Defined as the trait of passion and perseverance for long-term goals, the concept of grit has received a great deal of attention and examination in the academic literature due to its role in performance (Duckworth et al.
2007). However, there has been increasing criticism of its construct and predictive validity. For instance, grit only shares weak association with achievement, a relation that weakens when accounting for conscientiousness or self-control (Credé
2018; Credé et al.
2017). Moreover, scholars have noted issues regarding the alignment between the concept of grit and how it is measured (Credé
2018). For instance, although goals have been defined as a central component of grit, grit scales have rarely addressed them. Finally, the developmental characteristics of samples or goals may add complexity to identify grit effect; yet, extant research has largely relied on cross-sectional data. In response, this study aimed to bring the goal—the neglected component of grit—back into research by using a person-oriented approach to examining goal commitment and grit, and their associations with achievement. The present study also aimed to examine the antecedents, stability, and transition of grit-goal commitment profiles longitudinally to understand their immediate and long-term roles in student achievement.
Grit and Achievement
Grit was reported to associate with a wide range of achievement indicators across different domains in earlier studies (Duckworth et al.
2007; Eskreis-Winkler et al.
2014); nevertheless, recent meta-analyses have indicated that grit is only weakly associated with achievement when evidence is aggregated (Credé et al.
2017; Lam and Zhou
2019). The unique role of grit has also been questioned, as research has shown that grit—more specifically, grit’s perseverance facet—is highly correlated with conscientiousness (Rimfeld et al.
2016; Schmidt et al.
2018). However, some recent findings still have shown promising signs of grit’s predictive relation with achievement. For example, two longitudinal studies in Finland (grades 6–9; Tang et al.
2019) and China (grades 4–6; Jiang et al.
2019) found that grit, especially its perseverance facet, predicted adolescents’ academic achievement after controlling for previous achievement, conscientiousness/self-control, and other demographics. Another nationally representative employed-sample study in Germany (Lechner et al.
2019) also reported an effect of grit on career success (indexed by income, job prestige, and job satisfaction) and career engagement after accounting for cognitive ability and sociodemographic variables. Moreover, a newly published study espouse that grit (as compared to cognitive and physical ability) was the strongest predictor of completion of a highly-intensive training program and graduation status among cadets at West Point Academy (Duckworth et al.
2019). These findings suggest that the context (e.g., culture, sample age, physical setting) must be considered when examining the associations between grit and achievement.
Importantly, some studies have shown that the grit-achievement association could be enhanced in some circumstances, thereby positioning the concept as a potential point of intervention. One study found that the grit effect was more significant at the two ends of the cognitive ability continuum in a nationally representative adult sample (Light and Nencka
2019). For adults with low cognitive ability, those with high levels of grit had high education attainments; however, this same effect was not found among adults with average cognitive ability. Other researchers have found that when the grit scale is modified to be domain specific, the association between achievement and the domain-specific grit scale is higher than the association found for the original measure (Clark and Malecki
2019; Cormier et al.
2019; Schmidt et al.
2019). As such, future studies of grit are warranted to further investigate in which conditions and to what extent grit provides incremental validity for achievement (Credé
2018).
Goal, Commitment, and Grit
To find strong grit effects, the present study investigates a neglected component of grit— the
goal. Although goals have been used to define grit, the term “goal” and the role of goals have been largely ignored in the measurement and discussion of grit. For instance, the most frequently used measure of grit (Duckworth and Quinn
2009) includes only one goal-related item (i.e., “I often set a goal but later choose to pursue a different one.”). This lack of goal-related items not only raises concerns about conceptualization and measurement (Credé
2018), but it also hinders the ability of researchers to identify the strength of grit effects (Jordan et al.
2019). According to goal-setting theory (Locke and Latham
2002), successful goal pursuit requires two effective elements: goal setting and goal implementation (Kruglanski et al.
2015; Oettingen and Gollwitzer
2009). Goal setting is the process by which a goal is constructed, selected, and committed to (Locke and Latham
2002) and goal implementation is the action phase of goal pursuit in which an individual strives to achieve their chosen goal (Oettingen and Gollwitzer
2009). In other words, goal setting characterizes the direction of goal pursuit, whereas goal implementation reflects the energizing part of goal pursuit. To date, though, empirical and theoretical literature addressing grit has mostly explored goal implementation while largely ignoring goal-setting processes.
To find a strong association between grit and achievement in a certain domain, one needs to ensure that students hold achievement in that specific domain as a primary goal. For example, if achieving a good grade on a school math test is not a goal for a student, grit will not contribute to their academic achievement in math, no matter how much overall grit this student may have. Recent re-conceptualizations of grit have identified this contextualized goal-grit-achievement issue as the main reason behind the low associations between grit and achievement. According to Jordan et al. (
2019), grit should be regarded as the context-specific ability to (a) set and pursue long-term goals and (b) readjust short-term goals and goal attainment strategies in the face of challenges and difficulties. Thus, without information on goals and their contents, grit is an undirected energy that is easily drained (Jordan et al.
2019). Consequently, it is not a surprise that many researchers have found only weak associations between grit and achievement.
Returning to the goal setting process of grit, adolescents and adults typically have multiple long-term goals across several domains (Salmela-Aro et al.
2007). However, goal pursuit requires energy and resources; hence, people have to prioritize their commitment to the goal in order to achieve it (Klein et al.
2013; Kruglanski et al.
2015). To achieve success or excellence, people tend to focus on and devote much of their time, energy, and resources to domain-specific goals (Kruglanski et al.
