| This study provides a contemporary examination of the relationship between instructional goal structures and performance in an academic setting, and explores how this relationship may be moderated by individual differences in perfectionism. The cognitive performance of 63 adults was tested in three situational conditions (practice, individualistic and competitive instruction). It was predicted that adaptive perfectionists (APs), relative to maladaptive (MPs) and non perfectionists (NPs), would perform best overall under the conditions studied. Although the between-group effect was not supported, a significant interaction effect was obtained: APs performed significantly worse in situations of competitive instruction than MPs and NPs. The findings suggest the performance of some individuals may differ depending on the situational conditions, and supports hypotheses of the state-dependent nature of perfectionism and its potential moderating influence on the relationship between performance in different situational conditions. In addition, relationships between age, gender, competition related variables and performance outcomes were explored. |
