‘Smart students get perfect scores in tests without studying much’: why is an effortless achiever identity attractive, and for whom is it possible?
Abstract
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Discourses about the value of effort and hard work are prevalent and powerful in many western societies and educational contexts. Yet, paradoxically, in these same contexts effortless achievement is often lauded, and in certain discourses is heralded as the pinnacle of success and a sign of genius. In this paper we interrogate discourses about effort and especially ‘effortlessness’ in Swedish and English educational contexts. Informed, in particular, by interview data generated in upper secondary schools in Sweden and secondary schools in England, we address the questions: why is effortless achievement attractive, and for whom is it possible to be discursively positioned as an effortless achiever? We argue that the subject position of ‘effortless achiever’ is not available to all categories of students equally, and for some it would be almost impossible to attain; the intersections of gender, social class, ethnicity and institutional setting are influential. We end by considering the problematic implications of effortless achievement discourses.
... This, combined with the discourse of "effortless achievement" may encourage students to disguise and publicly minimise the academic labour that they are engaged in (Jackson, 2006a). The value placed on "effortless" achievement may specifically disadvantage workingclass and some minority ethnic groups because it is easier for those students with greater access to resources to provide the impression of effortless achievement (Jackson and Nyström, 2015): ...
Using ethnographic methods, my research investigates the “problem” of A-level underachievement in inner-city London, motivated by professional and personal concern about the consequences of underachievement. Whilst there is a long history and rich field of sociological research considering issues of educational engagement and achievement in relation to class, ethnicity, and gender (e.g. Willis, 2000; Gillborn and Youdell, 2000; Reay, 2006; Archer and Francis, 2007), very little research is focused on A-level students. At the time of starting my research, Inner London had seen dramatic improvements in its GCSE achievement and was the second-best-performing region in the country (out-performed only by Outer London). However, by several measures, it was the worst-performing region in terms of A-level achievement. This chimed with my professional experience in an inner-city London school achieving well above the national average in terms of GCSE results and far below the national average in terms of A-level outcomes. I carried out fieldwork in a school and a sixth form college, each in socio-economically deprived and ethnically diverse areas of inner-city London, and conducted in-depth interviews with 24 A-level students who had previously underachieved or were anticipated to underachieve. I draw on a range of sociological literature to understand my data, including using Bourdieu’s (1986) theoretical framework, whilst also drawing on wider educational literature. I consider a wide range of issues but argue that students’ learning careers and cultural capital are central to understanding their A-level engagement and achievement. My research makes a contribution to the sociological literature on education, drawing attention to the neglected and distinct educational phase of sixth-form.
... Many emphasised how such constructions made invisible the hard work that the majority of students invested in their studies (often outside of 'visible' contact hours), and the high levels of stress many experienced as a result of the demands of their study programmes, and having to balance these demands with paid work, internships and family responsibilities (see Chapter 6). Thus, our study participants did not seek to present themselves -or to be viewed by others -as 'effortless achievers', in order to demonstrate 'authentic intelligence' or portray an image of being 'cool', as has been documented in some other studies which have explored the relationship between learner identities and narratives of hard work and effort (for example, Jackson and Nyström, 2015). They also did not try to position themselves as 'stress-less achievers' or people who were cruising through their degrees, ably balancing academic and non-academic activities and pursuits (for example, Nyström et al, 2019). ...
Amid debates about the future of both higher education and Europeanisation, this book is the first full-length exploration of how Europe’s 35 million students are understood by key social actors across different nations.
The various chapters compare and contrast conceptualisations in six nations, held by policymakers, higher education staff, media and students themselves. With an emphasis on students’ lived experiences, the authors provide new perspectives about how students are understood, and the extent to which European higher education is homogenising. They explore various prominent constructions of students – including as citizens, enthusiastic learners, future workers and objects of criticism.
