Testing Structural Invariance of the Achievement Goal Questionnaire in American, Chinese, and Dutch College Students

Abstract

This study investigates the structural invariance of the Achievement Goal Questionnaire (AGQ) in American, Chinese, and Dutch college students. Using confirmatory factor analyses (CFA), the authors found evidence for the four-factor structure of achievement goals in all three samples. Subsequent multigroup CFAs supported structural invariance of the AGQ across the samples.

• achievement goals
• multigroup confirmatory factor analysis
• structural invariance

We are extremely grateful to Luce Claessens, Alyson Lavigne, PhD, and Amy Olsen for their help in collecting the data. We also thank Mary McCaslin, PhD, for motivating us to initiate this project.

Notes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/orPUBLICation of this article.

Funding The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/orPUBLICation of this article.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Huaping Sun

Huaping Sun is a visiting assistant professor at the University of Memphis. She received her PhD in Educational Psychology from the University of Arizona. Her areas of professional interest include psychometrics, professional licensure, achievement motivation, and evaluation of psychological and educational tests’ reliability and validity evidence.

Diley Hernandez

Diley Hernandez received her PhD in Educational Psychology from the University of Arizona. She is the Project Director of the GoSTEM initiative at the Center for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning, Georgia Institute of Technology. Her research interests include educational psychology, motivation, cultural studies in education, and learning and teaching.