Perfectionistic concerns suppress associations between perfectionistic strivings and positive life outcomes
Introduction
While perfectionism was initially proposed as a unidimensional construct (Burns, 1980), more recent investigation has described it as a multidimensional construct that includes having high personal standards or striving for excellence, having concerns about making mistakes, having high standards for others, having concern for the approval of others for one’s performance, being neat, and having a tendency toward obsessive rumination (Hill et al., 2004). Perfectionism has been assessed using several multidimensional instruments available in the research literature (Frost et al., 1990, Hewitt and Flett, 1991, Hill et al., 2004), but factor analyses reveal that virtually any measure of perfectionism reflects two basic forms of perfectionism (see Stoeber & Otto, 2006, for a comprehensive review). These two forms are called perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns, respectively, by Stoeber and Otto (2006), but they are variously referred to as adaptive and maladaptive perfectionism (Rice, Ashby, & Slaney, 1998), positive striving and maladaptive evaluative concerns (Frost, Heimberg, Holt, Mattia, & Neubauer, 1993), healthy and unhealthy perfectionism (Stumpf & Parker, 2000), conscientious and self-evaluative perfectionism (Hill et al., 2004), and positive and negative perfectionism (Terry-Short, Owens, Slade, & Dewy, 1995). This lack of consistency in terms is undesirable; thus, following Stoeber and Otto’s advice, we will use the terms perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns throughout this manuscript.
Perfectionistic characteristics have been related to a broad variety of negative outcomes including depression, social anxiety and social phobias, obsessive–compulsive disorder, eating disorders, somatic complaints, and maladaptive personality characteristics (for detailed reviews see Flett and Hewitt, 2002, Shafran and Mansell, 2001, Stoeber and Otto, 2006). Though perfectionism has been frequently studied in association with undesirable outcomes, it has been linked to desirable outcomes less often. Nonetheless, a growing literature has related perfectionism to more positive psychological variables, recently summarized by Stoeber and Otto. Despite these reports, some investigators have expressed doubts that perfectionism can be positive, adaptive, or healthy (Flett and Hewitt, 2002, Flett and Hewitt, 2005, Greenspon, 2000).
In their review of the positive aspects of perfectionism, Stoeber and Otto (2006) summarized a variety of positive psychological outcomes associated primarily with various representations of perfectionistic strivings. They presented diverse findings and suggested that more weight should be given to the investigation of positive outcomes, especially those that do not overlap with the scales used to measure perfectionistic strivings. The literature on positive versus negative characteristics associated with perfectionism has been complicated by the use of differing conceptualizations of perfectionism, as well as some mixed results associating both positive and negative characteristics with positive striving perfectionism (Bieling et al., 2004, Bieling et al., 2003). Additionally some investigators have utilized a dimensional approach to assessing associations with perfectionism, as in the current investigation of perfectionism factors related to positive life outcomes, while others have identified groups of perfectionists, often described as healthy or unhealthy, and compared them on various outcomes (see Stoeber & Otto, 2006). Following the Stoeber and Otto review, the current investigation had the goal of examining the relationship of both perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns dimensions with indices of positive psychological functioning. In particular, this investigation used the Perfectionism Inventory (PI; Hill et al., 2004), a multidimensional measure of perfectionism, with perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns factors (called conscientious perfectionism and self-evaluative perfectionism, respectively), to assess associations with measures of psychological well-being, satisfaction with life, and mood. This particular measure was chosen because of its two-dimensional structure and because it incorporates the strengths of other measures of perfectionism while avoiding some of their weaknesses (see Hill et al. for a thorough review of these issues). Thus, this study was designed to advance the literature associating perfectionism with positive outcomes.