... Cet objectif était en fait décomposé en deux sous-objectifs : le premier était de montrer qu'effectivement l'essentialisme renforce la menace et par extension le deuxième était de montrer que le nonessentialisme est une stratégie de réduction de la menace. Le premier sous-objectif prend la suite de l'étude de Dar-Nimrod et Heine (2006) (Jackson & Nyström, 2015). D'autre part, cette tendance à la légitimation et à la justification est valable pour les dominant·e·s ainsi que pour les dominé·e·s : chez les hommes comme chez les femmes dans la justification des différences genrées par exemple (Brescoll, Uhlmann, & Newman, 2013 (Haslam et al., 2000;Haslam & Levy, 2006). ...
La plupart des recherches a montré que l’effet de la menace du stéréotype pouvait être renforcé par l'essentialisme psychologique, c’est-à-dire par la croyance selon laquelle les caractéristiques de surface d’un groupe s’expliqueraient par une essence sous-jacente partagée par les membres de ce groupe. Dans cette thèse, nous envisageons le processus inverse en faisant l’hypothèse que la menace du stéréotype peut elle-même renforcer l’essentialisme psychologique. Selon nous, cet effet répondrait au besoin de justifier ou de rationaliser la situation d'échec dans laquelle la menace du stéréotype peut nous plonger. Ainsi, l'essentialisme offrirait cette possibilité car il serait plus confortable d’attribuer un échec à sa propre nature plutôt qu’à un manque d'apprentissage ou d'effort. De manière générale, l'essentialisme est étudié pour ses effets négatifs dans divers domaines et spécifiquement dans le paradigme de la menace du stéréotype. L'objectif englobant notre thèse est de dépasser cette conception sans toutefois la renier. Ainsi, nous tenterons d'observer l'utilité d'une telle croyance. En effet, il est possible de se demander, alors même que l’essentialisation peut renforcer la discrimination, pourquoi certaines personnes qui en sont elles-mêmes victimes usent de l’essentialisme en retour. Nous défendrons l’idée d’un essentialisme susceptible de constituer une stratégie défensive de soi, singulièrement efficace à un niveau individuel mais beaucoup moins désirable à un niveau plus groupal. Cette idée est particulièrement applicable à la menace du stéréotype dans notre optique de justification d’un échec. L'autre objectif général est d'étudier les tenants et aboutissants idéologiques de la menace du stéréotype.
... (Spain, HEI1) While various commentators have argued that, under conditions of marketisation, students have increasingly come to view a degree as a product to be bought, rather than a process of learning that requires effort on their part (e.g., Nixon et al., 2018), the responses above suggest that, not only did the focus group participants see the process of learning as central to their understandings of what it means to be a student, but also that they viewed it as not always easy and, often, requiring considerable effort. In general, there was no attempt to position themselves as 'effortless achievers' as a means of demonstrating their 'authentic intelligence', as has been documented in numerous studies of compulsory education, and some of HE (see, e.g., Jackson and Nystrom, 2015). ...
There are currently over 35 million students within Europe and yet, to date, we have no clear understanding of the extent to which understandings of ‘the student’ are shared across the continent. Thus, a central aim of this article is to investigate how the contemporary higher education student understands their own role, and the extent to which this differs both within nation-states and across them. This is significant in terms of implicit (and sometimes explicit) assumptions that are made about common understandings of ‘the student’ across Europe – underpinning, for example, initiatives to increase cross-border educational mobility and the wider development of a European Higher Education Area. Drawing on data from students across Europe – and particularly plasticine models participants made to represent their understanding of themselves as students – we argue that, in many cases, there is an important disconnect between the ways in which students are constructed within policy, and how they understand themselves. The models produced by participants typically foregrounded learning and hard work rather than more instrumental concerns commonly emphasised within policy. This brings into question assertions made in the academic literature that recent reforms have had a direct effect on the subjectivities of students, encouraging them to be more consumerist in their outlook. Nevertheless, we have also shown that student conceptualisations differ, to some extent, by nation-state, evident particularly in Spain and Poland, and by institution – most notably in England and Spain, which have the most vertically differentiated higher education systems. These differences suggest that, despite the ‘policy convergence’ manifest in the creation of a European Higher Education Area, understandings of what it means to be a student in Europe today remain contested.
