Need for achievement
person's desire for significant accomplishment
Need for achievement is a person's desire for significant accomplishment, mastery of skills, control, or high standards. The psychometric device designed to measure need-for-achievement, N-Ach, was popularized by the psychologist David McClelland. A need for achievement figures as a secondary or psychogenic need in Henry Murray's system of needs.
Theory
The pioneering research work of the Harvard Psychological Clinic in the 1930s, summarized in Explorations in Personality, provided the starting point for future studies of personality, especially those relating to needs and motives. David McClelland and his collaborators John William Atkinson, Russell A. Clark and Edgar L. Lowell later investigated achievement motivation and described their work using the term "achievement motivation theory".
N-Ach measure
Using results based on the Thematic Apperception Test, McClelland concluded in a 1958 study that individuals in a society can be grouped into high achievers and low achievers based on their scores on what he called "N-Ach". McClelland also found that high-need-for-achievers will accept risk only to the degree they believe their personal contributions will make a difference in the outcome.
N-Ach is characterized by an enduring and consistent concern with setting and meeting high standards of achievement. This concern is influenced by an internal drive for action (intrinsic motivation), and by the pressure exerted by the expectations of others (extrinsic motivation). Measured with the thematic apperception test (TAT), need for achievement motivates an individual to succeed in competition, and to excel in activities important to them.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jan 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1815990. The Library of Congress control number is sh85000493. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1958.
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This entry incorporates text from “Need for achievement” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.