According to Ryff (1989), psychological well-being represents more than mere happiness. Rather, constructs such as sense of purpose and direction, self-realization, and achievement of satisfying relationships are all parts of psychological well-being. Thus, she advocated for a model of psychological well-being comprising six dimensions of positive psychological functioning: autonomy, environmental mastery, personal growth, positive relations with others, purpose in life, and self-acceptance. In an investigation of the relationship between perfectionism and this conceptualization of psychological well-being, Chang (2006a) found strong negative zero-order associations between all six psychological well-being scales and perfectionistic concerns, with self-appraised stress mediating the inverse correlation. However, perfectionistic strivings was positively correlated with only purpose in life and personal growth. In another investigation associating positive outcomes with perfectionism, Chang (2006b) utilized a more complex conceptual conceptualization of perfectionism that included outcome cognition valence. While Chang, 2006a, Chang, 2006b has described some intriguing (though mixed) relationships between perfectionism factors and psychological well-being, the current study is designed to clarify and substantiate the relationship between perfectionism and psychological well-being by using the dimensions of perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns. We hypothesized that perfectionistic strivings would be associated positively and perfectionistic concerns would be associated negatively with each of Ryff (1989) indices of psychological well-being.
Another positive psychological outcome with which perfectionism may be related is life satisfaction. One influential perspective of life satisfaction defined it as “a judgmental process in which individuals assess the quality of their lives on the basis of their own unique set of criteria” (Pavot & Diener, 1993, p. 164). In other words, people compare their life circumstances with their self-derived standards and report life satisfaction with respect to the degree that these perceived life conditions match these self-standards. Chang (2000) found an inverse relationship between a composite measure of general perfectionism and satisfaction with life in both young and middle aged adults. Chang (2006b) later reported mixed results using more complex perfectionism scales, although his constructs only partly overlap with the more common perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns used in this investigation. In another investigation of perfectionism in adolescents, Gilman and colleagues reported positive associations between perfectionistic striving and life satisfaction and negative associations between perfectionistic concerns and life satisfaction (Gilman and Ashby, 2003, Gilman et al., 2005). For the current investigation, we sought to clarify further the relationship between life satisfaction and perfectionism, hypothesizing that perfectionistic striving would be associated positively with life satisfaction and perfectionistic concerns would be associated negatively with life satisfaction.
Another measure of positive psychological functioning is affect. The experience of positive versus negative affect can serve as a positive psychological outcome indicator, or an index of happiness (Ryff, 1989). When assessing the association between composite perfectionism and affect, Chang (2000) found that composite perfectionism was related to negative affect (but not positive affect), but the relationship was mediated by stress (rather than perfectionism leading directly to negative affect). In a later investigation, Chang (2006b) reported mixed results using more complex constructs than the current conceptualization of perfectionistic strivings and concerns. Further, he did not report associations with negative affect. In an investigation of perfectionism and health, Molnar, Reker, Culp, Sadava, and DeCourville (2006) found a significant positive association between perfectionistic striving and positive affect. Molnar and colleagues also reported that perfectionistic concerns were inversely related to positive affect and positively related to negative affect. Further, their results suggested that affect played a mediating role in the relationship between perfectionism and self reported physical health (rather than perfectionism directly leading to health outcomes). Dunkley, Zuroff, and Blankstein (2003) found that negative affect (recorded on a daily basis for a week) was negatively related to perfectionistic striving and positively related to perfectionistic concern, and that positive affect was negatively related to perfectionistic concern. For the current investigation, we hypothesized that perfectionistic striving would be positively associated with positive affect and negatively associated with negative affect. Similarly, we hypothesized that perfectionistic concern would be negatively associated with positive affect but positively associated with negative affect.
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Participants
Participants were recruited from Psychology classes and earned course credit for their participation. After granting informed consent, participants anonymously completed each measure in counterbalanced order in 1-h group sessions. The study received Institutional Review Board approval and was conducted in accordance with ethical standards of research with human participants. Two hundred and sixteen participants, 116 females and 83 males (17 respondents did not report) participated in the study.
Results
Descriptive statistics for all predictors (perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns) and criteria (psychological well-being: autonomy, environmental mastery, personal growth, purpose in life, self-acceptance; life satisfaction; affect: pleasant activation–unpleasant deactivation, unpleasant activation–pleasant deactivation) appear in Table 1. Skew and kurtosis are not reported, but there were no notable deviations from normality for any of the study variables. Internal consistency
Discussion
These results reflect significant associations between the perfectionism dimensions of perfectionistic striving and perfectionistic concern and the outcomes of psychological well-being, life satisfaction, and mood. As suggested by Stoeber and Otto (2006) in their review, the current analyses separated the variance assessed by these two correlated perfectionism dimensions and revealed a strong pattern with perfectionistic concern serving as a suppressor variable that reduced the strength of
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