Goal-setting as compensation for fear-of-success

Stories written in response to an academic achievement cue by junior high girls were scored for imagery that reflected fear of success. Fifty-four percent contained fear-of success themes, less than previously reported for college girls. The subjects subsequently worked in a group setting as they identified mistakes in a set of pictures. Each subject kept tally of her own progress as she proceeded with the task. Fifty-eight subjects were encouraged to set goals as they worked through the pictures and found significantly more mistakes from first picture to last than the 37 subjects who received control instructions. Task response was compared to interpretation of the story cue. The subjects who wrote positive stories and received control instructions for the picture mistake task found significantly more mistakes as they progressed through the task than the subjects who wrote fear-of-success stories. No significant difference in mistake indentification was found when goal-setting instructions were given between those who had written positive stories and those who had written fear-of-success stories. Goal-setting instructions appeared to compensate for the effects of fear-of-success that many girls exhibited.