the foreign markets than others. Existing international management studies largely use entrepreneurs’ conscious rationale, such as profitability, risks, resource limitations, country-specific knowledge, and personal values, to explain the commitment diversities. Drawing from achievement motivation theory and cognition theory, this study adds entrepreneurs’ unconscious motives and differentiates between implicit and explicit achievement motivation as important forces driving the diversities of the commitment. Evidence collected in this study suggests that both conscious and unconscious achievement motives are related to the commitment but the relationships are moderated curvilinearly by overseas operation complexity and overseas competition intensity respectively. The findings of this study have important implications for entrepreneurs managing international business.

Achievement motive, autonomous motivation, and attendance at fitness center: A longitudinal prospective study

ObjectivesThe aim of this study was to test whether achievement motive, autonomous forms of exercise motivation (intrinsic motivation, identified regulation), and controlled forms of exercise motivation (introjected regulation, external regulation) would predict gym attendance over 30 consecutive weeks in a sample of new gym members. DesignA longitudinal prospective study with four distinct measurement occasions was employed. Psychological variables and gym attendance were assessed in the first, fourth, 15th, and 30th week after starting the membership. MethodParticipants were 229 new gym members. The implicit achievement motive was measured using the Picture Story Exercise. The explicit achievement motive and exercise motivations were measured with questionnaires. Gym attendance was obtained via self-reports and also recorded electronically. Multilevel growth modeling was used as the main analysis method. ResultsParticipants overestimated their self-reported gym attendance; the overall gap between self-reported and actual attendance was 39%. The achievement motive did not predict participants’ gym attendance over the 30-week period, neither for self-reported nor for actual. The effect of autonomous motivation was mixed. Intrinsic motivation predicted self-reported, but not actual, gym attendance over the 30-week period, whereas the evolution of intrinsic motivation was unrelated to gym attendance. Identified regulation was unrelated to gym attendance, but the increase in identified motivation over time positively predicted both self-reported and actual gym attendance. Controlled motivation was unrelated to gym attendance. ConclusionsContinuous and regular participation in an exercise program is more likely when individuals enjoy the program and consider it personally important.

What Brings Out the Best and Worst of People With a Strong Explicit Achievement Motive? The Role of (Lack of) Achievement Incentives for Performance in an Endurance Task.

An explicit achievement motive is intuitively related to good performance. In contrast, the present paper directs attention to conditions where individuals with a strong explicit achievement motive display poor performance. We hypothesized that participants with a strong achievement motive perform worse in a bicycle ergometer task when task instructions lack achievement incentives than when the instructions include achievement incentives. Furthermore, we expected that, when achievement incentives are lacking, they show even worse performance than participants with a weak achievement motive. For the latter, we assumed that they are relatively unaffected by the achievement incentive content of the instructions. In a within-subject experimental design (N = 55) with two blocks (achievement incentives vs. lack of achievement incentives; each block consisted of three trials), our hypotheses were partly supported. The lack of achievement incentives brought out the worst (regarding performance), but the presence of achievement incentives did not bring out the best of participants with a strong achievement motive. In the discussion, we suggest how to improve future experimental achievement settings and reflect the results within the framework of the differentiation into implicit and explicit motives.

The Power and Affiliation Component of Achievement Pride: Antecedents of Achievement Pride and Effects on Academic Performance

Previous research on the self-conscious achievement emotion pride introduces the Achievement Pride Scales (APS) that illustrate the relation of self-based pride and social comparison-based pride with frames of reference, achievement goals, and achievement values. The present study (N = 354) extends those results with regard to explicit achievement, affiliation, and power motives, as well as performance. Results show that self-based pride is related to self-approach goals, individual achievement values, as well as achievement and affiliation motives. Social comparison-based pride, in turn, is positively related to other-approach goals, social achievement values, as well as achievement and power motives. In addition, when controlling for those antecedent variables a positive effect of social comparison-based pride on academic performance disappears whereas a positive effect of self-based pride on academic performance appears. As such, the present work replicates and broadens the knowledge on achievement pride.

