fixed mindset

Purpose Academic procrastination (AP) is a pervasive self-regulatory problem that undermines students’ academic functioning and psychological well-being. This study examined the direct and indirect relationships between growth and fixed mindsets, internal and external locus of control, and AP in sports science students. Method Internal and external locus of control were tested as parallel mediators in separate growth and fixed mindset models. A cross-sectional predictive design was employed with 544 undergraduate sports science students in Eastern Anatolia, Türkiye. Participants completed measures of mindset, locus of control, and AP. Parallel mediation analyses were conducted using PROCESS Macro (Model 4) with 5,000 bootstrap samples, controlling for age and gender. Results The direct effects indicated that a growth mindset was negatively associated with AP, whereas a fixed mindset was positively associated with AP. A growth mindset was positively associated with an internal locus of control and negatively associated with an external locus of control, whereas a fixed mindset was negatively associated with an internal locus of control and positively associated with an external locus of control. An external locus of control was positively associated with AP and significantly mediated the relationships between both mindset dimensions and AP. In contrast, the internal locus of control did not significantly mediate either relationship. Male students reported higher AP levels than female students, and age was negatively associated with AP. Conclusion These findings suggest that an external locus of control is a key behavioral mechanism linking mindset beliefs to AP. Interventions targeting maladaptive external control beliefs may help reduce AP among sports science students.

Objectives Cross-cultural equivalence translations of the widely used Implicit Theories of Intelligence Scale (ITIS) into Chinese are limited. Past research has focused on Western educational contexts, and Eastern cultural perspectives have been overlooked. This study aimed to translate and validate the Chinese version of the ITIS, and assess the growth mindset in undergraduate medical students. Methods This study was conducted among final-year undergraduate medical students in Fujian, China. Following forward and back-translation of the Implicit Theories of Intelligence Scale (ITIS), cognitive interviews were conducted with students to assess the clarity and comprehensibility of the translated items, followed by an online survey distributed through medical schools. Construct validity, convergent validity, and discriminant validity were evaluated using confirmatory factor analysis. Internal consistency was assessed using Cronbach's alpha and composite reliability (CR), while test–retest reliability was evaluated separately for the Fixed Mindset and Growth Mindset dimensions using the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). Results A total of 444 responses were obtained. Confirmatory factor analysis supported a two-factor structure with satisfactory model fit ( χ 2 = 52.293, df = 17, CMIN/DF = 3.076, CFI = 0.984, NFI = 0.977, RFI = 0.962, IFI = 0.984, TLI = 0.974, RMSEA = 0.068, SRMR = 0.059). Standardized factor loadings were satisfactory, while CR values were 0.908 for Fixed Mindset and 0.910 for Growth Mindset, and AVE values were 0.713 and 0.717, respectively, supporting convergent validity. Discriminant validity was supported by the Fornell–Larcker criterion, AVE values exceeding the corresponding maximum shared variance values, and HTMT ratios below 0.90. Test–retest reliability differed between the two dimensions: the Fixed Mindset dimension demonstrated moderate temporal stability (ICC = 0.662, 95% CI: 0.443–0.806), whereas the Growth Mindset dimension showed limited temporal stability (ICC = 0.159, 95% CI: −0.158–0.446). The mean scores for Fixed Mindset items ranged from 2.64 (SD = 1.09) to 2.86 (SD = 1.56), whereas those for Growth Mindset items ranged from 3.81 (SD = 1.16) to 3.96 (SD = 1.21), indicating relatively stronger endorsement of fixed-mindset beliefs in this sample. Conclusions The Chinese version of the ITIS is a valid and reliable instrument for assessing the intelligence mindset of medical students.

This study explores how senior high school students make meaning of underachievement through the lens of growth mindset. Underachievement is often reduced to laziness, while students' subjective experiences remain underexplored. A qualitative design with interpretative phenomenological analysis was used. Five students identified as underachieving were selected purposively, and a counseling teacher and a classroom teacher served as supporting informants. Data were gathered through in-depth semi-structured interviews, observation during interviews, and relevant documentation, then analyzed through repeated reading, initial noting, theme development, and cross-case analysis. Six themes emerged: feeling academically not good enough, fear of failure and environmental expectations, the conflict between potential and performance, avoidance of academic challenges, self-reflection on failure, and the emergence of growth mindset as a reinterpretation of ability. Underachievement was lived as a threat to academic identity sustained by fixed beliefs about ability, and avoidance functioned as self-protection that limited development. Growth mindset appeared not as a ready-made trait but as a gradual process triggered by reflection and supportive relationships, coexisting with lingering doubt. School counseling should therefore address how students interpret failure, not only their academic performance.

