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This article presents two independent studies of Finnish teachers' conceptions of giftedness and considers whether it is a malleable or fixed quality. The first qualitative study examined elementary school teachers' (N = 212) conceptions via inductiveoriented content analysis, whereas the second study measured teachers' (elementary n = 184, secondary n = 279) conceptions with a quantitative approach. According to teachers' open-ended definitions, giftedness was seen to be multidimensional and a characteristic that differentiates the person from others. Giftedness was also described via cognitive, creative, and motivational features of the gifted. Furthermore, the two independent studies suggest quite different views on how Finnish teachers understand the developmental nature of giftedness: The first indicates that the developmental nature of giftedness was not frequently mentioned, whereas the second found that a malleable view of giftedness (i.e., a growth mindset) was dominant. Thus, this article highlights a need for in-depth and mixed-methods research designs to study how teachers see the developing nature of giftedness.

This article examines how school children and adolescents ( = 607) perceive the nature of talent development. More particularly it is investigated whether students perceive intelligence and giftedness as developing or as inherent and how students' perspectives on talent development are related to their learning outcomes. Participants were students in elementary ( = 200), lower secondary ( = 256), and upper secondary school ( = 151). The results showed that students perceived the nature of intelligence as more malleable than giftedness. Along with this domain-specific variance, there were also age and gender related differences in students' perceptions. By examining the relation between implicit beliefs and students' academic achievements, it was found that growth-oriented views about intelligence, but fixed ideas about giftedness, indicated higher math grades. The results suggest that the relationship between implicit beliefs and academic outcomes might not be as straightforward as previous studies have suggested.

The purpose of this paper is to present the results of research in which the Finnish public discussion of giftedness and gifted children, and conceptions of giftedness and gifted children presented in it, were examined. The research was conducted by analyzing articles from the Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat and the teachers' periodical Opettaja, using the content analysis method. The results show that giftedness is seen as multidimensional, and both intrapersonal and environmental contributions are recognized as essential in talent development. The conceptions of gifted children were quite diverse, and gifted children's possible problems were frequently discussed. Moreover, misunderstandings were revealed as well as areas that have not been adequately addressed.

This study examined Finnish elementary school teachers' (N=212) attitudes toward the gifted and their education. On a general level, teachers' attitudes toward the gifted education were slightly positive. Teachers saw that gifted students have social value and that they need special services. The results of teachers' attitudes toward specific gifted education options were in line with earlier Finnish research, as teachers supported differentiated teaching but were more negative toward acceleration or separating gifted into their own groups. However, despite the strong support to differentiated teaching for the gifted, teachers' positions toward practice were more skeptical.