Assessing Achievement Motive of American and Israeli Managers: Design and Application of a Three-Facet Measure

Abstract

A questionnaire to assess the presence of achieve ment motive in various populations was developed and its structure analyzed. A facet definition of achievement motive was suggested which provided guidelines for the creation of items and the formu lation of hypotheses. The Achievement Motive Questionnaire was administered to 132 U.S. and 114 Israeli middle managers from various public and private organizations. The results support the main hypotheses. An empirical double-ordered con ceptual system was obtained which reflects the two facets characteristic to this study: (1) kind of con frontation (being confronted or confronting an an swer with a challenge) and (2) time perspective (be fore, during, or after) relative to task performance. The behavior modalities facet was found to order the conceptual space from instrumental to affective and cognitive modality. The systematic construction of the questionnaire based on the facet definition of achievement motive made it possible to distinguish differences in achievement tendencies between the U.S. and the Israeli samples.