این پژوهش به بررسی چگونگی معنابخشی دانش‌آموزان دبیرستانی به عملکرد پایین از منظر ذهنیت رشد می‌پردازد. عملکرد پایین اغلب به تنبلی تقلیل داده می‌شود، در حالی که تجارب ذهنی دانش‌آموزان کمتر مورد توجه قرار گرفته است. این مطالعه با رویکرد کیفی و تحلیل پدیدارشناختی تفسیری انجام شده است. پنج دانش‌آموز که به عنوان دارای عملکرد پایین شناسایی شدند به صورت هدفمند انتخاب شدند و یک مشاور مدرسه و یک معلم کلاس به عنوان مطلعان پشتیبان حضور داشتند. داده‌ها از طریق مصاحبه‌های عمیق نیمه‌ساختاریافته، مشاهده در حین مصاحبه و اسناد مرتبط گردآوری و از طریق خوانش مکرر، یادداشت‌برداری اولیه، توسعه مضامین و تحلیل بین‌موردی تحلیل شدند. شش مضمون استخراج شد: احساس ناکافی بودن از نظر تحصیلی، ترس از شکست و انتظارات محیطی، تعارض بین توان بالقوه و عملکرد، اجتناب از چالش‌های تحصیلی، تأمل بر شکست و ظهور ذهنیت رشد به عنوان بازتفسیر توانایی. عملکرد پایین به عنوان تهدیدی برای هویت تحصیلی تجربه می‌شد که با باورهای ثابت درباره توانایی تداوم می‌یافت و اجتناب، نقش محافظت از خود را ایفا می‌کرد که رشد را محدود می‌ساخت. ذهنیت رشد نه به عنوان یک ویژگی از پیش موجود، بلکه به عنوان فرایندی تدریجی که با تأمل و روابط حمایتی برانگیخته می‌شود و همزمان با تردیدهای باقی‌مانده همزیستی دارد، ظاهر شد. بنابراین، مشاوره مدرسه باید به نحوه تفسیر شکست توسط دانش‌آموزان بپردازد، نه صرفاً عملکرد تحصیلی آنان.

Understanding students' cost perceptions in introductory science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses and what precedes them is critical in preventing the considerable loss of talent in STEM.In this study, we examined the extent to which students' fixed mindset at the beginning of a semester predicts their weekly task effort and emotional cost perceptions.We also examined indirect associations of a fixed mindset with weekly perceived learning, STEM career intentions at the end of the semester, and final achievement, via weekly cost perceptions.Participants were 694 college students in introductory chemistry at a large midwestern university in the United States.Using multilevel structural equation modeling, we found that students with a greater endorsement of a fixed mindset tended to perceive higher task effort cost.Furthermore, students' fixed mindset indirectly predicted lower perceived learning, STEM career intentions, and achievement via higher perceived task effort cost.Fixed mindset did not significantly predict emotional cost perceptions.This study offers both theoretical insights and practical implications by demonstrating the differential predictions of mindsets across cost dimensions and identifying mindsets as a precursor of task effort cost. Educational Impact and Implications StatementCost is a key motivational factor contributing to college student attrition from science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) majors.This study shows that college students' beliefs in the innateness and fixedness of intelligence (i.e., fixed mindset) predicted their higher effort cost perceptions in an introductory chemistry course over a semester, which in turn was linked to lower perceived learning, STEM career intentions, and achievement.These findings underscore the potential of lowering a fixed mindset in STEM college students to enhance student learning and achievement by mitigating their perceptions of effort cost.Such efforts should also promote retention in STEM fields.

درک ادراک هزینه دانشجویان در دوره‌های مقدماتی علوم، فناوری، مهندسی و ریاضیات (STEM) و عوامل پیشین آن‌ها، برای جلوگیری از از دست رفتن قابل توجه استعدادها در حوزه STEM حیاتی است. در این مطالعه، میزان پیش‌بینی ذهنیت ثابت دانشجویان در ابتدای ترم برای ادراک هفتگی هزینه تلاش وظیفه و هزینه هیجانی آن‌ها بررسی شد. همچنین ارتباطات غیرمستقیم ذهنیت ثابت با یادگیری ادراک‌شده هفتگی، قصد ادامه مسیر شغلی در STEM در پایان ترم و دستاورد نهایی، از طریق ادراک هفتگی هزینه، مورد بررسی قرار گرفت. شرکت‌کنندگان شامل ۶۹۴ دانشجوی دانشگاهی در درس شیمی مقدماتی در یک دانشگاه بزرگ در منطقه غرب میانه ایالات متحده بودند. با استفاده از مدل‌سازی معادلات ساختاری چندسطحی، مشخص شد دانشجویانی که ذهنیت ثابت بیشتری داشتند، هزینه تلاش وظیفه بالاتری را ادراک می‌کردند. علاوه بر این، ذهنیت ثابت دانشجویان به طور غیرمستقیم، یادگیری ادراک‌شده پایین‌تر، قصد ادامه مسیر شغلی در STEM و دستاورد پایین‌تر را از طریق ادراک بالاتر هزینه تلاش وظیفه پیش‌بینی می‌کرد. ذهنیت ثابت، پیش‌بینی معناداری برای ادراک هزینه هیجانی نداشت. این مطالعه با نشان دادن پیش‌بینی‌های افتراقی ذهنیت‌ها در ابعاد مختلف هزینه و شناسایی ذهنیت به عنوان پیش‌زمینه هزینه تلاش وظیفه، بینش‌های نظری و پیامدهای عملی ارائه می‌دهد. بیانیه تأثیر و پیامدهای آموزشی: هزینه، عامل انگیزشی کلیدی در ترک تحصیل دانشجویان دانشگاهی از رشته‌های علوم، فناوری، مهندسی و ریاضیات (STEM) است. این مطالعه نشان می‌دهد باور دانشجویان دانشگاهی به ذاتی و ثابت بودن هوش (یعنی ذهنیت ثابت)، ادراک هزینه تلاش بالاتر را در طول یک ترم در درس شیمی مقدماتی پیش‌بینی می‌کند که به نوبه خود با یادگیری ادراک‌شده پایین‌تر، قصد ادامه مسیر شغلی در STEM و دستاورد پایین‌تر مرتبط بود. این یافته‌ها بر اهمیت کاهش ذهنیت ثابت در دانشجویان STEM برای ارتقای یادگیری و دستاورد دانشجویان از طریق کاهش ادراک هزینه تلاش تأکید می‌کند. چنین تلاش‌هایی باید به افزایش ماندگاری در حوزه‌های STEM نیز کمک کند.