Abstract

Industrial and organizational psychology research has focused on improving employee performance. A large body of research has examined the seemingly critical relevance of goal orientations in predicting individual performance, however, the findings from this literature remain equivocal. An important aspect of performance is the acquiring of knowledge, or learning the skills needed to perform. Internships provide a context for students to learn or develop the skills needed for their future careers, and can therefore, provide an interesting context to study knowledge development and performance. Drawing from this, the goal of the present study was to assess the impact of goal orientation through feedback seeking on change in performance and learning in an internship context, and the role of psychological safety as a contextual boundary condition. University students and their supervisors were surveyed at several timepoints throughout their program internship. Students’ learning goal orientation was shown to have a positive effect on their learning through their feedback seeking, while their performance avoid goal orientation had a detrimental effect on their change in performance throughout their internship. It is concluded that in order for students to benefit from their learning experiences in an internship context, learning goal oriented behaviour should be encouraged, and performance avoid goal oriented behaviour should discouraged. Further practical and theoretical implications are discussed.

Keywords: goal orientation, feedback seeking, learning, performance, internship