Perfectionism and performance expectations at university: Does gender still matter?

Abstract

The present study examines the relationship between the perfectionist orientation and performance expectations at university and whether gender moderates this relationship. One-hundred first year university students responded to two subscales from the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS-HF): the Self-Oriented Perfectionism (SOP) subscale and the Socially Prescribed Perfectionism (SPP) subscale. Results of the study showed that SOP and SPP correlated positively. Students, regardless of gender, demonstrated higher levels of SOP than SPP. Both SOP and SPP correlated positively with performance expectations. Self- oriented perfectionists and high perfectionists reported significantly higher performance expectations than socially oriented perfectionists  and non-perfectionists. There were no significant differences between socially oriented perfectionists and non-perfectionists nor were there significant differences between self-oriented perfectionists and high perfectionists in performance expectations. Gender did not moderate the effect of types of perfectionism on performance expectations. There were no gender differences in SOP, SPP, or performance expectations.