A STUDY OF RANGE AND FLEXIBILITY OF ACHIEVING STYLES IN RELATION TO EGO DEVELOPMENT

The purpose of this project was to investigate the relationship between achieving styles and range of achieveing styles as anticipated in Lipman-Blumen's theory. In addition, the relationship between Loevingerian level of ego development and range of achieving styles was examined. Last, the validity of the L-BLA Achieving Styles Inventory was assessed using a contrasting groups design.;Achieving styles were measured with the L-BLA Achieving Styles Inventory (ASI). Mean scores for the three subdomains within each domain were summated to arrive at a dominant domain of achieving styles for all subjects. Range of achieving styles were determined by responses to ten scenarios devised for the project. Three independent judges assessed each set of scenario responses. Range was defined as the number of subdomians expressed in responses to the ten scenarios.;Fifteen subjects with the widest range and fifteen subjects with the narrowest range were selected frm the business school sample and tested for level of ego development with the Washington University Sentence Completion Test (WUSCT).;Results indicated that the ASI has good contrasting groups validity. Seventy percent of the business school subjects were direct style achievers versus 44% of the sample from the School of Education. No differences were found on level of ego development between high and low range groups. The scenarios did not differentiate subjects on achieving styles; every subject was identified as dominant domain direct and dominant subdomain intrinsic direct on the scenarios. Range of achieving styles, however, varied from one to six. A near significant Pearson correlation was found between range of achieving styles and ASI Total Test Score, indicating that Total Test Scores may be a means of assessing range of achieving styles.;Subjects were 66 men and 34 women from the Graduate School of Business, mean age 29 years, and 30 men and 32 women from the Graduate School of Education, mean age 32 years, at the University of Pittsburgh.