Conceptions of Self - Academic Self-concept

Academic Self-concept

Academic Self-Concept (ASC) refers to the personal beliefs someone develops about their academic abilities or skills. A person's ASC develops and evolves as they age. Research by Tiedemann (2000) suggests that ASC begins developing in early childhood, from age 3 to 5, due to parental /family and early educators’ influences. Other research contends that ASC does not develop until age 7 or 8 when children begin evaluating their own academic abilities based on the feedback they receive from parents, teachers and their peers. According to Rubie-Davis (2006), by age 10 or 11 children view their academic abilities by comparing themselves to their peers.

Due to the variety of social factors that influence one’s ASC, developing a positive ASC has been related to people’s behaviours and emotions in other domains of their life, influencing one’s happiness, self-esteem, and anxiety levels to name a few. Due to the significant impact ASC has on a person’s life, fostering positive self-concept development in children should be an important goal of any educational system.

These research findings are important because they have practical implications for parents and teachers. Research by Craven et al. (1991) indicates that parents and teachers need to provide children with specific feedback that focuses on their particular skills or expressed abilities in order to increase ASC. Other research suggests that learning opportunities should be conducted in a variety of mixed-ability and like-ability groupings that down-play social comparison because too much of either type of grouping can have adverse effects on children’s ASC in the way they view themselves in relation to their peers.