Effects of regulatory focus on motivation and performance after upward comparison

Abstract

The present study investigated effects of upward comparison and regulatory focus on motivation and performance by focusing on assimilation and contrast, as well as examining the role of participants' emotions following that comparison. The university students (N=85; mean age, 20.26 years) who participated in the study were divided into two groups, an assimilation condition and a contrast condition, through manipulation of the degree of similarity. Next, they completed a task in which they connected numbered dots in sequence. Their performance was compared to a peer whose performance was better than that of the participants. The results indicated the following:In the assimilation condition,the performance and motivation of the promotion-focused individuals were superior to that of the prevention-focused individuals. This may have been because they attempted to succeed by using the peer's performance as a positive role model. Moreover, in the contrast condition, the performance of the prevention-focused participants was better than that of the promotion-focused participants. This may have been because they attempted to avoid failure by overlooking differences between their performance and the performance of the peer, and, instead, focused on the inadequacies of their own performance. In addition, the participants' reported emotions after the comparison were not related to these processes.