This study proposes the multidimensional concept of ‘student behavior at university’ and methodology for its quantitative investigation. Unlike previous concepts related to aspects of the student experience, the idea of student behavior considers the combinations and interrelations of individual and environmental characteristics affecting student experience and outcomes. It provides a new lens for viewing student experience at university, highlighting the multifacetedness of this phenomenon and the diversity of possible patterns of student behavior. Based on the conceptual model, a ten-dimensional scale measuring student behavior was developed and validated through mixed-method research with an exploratory sequential design. The following dimensions of student behavior were identified: 1) interaction with course content in class; 2) persistence; 3) self-learning; 4) irresponsible learning behavior; 5) active learning; 6) friendship; 7) study collaboration; 8) obedience; 9) creating a positive self-image; and 10) extracurricular involvement. To develop a survey instrument, we utilized semistructured in-depth interviews with Russian students (n = 119). In the quantitative phase of the study, based on the survey (n = 1,253) carried out at seven highly selective Russian universities, we tested the reliability and validity of the ten-dimensional scale. To test construct-related validity, we utilized the self-determination theory developed by Ryan and Deci and a short version of the Academic Motivation Scale developed by Gordeeva, Sychev, and Osin for the Russian educational context. Our findings are in line with assumptions of self-determination theory and the results of previous studies and can be considered evidence of construct validity. The directions for further development of the methodological approach and its practical implications are discussed.
This chapter offers a systematic review of sociological research in England on the relationship between race/ethnicity and educational inequality between 1980 and 2017. Five major research traditions are identified: (1) political arithmetic; (2) racism and racial discrimination; (3) school effectiveness and inclusion; (4) culture and educational outcomes and (5) educational markets and educational outcomes, with research on 'racism and racial discrimination' as the most dominant research tradition. Most of the research conducted in England is characterized by the use of qualitative research methods and a more interpretative approach to social sciences and focuses on identifying inequality in educational experiences and outcomes of racial and ethnic minorities, particularly in relationship to young people of 'Black Caribbean/African', 'Pakistani', 'Indian' and 'Bangladeshi' background and, in later research contribution, children with a 'Chinese', 'Gypsy/Traveller/Roma' or 'Mixed-race’ background. This rich body of research is written in English and developed by educational sociologists who take a more critical stance towards government policies that are underpinned by assimilationist principles even though they are often manifested as apparently multicultural; and a market-led education system which stresses the importance of between-school competition, accountability and standardised testing.
In this article, we explore the identity work done by four male, working-class students who participate in a Swedish mechanical engineering program, with a focus on their participation in project work. A focus on how individuals negotiate their participation in science and technology disciplines has proven to be a valuable way to study inclusion and exclusion in such disciplines. This is of particular relevance in engineering education where it is widely argued that change is needed in order to attract new groups of students and provide students with knowledge appropriate for the future society. In this study we conceptualized identity as socially and discursively produced, and focus on tracing students’ identity trajectories. The empirical data consists of ethnographic field notes from lectures, video-recordings of project work, semi-structured interviews, and video-diaries recorded by the students. The findings show that even though all four students unproblematically associate with the ‘technicist’ masculinity of their chosen program it takes considerable work to incorporate the project work into their engineering trajectories. Further, ‘laddish’ masculinities re/produced in higher education in engineering also contribute to a ‘troubled’ identity trajectory for one of the interviewed students.
De seneste år har motivation vundet indpas som et centralt tema i en dansk uddannelseskontekst. Motivation fremhæves som afgørende for elevernes læring, ligesom det indgår som et vurderingskriterie for elevernes uddannelsesparathed og deltagelse. I artiklen forstår vi motivation som et socialt fænomen, der produceres og kønnes i relationen mellem elever og undervisere i klasserummet. Vi sætter spot på unge kvinder og mænds muligheder for at blive læst som motiverede eller ikke motiverede elever på ungdomsuddannelsen STX.