Frontal Electroencephalogram Alpha Asymmetry Relates to Implicit Achievement Motives: A Pilot Study

ABSTRACTThe achievement motive is one of the core motives of human behavior and can be divided into two motives: an approach motive (i.e., hope for success [HS]), and an avoidance motive (i.e., fear of failure [FF]). Research has demonstrated that frontal electroencephalogram (EEG) asymmetry in the alpha frequency band is an important marker for differences in motivational processes. The present study investigated the relationship between resting state alpha asymmetry and the achievement motive. Resting state EEG was recorded, and implicit and explicit achievement motives, divided in HS and FF, assessed. Alpha activation asymmetries were calculated by subtracting the average left ln power from the average right ln power at frontal sites and at parietal sites as control position. Our results suggest a positive relationship between stronger left‐sided activation and higher implicit HS scores; no other significant correlations where found. Possible explanations for these findings are discussed.

They do! How the explicit motive-structure predicts user behavior in (business-) social network sites like Xing or LinkedIn

Despite the massive influence of business related social network sites (SBNSs) like Xing or LinkedIn regarding our professional networking-behavior, little is known about how motivational components (especially considering the `Big Three Motives' affiliation, achievement and power motive) affect user behavior in SNSs. The study's findings indicate that the explicit conscious affiliation, achievement and power motive were related to different networking outcomes. While the explicit affiliation motive predicted the percentage of colleagues in the contact list, the total amount of SBNS contacts was predicted by the explicit power motive. Also, people with high explicit achievement motivation networked significantly more often with persons of lower hierarchical status unlike people with less achievement motivated characteristics. This presents us with new research results and closes an empirical gap in motive research.

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.

Does achievement motivation mediate the semantic achievement priming effect?

The aim of our research was to understand the processes of the prime-to-behavior effects with semantic achievement primes. We extended existing models with a perspective from achievement motivation theory and additionally used achievement primes embedded in the running text of excerpts of school textbooks to simulate a more natural priming condition. Specifically, we proposed that achievement primes affect implicit achievement motivation and conducted pilot experiments and 3 main experiments to explore this proposition. We found no reliable positive effect of achievement primes on implicit achievement motivation. In light of these findings, we tested whether explicit (instead of implicit) achievement motivation is affected by achievement primes and found this to be the case. In the final experiment, we found support for the assumption that higher explicit achievement motivation implies that achievement priming affects the outcome expectations. The implications of the results are discussed, and we conclude that primes affect achievement behavior by heightening explicit achievement motivation and outcome expectancies.

Risk for Mania and its Relationship to Implicit and Explicit Achievement Motivation

There is evidence that bipolar disorders are associated with achievement-related cognitions such as setting high goals. A psychodynamic model, the manic defense hypothesis, postulates that a threat to fragile self-esteem triggers grandiosity and manic behaviors in vulnerable people. Vulnerability to bipolar disorders should therefore be positively associated with indicators of explicit hope of success (HS) and implicit fear of failure (FF). Using an online sample (n = 252), we tested these hypotheses using the well-validated Hypomanic Personality Scale as risk indicator for mania, the Multi-Motive Grid for achievement motivation, controlling for current and lifetime depression. Contrary to expectations, we found that vulnerability for mania was significantly and positively related to implicit HS but not to FF after controlling for depression. All measures were self-report tools. Our results contradict the Manic Defense Hypothesis, but they are in line with the idea that achievement-related cognitions are of relevance to vulnerability in bipolar disorders. This is in line with research focusing on the role of the Behavioral Activation System in relation to vulnerability for mania.

The effect of subordinate motivation on performance

The purpose of this study is to examine whether subordinate attribution style on leader emotional (positive and negative) display moderates the relationship between subordinate achievement motivation/personal need for structure(PNS) and performance. 75 employees in the sales department of a pharmaceutical company participated in the survey. Results showed that subordinates using person-attribution style on leader negative emotional display performed better than those using performance-attribution style, though they had the same high level of explicit achievement motivation and PNS. That is, the moderating role of subordinate attributional style on leader negative emotional display was verified. On the contrary, subordinate attributional style on leader positive emotional display did not moderate the relationship between subordinate explicit achievement motivation/PNS and performance. Theoretical and practical implications, limitations, and future research are discussed.

