ISSN 2039-2117 (online) ISSN 2039-9340 (print) Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences MCSER Publishing, Rome-Italy Vol 6 No 1 S1 January 2015 61 Anticipating Academic Progress of Students on the Basis of Self-Discipline and Demographic Variables Azam Haji Rostam MA in General Psychology, Faculty of Psychology and Education Science, University of Isfahan, Iran Hajirostam_azam@yahoo.com Shole Amiri Associate professor,Department ofPsychology, University of Isfahan, Iran Tahere Saeidi MA in General Psychology, Faculty of Psychology and Education Science, University of Isfahan, Iran Salar Faramarzi Assistant professor of Psychology, Department of Children with Special Needs, University of Isfahan, Iran Doi:10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n1s1p61 Abstract The present study was an attempt to predict academic progress of fifth-grade girl students of elementary schools in Isfahan city based on self-discipline and demographic variables. The research methodology was descriptive correlational. To this end, 196 students were elected from fifth-grade girl students of elementary school by multistage sampling method and in line with the entry requirements of the research. To collect data a demographic questionnaire and a researcher-made self-discipline questionnaire were employed. The obtained data were analyzed through regression statistical methods and correlation coefficients with the aid of SPSS 18 software. The findings revealed that students' academic progress is positively and significantly attributed to their mothers’ self-discipline and education; further, there is no significant relationship between the variables of parents’ age, father’s education, parents’ occupation, family’s economic status, the number of family members and students’ academic progress. The results of stepwise multivariate regression demonstrated that the variables of mother’s education and self-discipline were the best and most significant predictors of students’ academic progress, respectively. These findings prove the role of self- discipline and mother's education in students' academic progress and highlight the necessity to reinforce students’ self- discipline and to elevate mothers' education. Keywords: academic progress; self- discipline; demographic variables 1. Introduction Academic performance of students is a construct which has drawn attention for long and abundant pieces of research have been devoted to it. A principal goal of public education organization is better academic progress and all people are decided to identify effective factors on academic progress to adjust and direct each factor in a way that students achieve greater growth and learning. Generally, the term “academic progress” describes the extent of one’s institutional achievements that are measured through different academic tests such as Calculus, Dictation, History and so forth (Saeidi, 2010). Some education specialists classify the effective factors on academic progress into two categories:1-External factors (environmental) as learning situation, school’s social atmosphere, emotional atmosphere of class, peer pressure, demographic variables and etc. 2- Internal factors (personal) like intelligence, motivation, interest, expectation, need to excel , success and failure attribution, self-efficacy beliefs, self-discipline and so on. Nowadays it has been recognized that students’ academic progress at school not only depends on their intellectual abilities but also on their motivations, attitudes, and emotional reactions ( Seif, 1996). Among the variables, the one which seems to be associated with academic performance is self-discipline. Self- discipline means that an individual commits himself to do a particular assignment or correspond to a specific behavioral