Understanding Psychology (10th Ed)

 MEASURING ACHIEVEMENT MOTIVATION 
How can we measure a person’s need for achievement? The measuring instrument used 
most frequently is the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) (Spangler, 1992). In the TAT, an 
examiner shows a series of ambiguous pictures, such as the one in Figure 5. The exam-
iner tells participants to write a story that describes what is happening, who the people 
are, what led to the situation, what the people are thinking or wanting, and what will 
happen next. Researchers then use a standard scoring system to determine the amount 
of achievement imagery in people’s stories. For example, someone who writes a story 
in which the main character strives to beat an opponent, studies in order to do well at 
some task, or works hard in order to get a promotion shows clear signs of an achieve-
ment orientation. The inclusion of such achievement-related imagery in the participants’ 
stories is assumed to indicate an unusually high degree of concern with—and therefore 
a relatively strong need for—achievement (Tuerlinckx, DeBoeck, & Lens, 2002). 
The Need for Affi
liation: 
Striving for Friendship
Few of us choose to lead our lives as hermits. Why? 
One main reason is that most people have a  need for affi liation,  an interest in 
establishing and maintaining relationships with other people. Individuals with a 
high need for affi liation write TAT stories that emphasize the desire to maintain or 
reinstate friendships and show concern over being rejected by friends.
need for achievement
A stable, 
learned characteristic in which a 
person obtains satisfaction by striving 
for and attaining a level of excellence.
need for affi liation
An interest in 
establishing and maintaining relation-
ships with other people.
Study Alert
A key feature of people with a 
high need for achievement 
is that they prefer tasks of 
moderate
diffi
culty.
FIGURE 5
This ambiguous picture is 
similar to those used in the Thematic 
Apperception Test to determine people’s 
underlying motivation (© 1943 by the 
President and Fellows of Harvard 
College; 1971 by Henry A. Murray). What 
do you see? Do you think your response 
is related to your motivation?