The Relationship between Children\'s Achievement Motivation and Family Function and Attribution Style
AUTHOR : 이종민,최영희
INFORMATION : page. 37~50 / 2008 Vol.15 No.4
ABSTRACT
The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between children\'s achievement motivation and family function and attribution style. Additionally, to investigate the differences in achievement motivation due to area of residence, the data were collected in the capital (Seoul), in a small city (Uijeongbu) and in a small town (Seosan). The subjects were 420 fifth grade elementary school children. Family function consisted of family cohesion and flexibility, and attribution style consisted of ability, effort, task difficulty, and luck in situations of both success and failure. The results showed that children who lived in a large city, and had parents with higher educational levels showed higher achievement motivation levels than those who lived in a small town and whose parents had lower educational levels. Moreover, girls had high achievement motivation than boys. There was a positive correlation between achievement motivation and family function as perceived by the children, such as family cohesion and family flexibility. However these differences disappeared when family functions and attribution style were added to the equation as an explanation of achievement motivation. Family cohesion, family flexibility, ability and effort attribution in situations of success and ability attribution in situations of failure were the important factors influencing the achievement motivation of children. While ability attribution in situations of success explained higher levels of achievement motivation, ability attribution in situations of failure helped explained lower achievement motivation. This means that ability attribution had a different directional influence according to whether the situation was one of failure or.