2002; Salmela-Aro
2009). In other words, people may approach multiple long-term goals at the same time, but they likely do not commit to these goals equally. Goal commitment has been defined as a volitional psychological bond reflecting dedication to a specific goal (Klein et al.
2013). According to Locke and Latham (
2002), the goal–performance relationship is strongest when people are highly committed to their goals. Therefore, even if an individual is regarded as gritty, their grit cannot contribute to their academic achievement if academic achievement is not the goal, or their commitment to this goal is weak.
This study focuses on the relation between commitment of academic-related goals (i.e., concrete goals related to academic learning and achievement) and academic achievement. Preliminary evidence supports the assumption that the combination of academic-related goal commitment and grit will result in strong academic achievement. For example, one study found that a sample of student athletes had a high level of sport grit, but low levels of school grit and general grit (Cormier et al.
2019). In terms of student academic achievement, it was found that school grit—not sport or general grit—was the contributing factor (Cormier et al.
2019). Thus, this study intends to supply academic-related goal commitment into grit and aims to see they have a stronger effect on academic achievement.
The Change of Goal Commitment-Grit Compound and the Underlying Reasons
Although it is important to understand the combination of goal commitment and grit, it is also essential to examine dynamic changes in this relation over time. The formation of goals is largely affected by contextual factors such as age or educational level (Salmela-Aro
2009). As people move through life, they go through different developmental stages that often require them to explore, select, and revisit their goals (Salmela-Aro
2009). Adolescents and young adults explore their identity and are in the process of constructing their long-term goals (Hofer
2010; Salmela-Aro
2009). Amidst this process, the secondary school years (i.e., grades 7–12; ages 13–18) form a critical period for adolescents in terms of developing goals and grit. Research has found that leisure goals are most desired in early adolescence (age 10–14), while education-related goals increase during mid-adolescence (age 15–17) and then decline in late adolescence (Massey et al.
2008). Over the years, adolescents also become more realistic about their goals and abilities to attain them (Massey et al.
2008). To date, the development of grit has remained understudied. Several cross-sectional studies have suggested that grit increases with age (Credé et al.
2017) and a few exclusive longitudinal studies have indicated that grit may be less stable among early adolescents (grades 4–6; test–retest
r = 0.40; Jiang et al.
2019) but moderately stable among mid-adolescents (grades 8–9;
rs~0.60; Duckworth and Quinn
2009; Park et al.
2020). However, given the research aims of this study, how grit and goal commitment develop as a whole during the secondary school years is largely unknown.
As such, this study aims to identify how grit and goal commitment develop during the secondary school years using a Finnish sample of eighth- and ninth-grade students. As noted above, adolescents in their lower secondary years (grades 7–9) experience changes in personal goal-setting (Massey et al.
2008). In the Finnish education system, these changes coincide with the ninth grade, marking the end of compulsory education (OECD
2016). After this period, Finnish adolescents enter academic high school, vocational high school, or work life (Tuominen-Soini et al.
2012). This makes the eighth and ninth grades critical pre-transition years during which Finnish adolescents form and revisit their goals for the future. In other words, the ninth grade marks one of the first consequential crossroads regarding future career development for Finnish adolescents (Vasalampi et al.
2010).
Moreover, this study uses a person-oriented approach to examine the combination of academic goal commitment and grit longitudinally. Whereas variable-oriented approaches focus on aggregated sample characteristics or the relationships between variables, person-oriented approaches focus more on individuals. The person-oriented approach aims to identify subgroups of individuals so as to study them together as an undivided whole (Bergman and Trost
2006). Following the guidance of extant research, the present study examined two facets of grit independently (i.e., perseverance of effort and consistency of interest; Credé
2018; Guo et al.
2019). In comparison to the variable-oriented approach, the person-oriented approach better reflects the natural configuration of the combinations of variables, particularly for multiple variables (Bergman and Trost
2006); thus, a person-oriented approach can illuminate how goal commitment, grit-perseverance, and grit-consistency function together as well as how these combinations are associated with achievement. In addition, recent developments of latent transition analysis have enabled further examination of the changes, stability, or transitions among these combinations (Lanza et al.
2003). Consequently, the person-oriented approach as a whole provides not only proportional information on variable combinations, but also stability and transition information on these combinations. This approach can also test and ensure the equivalency of measures, constructs, and the interpretation and distributions of combinations across the years, which are particularly important for longitudinal studies (Morin and Litalien
2019).
In addition to identifying and monitoring changes in the profiles of academic-related goal commitment and grit over time, this study was also interested in understanding which factors influence the formation of these profiles. This line of inquiry may help researchers further understand the mechanism of change in goal commitment and grit combinations. This study focused on the role of educational aspirations (i.e., the highest degree one aims to obtain), gender, and socioeconomic status (SES) given their general impact on goals, personality, and achievements (Flunger et al.
2016; Parker et al.
2016). Previous studies have shown that adolescents who are girls, have high educational aspirations, or come from a high SES family tend to be highly committed to educational goals (for review, see Massey et al.
2008). In general, researchers have not identified significant gender differences grit (Credé et al.
2017; Duckworth and Quinn
2009); however, educational aspirations (e.g., Verdesco
2016) and SES (e.g., Usher et al.
2019) tend to both share a positive association with grit. Moreover, the present study included conscientiousness and academic persistence as covariates to examine the unique role of grit. Conscientiousness—that is, the personality trait of being thorough, industrious, and self-controlled—has been associated with grit (Duckworth et al.
2007), and academic persistence refers to one’s motivational tendency when facing difficult school tasks (Tuominen-Soini et al.
2012). Both of these factors are conceptual and instrumental closed constructs of grit, and they are included in this study so as to isolate the exclusive contributions of grit.