Primary school pupils’ attributions of academic success are presented in this study. The sample for the study comprised 1154 Year-3 and Year-5 pupils from ten primary schools in Hong Kong. Pupils’ academic attributions were measured by a 16-item Academic Attribution Scale. Pupils indicated the extent to which they attributed their performance at examinations, tests, homework assignments, and class work to luck, ability, effort and use of strategy, on the scale. It was found that girls tended to have healthier attributions than boys did. Girls attributed significantly more to strategy use and effort than boys did. Boys attributed performance to luck significantly more than girls did. Multilevel analysis showed that there was significant school-level and class-level variance for attributional beliefs. Nevertheless, most of the higher level variances of attributional beliefs occurred at the class-level rather than at school level. Implications for teaching and learning are discussed in the article.[Copyright © 2006 The Hong Kong Institute of Education.]
