scholarly journals Teachers' implicit beliefs about (mathematical) intelligence

2020 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
pp. 151-170
Author(s):  
Luna Radević ◽  
Ivona Jerković ◽  
Ilija Milovanović

Implicit theories of intelligence are individual beliefs about the nature of intelligence, which are used on a daily basis as part of self-assessment and assessment of others, and are a significant factor shaping attitudes and behaviors. Research to date suggests that teachers can influence their students' beliefs about intelligence, which in turn affect motivation and achievement. According to Dweck's model, implicit theories of intelligence are a bipolar construct, with two theories at its extremes - the entity theory, which stresses the immutability of intelligence, and the incremental theory, which holds that intelligence can be improved through training and learning. Recent research, however, indicates that these two theories represent distinct, uncorrelated dimensions. The aim of this study was to carry out a psychometric evaluation of the Implicit Theories of Intelligence Scale (ITIS) and the Mathematics-Oriented Implicit Theory of Intelligence Scale (MOITIS). 228 primary and secondary school teachers in Serbia (87.7% female; average age 42.79 years) took part in the study. The results of factor analysis suggest the existence of two factors on both scales: incremental theory and entity theory. Further analysis showed that both factors of the ITIS and MOITIS scales have satisfactory psychometric properties. Significant differences were detected between primary and secondary school teachers on the ITIS scale. More specifically, among teachers of science subjects, mathematics and medical subjects the attitude that intelligence is a fixed trait is more pronounced than among teachers of the arts, humanities and social sciences.

Author(s):  
Aleksandra Đurović ◽  
Sonja Protić ◽  
Ana Altaras Dimitrijević

Abstract. This study looked into the associations between parents’ implicit theories of intelligence, children’s cognitive aptitude, and children’s tendency to opt for mastery-oriented responses to challenging achievement situations. All child participants ( N = 59, 31 girls; 6;3 – 7;2 years) were individually assessed for cognitive aptitude and mastery orientation, while one of their parents (46 mothers) completed a questionnaire on entity versus incremental beliefs about intelligence. Correlation analyses indicated a statistically significant negative association between parental endorsement of the incremental theory and children’s cognitive aptitude ( r = −.29), as well as between parental endorsement of the entity theory and children’s mastery orientation ( r = −.28). Moreover, two significant canonical functions emerged, one of which was defined by higher parental endorsement of the entity theory along with higher cognitive aptitude and lower mastery orientation of the child, while the second entailed higher parental endorsement of the incremental theory, lower cognitive aptitude of the child, and again, the child’s lower mastery orientation. While confirming the theoretically proposed negative association between parents’ entity beliefs and children’s mastery orientation, the present results challenge a unidimensional conception of implicit theories of intelligence and their assumed independence of cognitive aptitude; moreover, they stimulate several interpretations regarding the psychological mechanisms surrounding children’s lower mastery orientation.


2016 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 288-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sunhee Park ◽  
Carolyn M. Callahan ◽  
Ji Hoon Ryoo

The psychometric qualities of the six- and eight-item implicit theories of intelligence scales that Dweck suggested were compared using a confirmatory factor analysis with data from 239 gifted students (100 students in Grades 5–7, 139 students in Grades 8–11). The results indicate that the six-item scale fits the data better than the eight-item scale. The factor reliabilities of data from the six-item scale were .853 for the entity theory and .878 for the incremental theory. We found evidence for measurement invariance across age and gender using measurement and structural invariance tests. Using the scale to investigate the beliefs about intelligence of gifted students and the association between their beliefs about intelligence and goal orientations, we found that the higher the incremental theory held by gifted students, the higher the learning goals they tend to pursue. Older students had a greater tendency to hold an entity theory than younger students.


2017 ◽  
Vol 225 (2) ◽  
pp. 146-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivar Bråten ◽  
Andreas Lien ◽  
John Nietfeld

Abstract. In two experiments with Norwegian undergraduates and one experiment with US undergraduates, we examined the potential effects of brief task instructions aligned with incremental and entity views of intelligence on students’ performance on a rational thinking task. The research demonstrated that even brief one-shot task instructions that deliver a mindset about intelligence intervention can be powerful enough to affect students’ performance on such a task. This was only true for Norwegian male students, however. Moreover, it was the task instruction aligned with an entity theory of intelligence that positively affected Norwegian male students’ performance on the rational thinking task, with this unanticipated finding speaking to the context- and culture-specificity of implicit theories of intelligence interventions.


2021 ◽  
pp. 003329412110091
Author(s):  
Aikaterini Gkolia ◽  
Nikolaos Tsigilis ◽  
Maria Evangelou ◽  
Athanasios Koustelios

The purpose of this study was to investigate the applicability of the Principal Leadership Questionnaire (PLQ) to Greek educational context and to present the most important aspects describing educational leadership in a centralized educational context. It was sought to examine; a) the factorial structure of PLQ b) its invariance across teachers’ levels of education and c) its concurrent validity. Data were collected from 730 Greek primary and secondary school teachers of 77 schools. Teachers were asked to fill in the PLQ and Teacher’s Satisfaction Inventory (TSI). A bi-factor model was selected as the most tenable among five completive PLQ structures to describe teachers’ responses. Moreover, PLQ was found to be invariant across primary and secondary school teachers. Multiple-group analysis results indicate that primary, compared to secondary school teachers, reported more often that their principals behave as a transformational leader. On the contrary, secondary school teachers’ perceptions revealed that their principal implemented practices related to factor “intellectual; stimulation” more often than primary school teachers. Structural equation modeling showed that the general factor of the PLQ significantly and substantially predicted the “principal” facet of teachers’ job satisfaction, providing evidence of concurrent validity of the Greek version of the PLQ. Implications and suggestions for future research and policy are discussed.


Author(s):  
Olga Granichina ◽  
Svetlana Surikova

The article discusses the possibilities, problems and prospects of using distance learning in the process of training primary and secondary school teachers. The presented results are based on a survey of students and undergraduates of one of the largest pedagogical universities in Russia. The identified problems that was based on data processing, are presented in an ordered form. The authors suggest possible solutions to problems based on many years of experience in using distance learning technologies in training of future teachers.


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