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Version 1.3 – Updated November 2024

Appropriately challenging goals

Overview

  • Influence: Appropriately challenging goals
  • Domain: Teaching Strategies
  • Sub-Domain: Learning intentions
  • Potential to Accelerate Student Achievement: Potential to considerably accelerate
  • Influence Definition: Appropriately challenging goals are based on the Goldilocks's principle of challenge is not too hard, not too easy, and not too boring for each student.

Evidence

  • Number of meta-analyses: 5
  • Number of studies: 272
  • Number of students: 16,694
  • Number of effects: 360
  • Weighted mean effect size: 0.62
  • Robustness index: 4

Meta-Analyses

Meta-Analyses
Journal Title Author First Author's Country Article Name Year Published Variable Number of Studies Number of Students Number of Effects Effect Size
Conference paper Chidester & Grigsby USA A meta-analysis of the goal setting-performance literature 1984 Goal difficulty 21 1,770 21 0.44
Journal of Applied Psychology Tubbs USA Goal setting: A meta-analytic examination of the empirical evidence 1986 Goal difficulty, specificity and feedback 87 0 147 0.58
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes Mento, Steel, & Karren USA A meta-analytic study of the effects of goal setting on task performance: 1966–1984 1987 Goal difficulty 39 7,763 77 0.64
Remedial and Special Education Burns USA Empirical analysis of drill ratio research: Refining the instructional level for drill tasks 2004 Degree of challenge 55 0 45 0.82
Journal of Applied Psychology Wright USA Operationalization of goal difficulty as a moderator of the goal difficulty-performance relationship 1990 Goal difficulty 70 7,161 70 0.55
TOTAL/AVERAGE 272 16,694 360 0.61
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