| Abstract: | Conducted 2 experiments to investigate whether projective and objective methods of measuring fear of success (FOS) differentially enable the assessment of motives and cognitions. In Exp I, 67 male and 85 female 14- and 15-yr-olds wrote 3 stories to story cues representing sex-appropriate success, sex-inappropriate success, and sex-appropriate nonsuccess. Ss then completed a concern-over-negative-consequences-of-success scale (CONCOSS), and their stories were judged for negative content. In Exp II, 29 14- and 15-yr-old girls viewed a film conveying positive information about a specific sex-inappropriate activity, and measures of FOS were taken 2 days later. 23 controls who did not view the film completed the same procedure as Ss in Exp I. Overall results reveal that, contrary to the predictions of motivation theory, stories written in response to sex-inappropriate success cues did not correlate negatively with sex-appropriate nonsuccess cues. Viewing the film resulted in long-term positive changes in story content, consistent with the cognition explanation but not in long-term change in CONCOSS score, consistent with the motive explanation. Sex and ability differences were found on CONCOSS but not on the projective measure, and the 2 measures did not correlate. Findings suggest that sex-inappropriate cues are culturally marked and, lacking the ambiguity characteristic of other projective tests, elicit culturally based rather than motive-based stories. (49 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) |
