THE STUDENT’S PERCEPTION OF ABILITY SCALE: AN INSTRUMENT FOR MEASURING ACADEMIC SELF- CONCEPT IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CHILDREN’

in response to a need for a reliable and valid instrument to measure subject-based academic self-concept in elementary school children. This scale was designed for use with children in grades three to six. Descriptive data on the SPAS were discussed in terms of their sub-stantive, structural, and external validity. Normative data were also highlighted. The scale was found to have six meaningful factors, rel-atively high alpha and test-retest reliability estimates, and reason-ably strong discriminant and experimental validity. Data were pre-sented which indicate that the SPAS clearly differentiates between children who have learning problems and those who do not. A con-current validity coefficient of.489 was obtained with school grades. Further, a recent study indicates that the scale appears useful in as-sessing affective change over time. It was concluded that the SPAS is measuring a unique domain of academic self-concept and that the scale has good measurement characteristics. Practical and research implications for the scale were also discussed. EDUCATIONAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL MEASUREMENT 1979, 39 MOST commonly used self-concept instruments measure some as-pect of global self-regard, and as such, tend to cover too many person-ality traits to allow for meaningful predictions of human behavior (Wylie, 1974). Investigations about the relationships between chil