Two explanations of fear of success (FOS), that it is a motive and that it is a sex role stereotype or cognition, are related to two methods of assessment, objective (CONCOSS) and projective measures of FOS. 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. Moreover, giving teenage girls positive information about sex-inappropriate success resulted in long-term positive changes in story content (which was consistent with the cognition explanation) but there was no long-term change in CONCOSS score (which was consistent with the motive explanation). Sex and ability differences were found on CONCOSS but not on the projective measure, and the two measures did not correlate. The evidence suggests that the motive FOS and cognition FOS are differentially assessed via objective and projective measures. It seems that sex-inappropriate cues are culturally marked and, lacking the ambiguity characteristic of other projective tests, elicit culturally based rather than motive-based stories.

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract