Prediction of Academic Performance among Chinese Students: Effort Can Compensate for Lack of Ability KIT-TAI HAU The Chinese University of Hong Kong AND FARIDEH SALILI The University of Hong Kong Previous studies appear to show that effort was strongly emphasized by Chinese students. The present study examined the issue by asking subjects to predict the performance of hypothetical students whose ef- fort, ability, and study skill levels were given. The way these various pieces of information were integrated and the relative importance of each of them were ana- lyzed using the information integration model (Ander- son, 1981). The subjects were 609 Chinese students at various educational levels and 102 teachers in Hong Kong. Results showed that Chinese students tended to use either the adding or the averaging rules, but not the multiplying rule. This supported the notion that Chinese students believed greater effort could com- pensate for the lack of ability. © 1996 Academic Press, Inc. There have been many problems in studying how people integrate information in making social judg- ment (e.g., Surber, 1984b, 1985). For example, in de- velopmental studies, age-related differences could well be artifacts arising from differences in the use of rating scales. Surber advocated, “A valid measure of the im- portance of information in judgment must be derived from a model of the way information is used in making judgments” (1985, p. 157). The present study uses a mathematical model—the information integration model (Anderson, 1981, 1982), to examine how Chinese students integrate effort and ability information to predict academic performance. There appears to be some evidence showing that Chi- nese students attribute their academic performance strongly to effort (e.g., Hau & Salili, 1991, Hess, Chang, & McDevitt, 1987). One of the aims of this study is to see whether Chinese students believe that greater effort can compensate for the lack of ability. COGNITIVE ALGEBRA It has been shown experimentally that most psycho- logical integration of information follows simple alge- braic rules. The study of these processes is collectively known as the information integration theory (Ander- son, 1981, 1982; Surber, 1984b). The model has been used successfully in many areas, such as prediction of academic performance (Surber, 1981, 1985), moral judgment (Surber, 1977, 1982), and other social behav- ior (Mullet & Neto, 1991; Norman & Singh, 1989; Schwartz & Norman, 1989; Shanteau, 1985). The information integration model is useful because it helps to delineate cognitive processing structures. For instance, in determining the relative importance of ability and effort in predicting academic performance, it is necessary to distinguish effects due to the differ- ences in weights assigned to the two factors against effects due to the perceived extremity of the values of the information (see discussion below) (Surber, 1985). Developmental changes can also be modeled through variations in the parameter values of the model (e.g., the relative weights of effort and ability in an averag- ing model) as well as changes in the rules being used (e.g., from adding to multiplying rule). In information integration, the concepts of scale value and weights have been used. For example, in the prediction of performance based on effort and ability This research was supported in part by the Hong Kong Institute of Educational Research and the Institute of Social Studies both at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Portions of this article have been presented at the 1991 American Educational Research Association Annual Conference, Chicago, April 4–7. We acknowledge the use in this work of subroutines STEPIT and FM#1, written by J. P. Chan- dler and D. J. Weiss, respectively. Correspondence and reprint re- quests should be addressed to Kit-Tai Hau, Faculty of Education, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, N.T., Hong Kong. ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR AND HUMAN DECISION PROCESSES Vol. 65, No. 2, February, pp. 83–94, 1996 ARTICLE NO. 0008 83 0749-5978/96 $18.00 Copyright © 1996 by Academic Press, Inc. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.