Learning or Succeeding? Conflict Regulation With Mastery or Performance Goals

The present study aimed to integrate research on mastery and performance goals into research on sociocognitive conflict (confrontation involving divergent points of view). Participants interacted by discussing conflictual issues in a context enhancing either performance goals, mastery goals, or no goals. The amount of disagreement during the interaction was measured. Results indicated that disagreement predicted epistemic conflict regulation (focused on task comprehension) in the mastery goals condition, but relational conflict regulation (focused on affirmation of competence) in the performance goals condition. Results are discussed in terms of their contribution to the conflict regulation framework.