Latent profiles of achievement goal-complexes: their relationship with students’ behavioral and agentic engagement

This prospective study used latent profile analysis (LPA) to explore the reasons underlying mastery-approach (MAp) and performance-approach (PAp) goals, examining their relationship with students’ and teachers’ reports on students’ behavioral and agentic engagement in mathematics. Participants were 395 Peruvian high school students. Five goal-complex profiles emerged for each goal. Latent profile analysis identified five distinct motivational profiles for each goal type, revealing that most students endorsed goals for both autonomous and controlled reasons. Students in profiles characterized by high autonomous reasons had increased student-reported engagement, whereas those in profiles characterized by low autonomous reasons had reduced engagement, regardless of controlled motivation. Conversely, teacher-reported engagement was higher in profiles characterized by low controlled reasons, and lower in those with high controlled reasons, regardless of students’ autonomous motivation. This person-centered approach provides nuanced insights into how combinations of autonomous and controlled reasons underlying MAp and PAp goals are endorsed by subgroups of students and how they relate to students’ behavioral and agentic engagement.