Need for Over-Achievement
Theory
Here's how Wikipedia defines and describes Need for Achievement (N-Ach), one of many concepts developed by psychologists and later applied to organizational behavior:
N-Ach (Need for Achievement) is a term introduced by David McClelland into the field of psychology, referring to an individual's desire for significant accomplishment, mastering of skills, control, or high standards.N-Ach is related to the difficulty of tasks people choose to undertake. Those with low N-Ach may choose very easy tasks, in order to minimise risk of failure, or highly difficult tasks, such that a failure would not be embarrassing. Those with high N-Ach tend to choose moderately difficult tasks, feeling that they are challenging, but within reach.
People high in N-Ach are characterised by a tendency to seek challenges and a high degree of independence. Many entrepreneurs may fall in this group. Their most satisfying reward is the recognition of their achievements. Sources of high N-Ach include: Parents who encouraged independence in childhood; Praise and rewards for success; Association of achievement with positive feelings; Association of achievement with one's own competence and effort, not luck; A desire to be effective or challenged; Intrapersonal Strength.
Application
A story appearing recently in the Health section of CNN.com entitled identifies high N-Ach as one of several contributing factors to the relatively high suicide rate among Asian-American women and girls:
Push to achieve tied to suicide in Asian-American womenAsian-American women ages 15-24 have the highest suicide rate of women in any race or ethnic group in that age group. Suicide is the second-leading cause of death for Asian-American women in that age range.
As Noh and others have searched for the reasons, a complex answer has emerged. First and foremost, they say "model minority" pressure -- the pressure some Asian-American families put on children to be high achievers at school and professionally -- helps explain the problem. "In my study, the model minority pressure is a huge factor," says Noh, who studied 41 Asian-American women who'd attempted or contemplated suicide. "Sometimes it's very overt -- parents say, 'You must choose this major or this type of job' or 'You should not bring home As and Bs, only As," she says. "And girls have to be the perfect mother and daughter and wife as well." Family pressure often affects girls more than boys, according to Dr. Dung Ngo, a psychologist at Baylor University in Texas. "When I go talk to high school students and ask them if they experience pressure, the majority who raised their hands were the girls," he said. Asian-American parents, he says, are stricter with girls than with boys.
But Noh says pressure from within the family doesn't completely explain the shocking suicide statistics for young women like her sister. She says American culture has adopted the myth that Asians are smarter and harder-working than other minorities. "It's become a U.S.-based ideology, popular from the 1960s onward, that Asian-Americans are smarter, and should be doing well whether at school or work."
Commentary
One of the problems with the aforementioned research is the deeply complex and socially- embedded nature of the phenomenon under study. Suicide is tragic and is tough enough to explain on its own. Trying isolate contributing factors and then use them to explain the suicide of young women of Asian descent who experience differing degrees of emotional, mental, and familial pressure, who differ in their need to achieve and to outperform the norm, who differ in their susceptibility to society's legitimate expectations and cruel stereotypes- this is an inordinately more complex task, one made all the more difficult by so severely limiting the population under study. Such an approach is unlikely to provide any genuine insights into either the phenomenon of suicide itself, the reasons why young Asian women commit suicide at higher rates, or whether and how the need for achievement aids or exacerbates the problem. Nor do expect that the research improve the understanding N-Ach in the workplace. That said, I wish Prof. Noh all the best in this endeavor. Maybe something will come of it. One can always hope.