Achievement motivation

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the level of correlation between Achievement Motivation, as measured by Atkinson’s Risk Taking Model of Achievement, and student performance as measured by project completion for 7th grade Industrial Technology students at Kellogg Middle School, Rochester, Minnesota. The subjects of this research were the 99 students in the Industrial Technology course at Kellogg Middle School, Rochester, Minnesota, during the period of August 1999 through January 2000. The instrument used was based on Atkinson and Feather’s (1966) study in which they used a ring toss to estimate achievement motivation. Each participant in the study was allowed to have one throw of a ring at any of three pegs. One peg was at five feet, one peg at ten feet, and one peg at fifteen feet. Atkinson and Feather (1966) contend that individuals with high achievement motivation will throw at the ten-foot peg. The students had many project choices they could attempt. The number of projects attempted was noted for each student. A project was considered attempted if the student completed it or worked on it until the learning unit was completed. The number of projects attempted was correlated with the distance of the ring toss attempted. A Pearson Correlation was calculated. Additionally, an ANOVA was computed on the number of projects attempted by the selected ring toss distance. The results of this study did not match the results of the original study done by Atkinson and Feather (1966). The Pearson Correlation was not significant. No relationship was found between the number of projects attempted and the distance of the ring toss attempted.