In this chapter, I consider a totemic figure of the early twenty-first century—the successful girl—in the context of the legacy of UK New Labour’s ‘Gifted and Talented’ policies and of girls’ success as a defining trope of the period. Highly achieving girls have been a focus of discourses of choice, of self-improvement, and of postfeminist optimism; I explore ways in which such girls engage with neoliberal success narratives as they encounter them in schools, as formally identified successful subjects. While for some, meritocratic accounts of self-management and hard work provide satisfactory explanations for their success, others seek to evade restrictions, reconcile contradictions, and to find spaces for thinking differently about competition and success in the gaps and cracks created by neoliberalism’s paradoxes and elisions.
‘Effort’ and ‘ability’ (understood as potential, intelligence or achievement) are concepts widely used in the everyday language of schooling in Britain but each term lacks clear definition of its use in the school context. Meanwhile, the assessment of effort, alongside that of achievement, remains widespread. This article reports on an exploratory case study of conceptions of effort among three major actors in an English secondary school. Qualitative and quantitative data from questionnaires and interviews with teachers, students and parents at an English comprehensive school were collected. Analysis reveals that understandings of ‘effort’ are not uniform. Rather, ‘effort’ is a shorthand term, which can be used variably, therefore can be construed as a tool of negotiation, or a form of investment in a set of aims distinctive to each group or individual case. There is a strong case for more sustained research into the operationalizing of such key concepts in schools and other professional and workplace settings.
In the last three years a new vocabulary of social class has emerged in Britain. The word “chav,” alongside its various synonyms and regional variations, has become a ubiquitous term of abuse for the white poor. This article explores the emergence of the grotesque and comic figure of the chav within a range of contemporary British media focusing on the role played by disgust reactions in the generation and circulation of the chav figure through popular media. Concentrating on the figure of the female chav, and the vilification of young white working-class mothers, this article argues that the “chav mum” is produced through disgust reactions as an intensely affective figure that embodies historically familiar and contemporary anxieties about female sexuality, reproduction, fertility, and “racial mixing.”
Gender distinction has been shown to characterise both undergraduate experiences and outcomes. Yet research recounted in this article supports work that shows that young people are often unaware of such trends, subscribing instead to individualist perspectives that foreground equality of opportunity and agency. This article examines the gender continuities and divergences in 64 undergraduate students' accounts of their experiences, and constructions of peers and lecturers, in higher education. Concepts of heteroglossia and monoglossia are applied to gender to explain how students submerged ‘structure’ and inequality in their accounts, but how discourses that presented the genders as distinct (and in which the masculine is elevated over the feminine) nevertheless ‘bubbled up’ in their articulations. The students tended to reject the notion that gender and other structural differences impact their experiences and outcomes; yet their broader discussions frequently reflected (often stereotypical) monoglossic constructions of gender difference. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of these findings for the sociology of education and for higher-education pedagogy.
This article explores the construction and maintenance of hegemonic masculinity in the classroom through discussion and analysis of boys’ talk about girls in school. Key in this process is the marking of distance between masculinity and femininity, and boys’ talk in this context is representative of a deeply entrenched discourse of disparagement which positions femininity as a subordinated ‘other’. Using examples from field research the article explores how boys strive to position themselves in opposition to femininity and in relation to the hegemonic norms which police and regulate their behaviour in the group context. There is specific focus on how boys disparage girls’ gendered practices against a legitimizing backdrop of the public discourse of a ‘crisis for masculinity’. The article documents the circular and self-perpetuating relationship between the continuing prevalence of a widely shared expression of hegemonic masculinity, boys’ disparaging talk about girls, and the positioning of boys as educationally disadvantaged subjects.
