Approach and avoidance motivation and achievement goals

TLDR

Researchers have traditionally distinguished achievement goals into performance and mastery categories to differentiate competence-based strivings. The article argues for adding an approach–avoidance dimension to the performance–mastery achievement goal framework. The authors propose a trichotomous framework of mastery, performance‑approach, and performance‑avoidance goals, situating it within a hierarchical model of achievement motivation and outlining future theoretical extensions.

Abstract

Achievement goal researchers and theorists have relied primarily on the distinction between performance goals and mastery goals in differentiating competence-based strivings. In this article, an argument is made for incorporating the distinction between approach and avoidance motivation into the performance-mastery dichotomy. Historical, theoretical, and empirical reasons for attending to the approach-avoidance distinction are offered, and a revised, trichotomous framework of achievement goals comprising mastery, performance-approach, and performance-avoidance goals is described and reviewed. This trichotomous framework is discussed in the broader context of a hierarchical model of achievement motivation that attends to the motivational foundation underlying achievement goals per se. Avenues for further theoretical development are also overviewed, including consideration of a mastery-avoidance goal construct.