Copyright © 2018 Authors. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. International Journal of Engineering & Technology, 7 (2.10) (2018) 113-116 International Journal of Engineering & Technology Website: www.sciencepubco.com/index.php/IJET Research Paper Cluster analysis on Malaysian student’s achievement goals orientation in mathematics from multiple goal perspective Mohd Rustam Mohd Rameli 1 *, Azlina Mohd Kosnin 1 , Yeo Kee Jiar 1 , Zakiah Mohamad Ashari 1 1 Faculty of Education, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia *Corresponding author E-mail: mrustam2@utm.my Abstract This study examined students’ achievement goal orientation by applying multiple goals perspective in lear ning Mathematics. This per- son-centered approach study involved 969 Malaysian upper secondary school students from 20 selected schools. Results of correlational analysis showed that all the four goal orientations (mastery-approach, mastery-avoidance, performance-approach, and performance- avoidance) correlated moderately (r=.151-.475) to each other. This suggests that students could adopt more than one goal orientation simultaneously. By means of cluster analysis, the notion of simultaneous adoption of goal orientations is supported from which five distinct clusters were extracted, namely mastery-oriented (mean value is higher for the mastery-approach and mastery-avoidance goal), approach-oriented (mean value is higher for mastery and performance-avoidance goal), avoidance-oriented (mean value is higher for mastery and performance-approach goal), demotivated (low mean value for all types of goals) and success-oriented (high mean value for all types of goals). Success-oriented cluster had the highest frequency of students (f=271, 28.0%) while only 3.6% (f=35) of the students were in the demotivated cluster. This study extends the knowledge of how students adopt multiple goals in Mathematics learning. The results have significant impact on mathematics education context of Malaysia. Keywords: Achievement Goals Orientation, Multiple Goals, Cluster Analysis 1. Introduction The focus of Mathematics learning today emphasizes the devel- opment of Mathematics competence among students as well as prepare them to pursue their academic goals [1]. Therefore, the process of learning Mathematics should involve active participa- tion of students. Understanding reasons for students setting up certain goals in learning Mathematics and how the goals influ- enced the academic achievement are very important as students will show various kinds of behaviours for different achievement situations [2]. Achievement goal orientation has always been studied for its rela- tionship with academic achievement, not only in the school setting which includes the primary and secondary schools, but has includ- ed university students as well [3]. Achievement goal orientation is related to the elements of perseverance such as constant interest in learning [4] and positive learning behaviour such as being active and responsible in learning [5]. Previous studies have shown that students with different achievement goal orientation profiles lead to different of subjective well-being [6]. Nowadays, students are facing the 21 st century education chal- lenges which require them to be more self-directed and independ- ent. However, social influence in the Mathematics learning pro- cess such as the existence of pressure from the school and high expectations from parents are undeniable. These factors lead to conflict in determining the type of achievement goal orientation to be adopted by students in the learning process. As a consequence, the combination of goal orientation profiles is more relevant to be studied in recent studies. The significance of goal orientation exploration is that it helps in understanding students’ motivation which is related to achievement in the class environment [7, 8]. 2. Multiple Goals Perspective The theory as the foundation to explain achievement goal orienta- tion is known as achievement goal theory [9]. This theory is a dominant framework used to conceptualize students’ motivation in schools or, specifically, their achievement motivation in learning [10]. Generally, this theory is related to the idea that a student will give meaning to his or her specific achievement situation. The meaning involves comprehensive purpose to involve them- selves in the achievement goal orientation behaviour to achieve a targeted goal [11]. In this study, the main perspective for achievement goal orienta- tion is Multiple Goals Theory that is used in determining students’ achievement goal orientation profile in learning Mathematics. Multiple Goals Perspective states that individuals can use more than one goal at once simultaneously and there are various ways of how achievement goal influenced learning [12]. From the re- search findings, it shows that different goal configurations are related with different positive and negative effect [13]. In this study, Multiple Goal Perspective is synchronised with the research objectives to examine students’ achievement goal orientation pro- file which is a combination of more than one type of dominant goals used by students in learning Mathematics.