THE IMPLICIT THEORIES OF INTELLIGENCE FROM A DEVELOPMENTAL PERSPECTIVE

The implicit theories of intelligence are sets of personal beliefs about the nature of intelligence. According to Dweck and her colleagues (Dweck, 1986; Dweck & Leggett, 1988; Dweck & Master, 2008) peoples' implicit perspectives about intelligence are structured around two opposite core beliefs: intelligence is either viewed as a fixed entity genetically inherited (an entity theory), or it is viewed as a malleable and developing attribute (an incremental theory). In school settings, research has found that the students’ dominant implicit theory of intelligence has important consequences on their motivation, involvement in learning, autonomy in self-regulated learning abilities, attributions, attitudes, self-efficacy and self-concept, feelings, social and academic behavior and as a consequence on their learning outcomes. In general, an incremental theory of intelligence correlates with higher academic achievement and this relation could be mediated by the students' learning goals (Leondari & Gialamas, 2002). Previous studies suggests that most children have an incremental theory of intelligence until about 10-12 years old and after the entity theory becomes prevalent (in Jones et al., 2012). The aims of this study are: 1. To explore the development of the students' implicit theory of intelligence and 2. to investigate a possible relation between students' implicit theory of intelligence and their learning and performance goals. The participants were 127 students aged 8 to 18 years, 77 females and 50 males. The assessment instruments were: An open-ended item titled "Definition of intelligence" (Jones et al., 2009); The Implicit Theory of Intelligence Scale (ITIS; Abd-El Fattah & Yates, 2005); Learning and Performance Goal Orientation Scale (Button et al., 1996). The overall results indicate significant correlations between the students' implicit theories of intelligence and their learning goals.