Characterizing the Achievement Motivation Orientation of Children from Low- and Middle-Income Families.

Research Findings: The current study examined achievement motivation orientation in preschool-age children from low- and middle-income families. Participants were 126 children who were attending an urban Head Start site or a private preschool. Children's motivation orientation was assessed as being performance oriented or mastery oriented using a challenging puzzle task (Smiley & Dweck, 1994). Children's verbalizations during the task were coded into performance concern, disengaged, and negative self-evaluation categories. Logistic regression and Mann-Whitney U analyses were conducted to examine differences between income groups in motivation orientation and verbalizations. Patterns of motivation orientation in preschool-age children from low- and middle-income families did not differ after controlling for differences in age and puzzle-solving ability. However, children from low-income families made a significantly higher proportion of performance-related verbalizations while working on the task. Practice...