The Formation of Ability Conceptions: Developmental Trend or Social Construction?

This paper examines a growing literature on the ways in which children develop conceptions of their own and their peers’ intellectual abilities, a phenomenon we will call ability formation. We show that this literature may be integrated usefully under a recently developed theory regarding the ways in which schools construct academic ability as a reality experienced by students. We argue that this perspective offers an advance on developmental interpretations of findings in this area.