achievement
(əˈtʃiːvmənt)
Also 6–9 atchievement, and see sense 3.
[a. Fr. achèvement a finishing, completing, n. of action, f. achever. See achieve.]
1. The action of achieving, completing, or attaining by exertion; completion, accomplishment, successful performance.
| 1475 Caxton Jason 110 b, With thachieuement of these deuises the king Oetes approched. c 1585 Faire Em i. 69 The bliss That hangs on quick achievement of my love. 1638 Knolles Hist. Turkes 182 (ed. 5) He would vndertake the atchieuement of that exployt. 1815 Southey Roderick ix. 19 So it be lawful, and within the bounds of possible atchievement. 1878 B. Taylor Pr. Deukalion i. vi. 46 What virtue lies More in achievement than its hot desire? |
2. Anything achieved, accomplished, or won by exertion; a feat, a distinguished and successful action, a victory.
| 1593 R. Harvey Philad. 106 Spending the might of it [the flesh] in contemplatiue assaults and atchiuements. 1602 Warner Albion's Eng. xi. lxviii. 289 We intreate of great Achiuements done By English, in contrarie Clymes. 1678 Jordan Lond. Triumph. in Heath Grocer's Comp. (1869) 522 You might see an hundred persons confusedly scrambling in the dirt for the frail atchievement of a bunch of raisins. 1794 Sullivan View Nat. II. 367 The many and great atchievements attributed to heroes of the first ages. 1824 Dibdin Libr. Comp. 161 The achievements of Agincourt and Waterloo. 1855 Brewster Newton II. xxvii. 398 The achievements of genius, like the source from which they spring, are indestructible. |
3. Her. An escutcheon or ensign armorial, granted in memory of some achievement, or distinguished feat. (In this sense variously contracted or corrupted to atcheament, achement, atch'ment, ach'ment, achment, hachement, hatchment.)
| 1548 Hall Chronicle, Henry V, 50 The Hachementes wer borne onely by capitaynes. 1586 J. Ferne Blazon of Gentrie 186 The creast, tymber, mantell, or worde, bee no part of the coat-armour; they be addicions called atcheaments. 1610 J. Guillim Displ. Heraldry vi. v. 394 An Atchievement, according to Leigh, is the Arms of every Gentleman, well marshalled with the supporters, Helmet, Wreath and Crests, etc. 1750 Gray Let. in Poems (1775) 214 To raise the cieling's fretted height, Each pannel in achievements cloathing. 1809 W. Taylor in Robberds Memoir II. 283 Let no motto be written upon its ach'ment but Resurgam. 1868 Stanley Westm. Abb. iv. 201 Graves, piled with the standards and achievements of the noble families of Florence. |
4. Psychol. Chiefly U.S. Performance in a standardized test (achievement test) or tests. So achievement age, achievement quotient (abbrev. A.Q.): see quot. 1921.
| 1921 Univ. Illin. Bur. Educ. Res. Bull. VI. 5 Medians are the mental age norms, which are used as a basis for translating the point scores into achievement ages. Ibid., Provision is made for comparing a pupil's achievement score..with the norm corresponding to his mental age by dividing his achievement age by the standard score for his mental age. This quotient is called the Achievement Quotient. Ibid., The plan consists of establishing for the achievement tests mental age norms which are used to supplement the usual grade norms. 1934 Warren Dict. Psychol. 1/1 AQ, abbrev. for accomplishment (or achievement) quotient. 1957 Encycl. Brit. XVIII. 673/2 Tests of proficiencies, also called achievement tests, are intended to measure outcomes of systematic education and training in school or occupation toward a conventionally accepted pattern of skill or knowledge... Several subject tests may be combined into an achievement battery for measuring general school proficiency either in point scores or ‘achievement ages’ and perhaps ‘accomplishment quotients’ (AA/CA). |
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Add: [4.] b. Special Comb. achievement motivation, motivation to attain a desired end or level of performance, esp. where a degree of competitiveness is involved; the drive to excel through addressing and succeeding at difficult tasks.
| 1949 McClelland & Liberman in Jrnl. Personality XVIII. 247 Our measures of n Achievement are not reflecting simply a temporary motivational state but do in fact represent..the level of *achievement motivation a subject maintains over a period of months. 1953 D. C. McClelland et al. Achievement Motive v. 145 As achievement motivation is increased, the imaginative stories that subjects write become increasingly more concerned with achievement. 1962 Listener 11 Jan. 61/1 Tests of what is known as ‘achievement motivation’ do discriminate between over- and under-achievers. 1982 Psychol. Rep. L. 51 One aspect of training children that seems instrumental in the development of achievement motivation is maternal expectancies for achievement. |