The Maze Test: A Computer Tool for Testing Perseverance

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Behavioral Science

Background:

• Perseverance is crucial for goal achievement, influenced by motivation, personality, and situational factors.
• Existing measures of perseverance lack precise definitions and struggle to capture its complexity.
• Understanding perseverance is vital for human functioning and goal attainment.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce the novel Maze Test for measuring perseverance.
• To establish the theoretical foundations and indicators of perseverance within the Maze Test.
• To demonstrate the practical application of the Maze Test in assessing personality- and situation-conditioned perseverance.

Main Methods:

• Development and theoretical validation of the Maze Test.
• Study 1: Assessing personality-conditioned perseverance using the Maze Test and correlating with the Big Five personality traits.
• Study 2: Evaluating the impact of mental simulations on perseverance indicators.

Main Results:

• Weak correlations were found between perseverance indicators and Big Five traits; neuroticism showed negative correlations, while conscientiousness and agreeableness showed positive correlations.
• Mental simulations demonstrated a medium to high effect on perseverance indicators.
• The Maze Test provides a multidimensional view of perseverance based on task-solving analysis.

Conclusions:

• The Maze Test offers a novel, multidimensional approach to understanding and measuring perseverance.
• The tool is versatile, suitable for both laboratory and remote web-based testing.
• A significant advantage is the Maze Test's free and general availability.