Impact of Learned Resourcefulness and Theories of Intelligence on Academic Achievement of University Students: An integrated approach

This was the first study to integrate Rosenbaum's concept of learned resourcefulness with Dweck's implicit theories of intelligence in predicting university students' academic self‐control behaviour and year‐end grades. Rosenbaum highlights the prominent role that learned resourcefulness skills play in promoting mastery responses and goal attainment during difficult situations. Dweck, on the other hand, describes how students' beliefs about intelligence direct their goal‐setting preferences and correspondent reactions to disappointing performance outcomes. Students completed self‐report measures assessing their learned resourcefulness skills, academic self‐control skills, academic self‐efficacy, theories of intelligence, goal orientation, and attributions for academic failure. Our findings supported the integrated approach to understanding academic goal attainment. Students who reported engaging in academic self‐control behaviours possessed a better‐developed repertoire of general self‐control skills, believed in their academic ability to succeed, applied more effort in response to academic setbacks, valued learning something new in class more than merely getting good grades, and actually obtained higher grades. Theories of intelligence had an indirect association with academic self‐control through ability attributions. Directions for future research are noted.