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Abstract:

Beliefs about academic functioning (e.g., academic self-concept) play an important role in the academic development of students. In this study, we considered perceptions about underachievement, that is, whether accomplishments are believed to be in line with potential, distinguishing between three perspectives (students, parents and teachers). In particular, we examined why these perceptions might deviate from measured underachievement. First, we expected that at a given level of measured underachievement, girls would be less likely to be perceived as underachievers than boys, as previous research has suggested that while male underperformance is often recognized as such, low performance by girls is rather attributed to an inherent lack of ability (e.g., Mok et al., 2011). Second, we hypothesized that highly intelligent underachievers risk to stay unnoticed, as the absolute level of performance of these students often still is acceptable (e.g., at a class average level). Perceptions about underachievement (Snyder & Adelson, 2017) were surveyed in a sample of 3,298 Grade 7 students, their parents and their teachers. These perceptions were contrasted with measured underachievement, determined by regressing achievement outcomes (either school grades or standardized test results) on cognitive ability scores (CoVaT-CHC). Correlations between perceived and measured underachievement were moderate (e.g. with underachievement measured in terms of GPA: self-perceptions: r = .40, parent perceptions: r = .47, teacher perceptions: r = .34). In a series of multilevel models to account for the nesting of students into classes, underachievement perceptions (from the three perspectives) were then predicted as a function of measured underachievement, gender and cognitive ability. Over all operationalizations, girls were consistently less likely to be perceived as underachievers than boys with a similar level of measured underachievement. Moreover, cognitive ability was negatively associated with perceived underachievement, suggesting that underachievement may remain unnoticed among high potential students. Implications for educational practice will be discussed.