Researchers’ achievement goals: Prevalence, structure, and associations with job burnout/engagement and professional learning

Abstract

Researchers’ motivations are important for high-quality research and the productivity of the scientific system, but remain largely uninvestigated. Using three studies, we tested the usefulness of Achievement Goal Theory (AGT) for describing research motivations, investigated which goals researchers pursue, and examined their associations with job burnout/engagement and professional learning. Interviewing 20 researchers (Study 1), we found that most of their goals in the research context were classifiable as achievement goals. Apart from mastery and performance goals that are well-established in the AGT literature, they also mentioned relational and work-avoidance goals. Mastery goals comprised task and learning standards, performance goals comprised appearance and normative strivings. In Study 2, we used a standardized questionnaire to assess these goals in 824 researchers, along with burnout/engagement, professional learning time, and professional learning gains. Results confirmed the separability of all conceptualized goals, measurement invariance across academic status, and differential patterns of associations with burnout/engagement and professional learning. In Study 3, we analyzed these constructs in 471 researchers at two time points, six months apart. Results attested measurement invariance over time. Cross-lagged analyses documented similar associations as in Study 2. Learning approach and relational goals had positive effects on professional learning; appearance avoidance and work-avoidance goals were negative predictors. In contrast, burnout was negatively predicted by normative avoidance goals. However, high initial burnout levels were associated with reduced task approach and learning approach, and stronger work-avoidance goals six months later. Taken together, the results highlight the usefulness of AGT for understanding researchers’ motivations, and their relatedness with professional learning and well-being at work.

Motivation of higher education faculty: Theoretical approaches, empirical evidence, and future directions

“…Moreover, most researchers agree on the notion that goals can be characterized by an approach or avoidance goal valence (e.g., Murayama, Elliot, & Yamagata, 2011). Building on results from interview studies documenting that scholars pursue the respective goals for teaching (Daumiller, Figas, & Dresel, 2015) and for research (Daumiller & Dresel, 2019b), Daumiller and colleagues (2019) have proposed an integrative achievement goal framework that is suitable to describe faculty motivation. This Hexagon model of achievement goals differentiates ten different goal classes in total and is described in greater detail in the contribution by Daumiller and Dresel within this special issue.…”

“…This Hexagon model of achievement goals differentiates ten different goal classes in total and is described in greater detail in the contribution by Daumiller and Dresel within this special issue. In both the teaching and the research domain as well as across different university types and countries, pioneering research has documented the power of this model for describing university faculty members' experiences and behaviors, including student ratings of teaching behaviors, professional development, and fraudulent behaviors of faculty such as questionable research practices Daumiller, Bieg, Dickhäuser, & Dresel, 2019;Daumiller & Dresel, 2019b;Daumiller et al, 2016;Daumiller, Janke, Rinas, & Dresel, 2020;Hein, Daumiller, Janke, Dresel & Dickhäuser, 2019, Janke & Dickhäuser, 2018Janke, Daumiller, & Rudert, 2018). Finally research on this framework also investigated the separability of achievement goals for teaching and for research and their joint interplay (Daumiller & Dresel, this special issue).…”

Higher Education Instructors’ Usage of and Learning From Student Evaluations of Teaching – Do Achievement Goals Matter?

“…We did not consider normative goals, as these goals should be relevant when instructors have the clear possibility to compare their results with colleagues (e.g., in a situation with mandatory SETs), which was not the case in our study on voluntary conducted SETs. In addition, possible associations between task goals and professional learning are not clear from a theoretical perspective ( Daumiller and Dresel, 2020 ).…”