Three Paradoxical Effects on Academic Self-Concept Across Countries, Schools, and Students
Frame-of-Reference as a Unifying Theoretical Explanation
Abstract
Abstract. We simultaneously resolve three paradoxes in academic self-concept research with a single unifying meta-theoretical model based on frame-of-reference effects across 68 countries, 18,292 schools, and 485,490 15-year-old students. Paradoxically, but consistent with predictions, effects on math self-concepts were negative for:
- •being from countries where country-average achievement was high; explaining the paradoxical cross-cultural self-concept effect;
- •attending schools where school-average achievement was high; demonstrating big-fish-little-pond-effects (BFLPE) that generalized over 68 countries, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)/non-OECD countries, high/low achieving schools, and high/low achieving students;
- •year-in-school relative to age; unifying different research literatures for associated negative effects for starting school at a younger age and acceleration/skipping grades, and positive effects for starting school at an older age (“academic red shirting”) and, paradoxically, even for repeating a grade.
Contextual effects matter, resulting in significant and meaningful effects on self-beliefs, not only at the student (year in school) and local school level (BFLPE), but remarkably even at the macro-contextual country-level. Finally, we juxtapose cross-cultural generalizability based on Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) data used here with generalizability based on meta-analyses, arguing that although the two approaches are similar in many ways, the generalizability shown here is stronger in terms of support for the universality of the frame-of-reference effects.
References
2009). Quality of research design moderates effects of grade retention on achievement: A meta-analytic, multi-level analysis. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 31, 480–499. https://doi.org/10.3102/0162373709352239
(2006). Toward a psychology of human agency. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 1, 164–180.
(1985). Special class placement, level of intelligence, and the self-concepts of gifted children: A social comparison perspective. Remedial and Special Education, 6, 7–11. https://doi.org/10.1177/074193258500600103
(2009). Who am I and what am I going to do with my life? Personal and collective identities as motivators of action. Educational Psychologist, 44, 78–89. https://doi.org/10.1080/00461520902832368
(2005).
(Competence and motivation: Competence as the core of achievement motivation . In A. J. ElliotC. S. DweckEds., Handbook of competence and motivation (pp. 3–12). New York, NY: Guilford Press.1996). The pictorial scale of perceived competence and social acceptance: Does it work with low-income urban children? Child Development, 67, 1071–1084.
(1954). A theory of social comparison processes. Human Relations, 7, 117–140.
(2008). Outliers. New York, NY: Little, Brown and Company.
(1988).
(A social-cognitive account of the self’s development . In D. K. LapsleyF. C. PowerEds., Self, ego and identity: Interpretative approaches (pp. 30–42). New York, NY: Springer.2015). Achievement, motivation, and educational choices: A longitudinal study of expectancy and value using a multiplicative perspective. Developmental Psychology, 51, 1163–1176. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0039440
(2012). Visible learning: A synthesis of 800 + meta-analyses on achievement. Abingdon, UK: Routledge.
(2010). Cultures and organizations: Software of the mind (3rd ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
(1890/1963). The principles of psychology (Vol. 2, New York, NY: Holt.
(1995). Considering children’s early development and learning: Toward common views and vocabulary (Report N. 95–03). Washington, DC: National Education Goals Pane
(1984). Self-concept: The application of a frame of reference model to explain paradoxical results. Australian Journal of Education, 28, 165–181.
(1987). The big-fish-little-pond effect on academic self-concept. Journal of Educational Psychology, 79, 280–295.
(2016). Cross-cultural generalizability of year in school effects: Negative effects of acceleration and positive effects of retention on academic self-concept. Journal of Educational Psychology, 108, 256–273. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000059
(2014). The big-fish-little-pond effect in mathematics: A cross-cultural comparison of US and Saudi Arabian TIMSS responses. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 45, 777–804. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022022113519858
(2015). The big-fish-little-pond effect: Generalizability of social comparison processes over two age cohorts from Western, Asian, and Middle Eastern Islamic countries. Journal of Educational Psychology, 107, 258–271.
