Intrinsic and extrinsic goals: Their structure and relationship to well-being in German and U.S. college students

ABSTRACT. Aspirations for intrinsic (e.g., self-acceptance, affiliation, com-munity feeling) versus extrinsic (e.g., financial success, appearance, social recog-nition) goals were examined in German and U.S. college students. The structure of students ’ goal-systems in terms of goal content was remarkably similar in the two cultures, as evidenced by examination of the ordering of goals. Also, as in past work in the U.S., German college students who were especially focused on intrinsic goals had high well-being, whereas the reverse was true for a focus on extrinsic goals. Some differences between the cultures in terms of specific goals are also discussed. Recent work in the United States has suggested that some of the goals proferred by free-market economy cultures as worthwhile are actually associated with lower levels of well-being when they are highly valued. For example, Kasser and Ryan (1993, 1996, in press) have shown in a series of studies that people whose system of goals is strongly focused on financial success, attractiveness, and popularity have relatively low levels of well-being and happi-ness. In contrast, Kasser and Ryan have found that people oriented toward goals such as self-acceptance, affiliation, community feel-ing, and physical fitness generally have higher levels of well-being. Other work by Cohen and Cohen (1996) has shown that adolescents especially oriented to wealth and financial success have a higher susceptibility to several psychological disorders. Similar findings have also been reported by Sheldon and Kasser (1995, 1998), Lapierre et al. (1997), and Dykman (1998). As a way of understanding these results, Kasser and Ryan (1996) suggested that goals can be classified on the basis of their content into two types, intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsic goals (e.g., self