A comparison of fear of failure, achievement perceptions and causal attributions in New Zealand and Japanese students

Abstract

The present research examined "fear of failure", achievement perceptions, and causal attributions in the academic domain, comparing New Zealand and Japanese students. In Study 1, the Fear of Failure Questionnaire measuring multidimensional characteristics of fear of failure was developed. Psychometric evaluation using 199 New Zealand university students showed the adequacy of this measure for assessing students' level of fear of failure. In Study 2, a Japanese version of the Fear of Failure Questionnaire was developed and a cross-cultural comparison of fear of failure, achievement perceptions, and causal attributions for success and failure was undertaken using the responses of 287 New Zealand and 285 Japanese university students. Contrary to predictions, New Zealand students had a higher level of fear of failure than Japanese students and indicated that it was more important for them not to fail than to succeed. As expected, Japanese students had a higher criterion mark for success and a lower criterion mark for failure in examinations than New Zealand students. In addition, Japanese students held a higher perceived parental criterion for success, and indicated that the mark that they believed would make their parents happy was higher than that of New Zealand students. With regard to causal attributions, New Zealand students rated ability and the role of parents higher and effort and luck lower than Japanese students for success and failure. These findings, particularly the unexpected result suggesting that New Zealand students are more motivated to avoid failure than Japanese students, demonstrate the need for further research between these countries in order to clarify the role of "failure" in students' motivation to achieve.