In plain language
Does positive thinking help students get better grades, or is school success mostly a matter of raw intelligence? This study followed 639 Australian high school students for three years to find out, measuring their verbal and numerical ability plus three “positive thinking” traits—hope, self-esteem, and optimistic attributional style—in Grade 7, and then collecting their exam grades in English, Math, Science, and History at the end of Grade 10.
Cognitive ability was, as expected, the strongest predictor of grades three years later. But it was not the whole story. In a regression analysis, trait hope—a student’s belief that they can find routes to their goals and keep moving toward them—predicted grades even after accounting for verbal and numerical aptitude. Self-esteem, by contrast, was a weak and inconsistent predictor.
Structural equation modelling showed that hope, self-esteem, and attributional style formed a broader “positive thinking” factor that predicted grades alongside general intelligence and gender (girls outperformed boys). Because intelligence is hard to change but positive thinking is a common target of cognitive behavioural interventions, the authors argue that building hope may be a practical way to help students make the most of their abilities.
Key findings
- Verbal and numerical aptitude in Grade 7 were the strongest correlates of Grade 10 achievement, with correlations up to .73 with total grade.
- Trait hope in Grade 7 predicted total grades and every individual subject three years later, and remained a unique predictor after controlling for cognitive ability and gender.
- Self-esteem was the weakest predictor, correlating significantly only with Science grades—consistent with longitudinal evidence questioning self-esteem’s causal role in achievement.
- Positive attributional style was significantly related to every outcome except Mathematics.
- In structural equation modelling, a second-order positive thinking factor (hope, self-esteem, attributional style) predicted grades over and above psychometric g and gender (model fit: CFI = .93, RMSEA = .06).
- The full regression model explained 61% of the variance in academic performance; girls significantly outperformed boys on total Grade 10 grades.
How to cite
APA
Leeson, P., Ciarrochi, J., & Heaven, P. C. L. (2008). Cognitive ability, personality, and academic performance in adolescence. Personality and Individual Differences, 45, 630–635. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2008.07.006
BibTeX
@article{leeson2008cognitive,
title = {Cognitive ability, personality, and academic performance in adolescence},
author = {Leeson, Peter and Ciarrochi, Joseph and Heaven, Patrick C. L.},
journal = {Personality and Individual Differences},
volume = {45},
pages = {630--635},
year = {2008},
doi = {10.1016/j.paid.2008.07.006}
}
Related work
- All publications by Joseph Ciarrochi (searchable, with free PDFs)
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Author: Joseph Ciarrochi (ORCID 0000-0003-0471-8100). Free copy hosted with permission for scholarly use. Please cite the published version via the DOI above.