Teachers’ beliefs play a significant role in students’ academic attainment and career choices. Despite comparable attainment levels between genders, persistent stereotypes and beliefs that certain disciplines require innate ability and that men and women have different ability levels impede students’ academic career paths. In this study, we examined the prevalence of US mathematics teachers’ explicit general and gender-specific beliefs about mathematical ability and identified which teacher characteristics were associated with these beliefs. An analysis of data from 382 K-8 teachers in the USA indicated that overall, teachers disagreed with the idea that general and gender-specific mathematical ability is innate and agreed with the idea that hard work and dedication are required for success in mathematics. However, our findings indicate that those who believed mathematics requires brilliance also tended to think girls lacked this ability. We also found that teachers who were teaching mathematics to 11- to 14-year-old students seemed to believe that mathematics requires innate ability compared with teachers who were teaching mathematics to 5- to 10-year-old students. In addition, more experienced teachers and teachers who worked with special education students seemed to believe less in the role of hard work in success in mathematics, which could have serious consequences for shaping their students’ beliefs about their academic self-concept and future career-related decisions.

教师的信念对学生的学业成就和职业选择起着重要作用。尽管两性之间的成就水平相当，但某些学科需要先天能力以及男性和女性具有不同能力水平的持续刻板印象和信念阻碍了学生的学术职业道路。在这项研究中，我们检查了美国数学教师关于数学能力的明确的一般性和性别特定信念的普遍性，并确定了哪些教师特征与这些信念相关。对美国 382 名 K-8 教师的数据进行的分析表明，总体而言，教师不同意一般和特定性别的数学能力是与生俱来的观点，并且同意数学成功需要努力工作和奉献精神的观点。然而，我们的研究结果表明，那些认为数学需要才华的人也倾向于认为女孩缺乏这种能力。我们还发现，与为 5 至 10 岁学生教授数学的教师相比，为 11 至 14 岁学生教授数学的教师似乎认为数学需要与生俱来的能力。此外，更有经验的教师和与特殊教育学生一起工作的教师似乎不太相信努力学习对数学成功的作用，这可能对塑造学生对学术自我概念和未来职业的信念产生严重后果。相关决定。我们还发现，与为 5 至 10 岁学生教授数学的教师相比，为 11 至 14 岁学生教授数学的教师似乎认为数学需要天生的能力。此外，更有经验的教师和与特殊教育学生一起工作的教师似乎不太相信努力学习对数学成功的作用，这可能对塑造学生对学术自我概念和未来职业的信念产生严重后果。相关决定。我们还发现，与为 5 至 10 岁学生教授数学的教师相比，为 11 至 14 岁学生教授数学的教师似乎认为数学需要与生俱来的能力。此外，更有经验的教师和与特殊教育学生一起工作的教师似乎不太相信努力学习对数学成功的作用，这可能对塑造学生对学术自我概念和未来职业的信念产生严重后果。相关决定。