The effect of subordinate motivation on performance: The moderating role of subordinate attributional style on leader emotional display

The purpose of this study is to examine whether subordinate attribution style on leader emotional (positive and negative) display moderates the relationship between subordinate achievement motivation/personal need for structure(PNS) and performance. 75 employees in the sales department of a pharmaceutical company participated in the survey. Results showed that subordinates using person-attribution style on leader negative emotional display performed better than those using performance-attribution style, though they had the same high level of explicit achievement motivation and PNS. That is, the moderating role of subordinate attributional style on leader negative emotional display was verified. On the contrary, subordinate attributional style on leader positive emotional display did not moderate the relationship between subordinate explicit achievement motivation/PNS and performance. Theoretical and practical implications, limitations, and future research are discussed.

Do People’s Motives Influence Their Susceptibility to Imagination Inflation?

People are motivated to remember past autobiographical experiences related to their current goals; we investigated whether people are also motivated to remember false past experiences related to those goals. In Session 1, we measured subjects' implicit and explicit achievement and affiliation motives. Subjects then rated their confidence about, and memory for, childhood events containing achievement and affiliation themes. Two weeks later in Session 2, subjects received a "computer-generated profile" based on their Session 1 ratings. This profile suggested that one false achievement event and one false affiliation event had happened in childhood. After imagining and describing the suggested false events, subjects made confidence and memory ratings a second time. For achievement events, subjects' explicit motives predicted their false beliefs and memories. The results are explained using source monitoring and a motivational model of autobiographical memory.

Investigating Measures of Achievement Motivation(s)

After a long debate there is now growing agreement that implicit and explicit achievement motivation can be seen as distinct constructs. One of their major differences lies in their predictive validity, which supposedly differs depending on the setting. Empirical evidence exists to the effect that different explicit measures based on different theoretical concepts build one construct. For implicit measures, however, such evidence is lacking. Thus, scores on three implicit and three explicit achievement motivation measures, an intelligence test, and a Big 5 questionnaire were obtained (N = 150) as well as two criteria. The explicit achievement motivation measures were classified as being based either on Murray’s or on McClelland’s theory. Results replicate the idea of a common construct for explicit measures but not for implicit measures. The assumed predictions did not occur for all tests and disappeared when controlling for intelligence.

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.

Effects of Achievement Goal Striving on Well-Being: The Moderating Role of the Explicit Achievement Motive

This research is based on the theoretical conception of motives and goals as distinct motivational concepts. Previous research has demonstrated that discrepancies between implicit motives and goals have negative consequences for well-being. The authors have extended these findings to the explicit motive system, with four studies investigating the moderating role of the explicit achievement motive on the relationship between achievement goal striving and well-being. In line with their expectations, achievement goal striving was accompanied by high positive affect (Studies 1 and 2) and a high number of positive affective experiences (Study 3) only when the explicit achievement motive was high. Longitudinal Study 4 showed that the interaction between the explicit achievement motive and achievement goal commitment predicts changes in subjective well-being and health measured over a 3-month period.

Congruence Between Implicit and Explicit Motives and Emotional Well-Being: The Moderating Role of Activity Inhibition

The current research tested the hypothesis that activity inhibition–conceptualized as the degree of restraint an individual exercises over emotional and motivational impulses–moderates the association between congruence of implicit and explicit motives and emotional well-being. Congruence of implicit and explicit motives was expected to be related to a more positive well-being among individuals low in activity inhibition, but not among individuals high in activity inhibition. Two cross-sectional studies (Study 1: N=72; Study 2: N=147) were conducted to test this hypothesis. Both studies found the predicted pattern of results for achievement motivation, demonstrating that congruence of implicit and explicit achievement motivation was related to a more positive mood only for participants low in activity inhibition. There was no evidence of congruence effects for affiliation motivation.