Academic Self-Concepts in Ability Streams: Considering Domain Specificity and Same-Stream Peers

Abstract

The study examined the relations between academic achievement and self-concepts in a sample of 1,067 seventh-grade students from 3 core ability streams in Singapore secondary education. Although between-stream differences in achievement were large, between-stream differences in academic self-concepts were negligible. Within each stream, levels of students' achievement and their self-concepts were systematically related only when considered in the matching academic domain and the appropriate level of specificity. In English, lower achievers in the high-ability stream tended to underestimate their achievement, whereas higher achievers in the low-ability stream tended to overestimate their achievement. This pattern, however, was not evident in mathematics and the general academic domain. Taken together, the findings highlight the importance of considering the interplay of domain specificity and same-stream peers in academic self-concepts.

Potential‐based achievement goals

“…In the studies of the present research, we investigated US undergraduates in introductory‐level psychology courses. The restricted range in terms of age, culture, and academic subject may be considered a limitation of our work; future research is needed to extend our findings to different age groups (e.g., De Lange, Van Yperen, Van der Heijden, & Bal, ), different cultures (e.g., Wu, ), and different academic subjects (e.g., Liem, McInerney, & Yeung, ).…”

Attainment Grouping as self-fulfilling prophesy? A mixed methods exploration of self confidence and set level among Year 7 students

“…This contrasted to findings from a prior study which found that students in schools using 'moderate levels of setting' had higher general self-concept; and that setting in English tended to lower the self-concepts of the higher attaining pupils and to raise the self-concepts of lower attaining pupils ). In their Singaporean study of streaming (tracking), Liem et al (2015) found that between-stream differences in academic selfconcepts were negligible, where in the same national context Liu et al (2005) found that streaming appeared to have a short-term negative impact on lower-'ability' stream students' academic selfconcept (albeit they also found this relationship reduced over a three year period). Belfi et al's (2012) literature review surprisingly concluded that 'ability' grouping is beneficial for the academic self-concept of lower attaining students.…”

Implicit Theories of Intelligence and Achievement Goals: A Look at Students’ Intrinsic Motivation and Achievement in Mathematics

“…This study focuses on lower-progress students because empirical studies have suggested that in general, lower-progress students relative to higher-progress have motivational related issues such as lower intrinsic motivation and self-determination (e.g., Chow and Yong, 2013 ; O’Shea et al, 2017 ), and lower self-esteem, more negative self-concepts, and poorer social adaptation ( Safree et al, 2009 ). Studies in Singapore have indeed found that lower-progress students had significantly lower mathematics achievements and mathematics self-concept than higher-progress students ( Liem et al, 2015 ). In addition, lower-progress students were overrepresented in more maladaptive clusters that had lower intrinsic motivation and mathematics performance and higher anxiety and boredom compared to higher-progress students ( Jang and Liu, 2012 ).…”