(2009). Gender effects in the peer reviews of grant proposals: A comprehensive meta-analysis comparing traditional and multilevel approaches. Review of Educational Research, 79, 1290–1326.
(2006). Reciprocal effects of self-concept and performance from a multidimensional perspective: Beyond seductive pleasure and unidimensional perspectives. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 1, 133–163. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-6916.2006.00010.x
(2003). Big-fish-little-pond-effect on academic self-concept. A cross-cultural (26 country) test of the negative effects of academically selective schools. The American Psychologist, 58, 364–376.
(2001). Reunification of East and West German school systems: Longitudinal multilevel modeling study of the big-fish-little-pond effect on academic self-concept. American Educational Research Journal, 38, 321
(2014). Big-fish-little-pond social comparison and local dominance effects: Integrating new statistical models, methodology, design, theory and substantive implications. Learning and Instruction, 33, 50–66. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.learninstruc.2014.04.0020959-4752/
(2008). Reciprocal effects between academic self-concept, self-esteem, achievement, and attainment over seven adolescent years: Unidimensional and multidimensional perspectives of self-concept. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 34, 542–552. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167207312313
(2004).
(In the looking glass: A reciprocal effect model elucidating the complex nature of bullying, psychological determinants, and the central role of self-concept . In C. E. SandersG. D. PhyeEds., Bullying: Implications for the classroom (pp. 63–109). San Diego, CA: Elsevier Academic Press.1984). Determinants of student self-concept: Is it better to be a relatively large fish in a small pond even if you don’t learn to swim as well? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 47, 213–231.
(2016). Long-term positive effects of repeating a year in school: Six-year longitudinal study of self-beliefs, anxiety, social relations, school grades, and test scores. Journal of Educational Psychology. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000144
(2015).
(The Big-fish-little-pond effect, competence self-perceptions, and relativity: Substantive advances and methodological innovation . In A. J. ElliottEd., Advances in Motivation Science (Vol. 2, pp. 127–184). New York, NY: Elsevier.2008). The big-fish-little-pond-effect stands up to critical scrutiny: implications for theory, methodology, and future research. Educational Psychology Review, 20, 319–350. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-008-9075-6
(1997). Coursework selection: Relations to academic self-concept and achievement. American Educational Research Journal, 34, 691–720.
(2008). Self-enhancement and self-stability predict school achievement at the national level. Cross-Cultural Research, 42, 172–196. https://doi.org/10.1177/1069397107312956
(2012). Big fish in little ponds aspire more: Mediation and cross-cultural generalizability of school-average ability effects on self-concept and career aspirations in science. Journal of Educational Psychology, 104, 1033–1053. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0027697
(2014). Juxtaposing math self-efficacy and self-concept as predictors of long-term achievement outcomes. Educational Psychology, 34, 29–48. https://doi.org/10.1080/01443410.2013.797339
(2018). An Information Distortion Model of social class differences in math self-concept, intrinsic value and utility value. Journal of Educational Psychology, 110, 445–463. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000215
(2018). The negative year in school effect: Extending scope and strengthening causal claims. Journal of Educational Psychology. Advance Online publication. https://doi.org/10.1037/2Fedu0000270
(2018). Girls get smart, boys get smug: Historical changes in gender differences math, English, and academic social comparison and achievement. Learning and Instruction, 54, 125–137. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.learninstruc.2017.09.002
(2006). The control-value theory of achievement emotions: Assumptions, corollaries, and implications for educational research and practice. Educational Psychology Review, 18, 315–341. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-006-9029-9
(2009). Earning its place as a pan-human theory: Universality of the big-fish-little-pond effect across 41 culturally diverse countries. Journal of Educational Psychology, 101, 403–419.
(2000). Positive psychology: An introduction. The American Psychologist, 55, 5–14. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.55.1.5
(2006). The paradoxical relationship between students’ achievement and their self-perceptions: A cross-national analysis based on three waves of TIMSS data. Proceedings of the IRC-2006, The 2nd IEA International Research Conference, 1, 43–60.
(1993). Motivation and achievement of gifted children in East Asia and the United States. Journal for the Education of the Gifted, 16, 223–250.
(