Past studies that explored the antecedents of achievement goals have mostly focused on the role of personal characteristics and parental/teacher influences. However, the role of one’s classmates has not been given much attention. Drawing on the concept of goal contagion, the present study aimed to examine whether classmates’ achievement goals influence one’s achievement goals. We recruited 848 secondary school students nested within 30 classes and asked them to answer relevant questionnaires at Time 1 and Time 2. Multilevel analysis was used to examine whether classmates’ achievement goals at Time 1 predicted one’s achievement goals at Time 2 thereby demonstrating achievement goal contagion. To rule out alternative explanations, we controlled for baseline achievement goals at Time 1, social desirability bias, and other relevant demographic factors. Results indicated that mastery-approach, performance-approach, and performance-avoidance goals were contagious, but mastery-avoidance goals were not. Our study highlights the importance of understanding achievement goal contagion among classmates.

中文翻译：

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成就目标的传染性：精通和绩效目标在同学之间传播

过去探索成就目标前因的研究大多集中在个人特征和父母/老师的影响力上。但是，同班同学的角色并未得到足够的重视。基于目标传染的概念，本研究旨在检验同学的成就目标是否影响一个人的成就目标。我们招募了30个班级中的848名中学生，并要求他们在时间1和时间2回答相关问卷。使用多层次分析来检查时间1的同学的成就目标是否预测了时间2的成就目标，从而证明成就目标的传染性。为了排除其他解释，我们控制了时间1，社会期望偏差和其他相关人口统计学因素的基线成就目标。结果表明，精通方法，绩效方法和绩效回避目标具有传染性，而精通避免目标则不具有传染性。我们的研究强调了了解同学之间成就目标传染的重要性。