Attributing the negative behavior of an adversary to underlying dispositions inflames negative attitudes. In two studies, by manipulating both implicit theories and attributions, we show that the negative impact of dispositional attributions can be reduced. Both studies showed that inducing an incremental theory (“traits are malleable”) in Israelis kept negative attitudes toward Arabs low (Study1), and political tolerance and willingness to compromise for peace high (Study 2), even when people were oriented toward dispositional attributions. Thus an incremental theory blocked the negative effect of dispositional attributions. Inducing an entity theory (“traits are fixed”) had a negative effect on attitudes, tolerance, and compromise when dispositional attributions were salient but not when situational attributions were made salient. These findings have important implications for promoting intergroup relations and conflict resolution.
This paper draws on data from a research project investigating gendered identities and interactions of high‐achieving students in Year Eight in England (12–13 years old), particularly in relation to students’ ‘popularity’ amongst their peers. As part of this study 71 students were interviewed from nine different schools in urban, rural and small town locations. From an analysis of participants’ conceptions of the characteristics of ‘popular’ and ‘unpopular’ students, this paper looks in depth at notions of in/authenticity and how it is perceived and judged in relation to the self and others. In particular, the paper focuses on the genderedness of such discourses of in/authenticity as constructed by these students, and relates such concerns to theorizations of ‘impossible’ femininity.
This article explores the role of the psychological construct of ‘implicit theories’ or ‘mindsets’ in the context of foreign
language learning. It considers psychology-based research of the construct in respect to the EFL context and reports on a
small exploratory study using interviews carried out with tertiary-level learners in Austria and Japan. The authors wish to
argue for the relevance and importance of the construct for ELT, explore some of the potential issues raised by the initial
study, and consider some of the pedagogical implications arising from both the literature and the findings.
This study explores the perspectives of three girls, identified through progressive sampling, from an original study of over 100 children's behaviour in, and feelings towards, literacy and, in the latter stages, all subjects, across one academic year. Through observational and semi-structured interview data, the girls’ dissatisfaction, veiled behind compliant behaviour (Fisher, 2011), emerged, but also revealed their peripheral classroom position (Francis, 2005), relative to the more central position of masculine pupils and/or those ‘working above the expected level’. This article argues for an emphasis on the classroom ecology, both within policy and practice, so that in our desire to raise standards, we do not neglect the values which the teacher inspires and encourages, both in the classroom and throughout the school day, values so often witnessed, anonymously and silently, by children. Through the identification of these values, and the ecologies which they encourage, it is argued that a peripheral position can be exposed and challenged.
This study explores whether gender stereotypes about math ability shape high school teachers' assessments of the students with whom they interact daily, resulting in the presence of conditional bias. It builds on theories of intersectionality by exploring teachers' perceptions of students in different gender and racial/ethnic subgroups, and advances the literature on the salience of gender across contexts by considering variation across levels of math course-taking in the academic hierarchy. Utilizing nationally representative data from the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002 (ELS), analyses reveal that disparities in teachers' perceptions of ability that favored white males over minority students of both genders are explained away by student achievement in the form of test scores and grades. However, we find evidence of a consistent bias against white females which, although relatively small in magnitude, suggests that teachers hold the belief that math is easier for white males than it is for white females. We also find some evidence of variation across course level contexts with regard to bias. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for research on the construction of gender inequality.
Can comforting struggling students demotivate them and potentially decrease the pool of students pursuing math-related subjects? In Studies 1–3, instructors holding an entity (fixed) theory of math intelligence more readily judged students to have low ability than those holding an incremental (malleable) theory. Studies 2–3 further revealed that those holding an entity (versus incremental) theory were more likely to both comfort students for low math ability and use “kind” strategies unlikely to promote engagement with the field (e.g., assigning less homework). Next, we explored what this comfort-oriented feedback communicated to students, compared with strategy-oriented and control feedback (Study 4). Students responding to comfort-oriented feedback not only perceived the instructor's entity theory and low expectations, but also reported lowered motivation and lower expectations for their own performance. This research has implications for understanding how pedagogical practices can lock students into low achievement and deplete the math pipeline.