| Abstract: | Investigated whether competitive and individualistic goal structures elicit achievement cognitions that have been associated with helpless vs mastery-oriented children, respectively. 88 5th- and 6th-grade children were administered a novel achievement task in which a high vs low performance outcome was manipulated by varying the number of solvable puzzles across 2 sets of 6 puzzles, within either a competitive or individual goal structure. A "thought-matching" methodology was used to assess the type of frequency of Ss' thoughts. Results revealed that Ss made more ability attributions in the competitive than in the individual condition. In the individual condition, Ss displayed a mastery orientation in that they made more effort attributions and engaged in self-instructions and self-monitoring more than did Ss in the competitive condition. Ability attributions were predictive of Ss' positive and negative affective reactions. Results suggest that Ss were thinking about responses to the question "Was I smart?" in the competitive setting but were thinking about "How can I do this task?" in the individual setting. It is suggested that getting children to think about how to improve their performance may not be compatible with the focus of attention in competitive situations. (29 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) |
