The study aimed to examine rural high schoolers’ achievement goal preferences and the potential gender variations in a neglected rural context in Iran. To this end, a sample of 252 high schoolers answered Elliott and Murayama’s (2008) Achievement Goal Questionnaire-Revised (AGQ-R). Quantitative results indicated the prevalence of mastery approach (MAp) and performance approach (PAp) goals, followed by performance avoidance (PAv) and mastery avoidance (MAv) goals. Further, an examination of gender differences indicated no significant differences between male and female high schoolers in their adoption of MAp, PAp and MAv goals. However, a significant difference was observed between male and female students in their resort to PAv goal. Results may have implications for different individuals in educational settings such as educational authorities, teachers, and counselors as well as researchers.

This qualitative study aimed to investigate the influences on 32 rural Iranian high school students’ adoption of achievement goals. To this end, the high school students took part in individual semi-structured interviews. The outcomes indicated the high school students’ goal orientation adoption was impacted by a host of significant individuals in four contexts: (1) school (e.g. teachers, classmates), (2) family (e.g. parents, relatives), (3) rural community (e.g. neighbors and rural university graduates) and (4) media (e.g. counselors on TV). Likewise, various factors (i.e. social, psychological, economic, educational, rural, biological and religious) also appeared to influence their achievement goal adoption. Results may have implications for various stakeholders such as educational authorities, policy makers, researchers and significant others (e.g. teachers, counselors, parents, among many others).