Characterizing the Content and Mechanisms of Instructor Messages that Communicate Instructor Beliefs About Ability to Undergraduates

Abstract

Instructors’ beliefs about their students’ abilities (called “lay theories”) and student perceptions of instructors’ beliefs impact students’ outcomes. Lay theories include three beliefs: mindset (improvability of intelligence), universality (distribution of potential for achieving high ability), and brilliance (whether talent is required for success). There is growing literature explaining how instructors’ mindset beliefs affect students, but little is known about instructors’ universality and brilliance beliefs, despite evidence that all three beliefs uniquely impact student outcomes. Our qualitative study (1) characterizes the content and mechanism of instructor messages that inform students’ perceptions of instructors’ beliefs and (2) compares how different beliefs are communicated. We interviewed 24 Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) undergraduates about how they perceive their instructors’ beliefs. We identified four themes of content of instructor messages that communicate beliefs: affordances for success, goal orientations, distribution of achievement, and attributions for performance. We identified three mechanisms through which these messages are communicated: statements, actions, and course structure and policies. We also found that students assume their instructors’ beliefs based on instructor, class, or institution characteristics, or their own beliefs. Students use all the message contents and mechanisms to infer all three beliefs, though not in equal frequencies. Our results provide practical implications to enhance instructor–student communication.

INTRODUCTION

The United States requires a growing Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) workforce to meet the nation's needs (President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, 2020). Thus, it is critically important to minimize student attrition and produce more STEM graduates (Snyder and Dillow, 2011; Hinton et al., 2020; Speer, 2021). Many students leave STEM due to “chilly” classroom climates and experiencing challenges, setbacks, and failures (Seymour and Hewitt, 1994; Seymour and Hewitt, 1996; Seymour and Hunter, 2019).

One important factor influencing students’ persistence (or lack thereof) is students’ beliefs about their intellectual ability, also known as their “lay theories” (Flugel, 1947; Molden and Dweck, 2006; Limeri et al., 2023). Previous research has identified three distinct lay theories that impact students’ outcomes in unique ways: mindset, universality, and brilliance (Limeri et al., 2023). Mindset describes beliefs about the extent to which intellectual abilities are malleable (Dweck, 1999). Fixed mindset describes the belief that intelligence is a static personal trait; conversely, growth mindset describes the belief that intelligence is malleable and can be developed with hard work, strategy, and feedback (Dweck, 1999). Students with a growth mindset respond more adaptively to failure and errors (O'Rourke et al., 2014; Lee et al., 2021; Calvete et al., 2022), report a greater sense of belonging, endorse mastery approach goals, have greater intentions to persist (Limeri et al., 2023), and thus have better academic outcomes (Outes-Leon et al., 2020; Bostwick and Becker-Blease, 2018; Miller and Srougi, 2021; Limeri et al., 2023, 2025). Mindset beliefs influence far-reaching outcomes by creating a “meaning system” which shapes how students interpret and attribute their experiences (Molden and Dweck, 2006; Dweck and Yeager, 2019).

Universality describes beliefs about whether potential for high ability is held by only a few, special students (nonuniversal belief), or whether all students have the same inherent potential (universal belief; Rattan et al., 2012b, 2018). The universal belief is that everyone can reach the highest level of ability, while acknowledging that situational factors could prevent some individuals from realizing this potential. Conversely, the nonuniversal belief is that some individuals could never reach the highest levels of ability even if investing extensive resources.

When students endorse the universal belief, they experience less evaluative concern, greater intent to persist, and earn higher course grades (Limeri et al., 2023). Conveying a universal belief to undergraduates helps eradicate racial gaps in their attraction to STEM courses and gender gaps in sense of belonging, perceived stereotype endorsement, and social identity threat (Rattan et al., 2018). When students perceive that their professors endorse universal beliefs, they experience a greater sense of belonging (Rattan et al., 2018).

Brilliance describes the belief about the extent to which talent is required for success in a field (Leslie et al., 2015; Meyer et al., 2015). Brilliance beliefs predict students’ evaluative concerns, meaning that students with stronger brilliance beliefs experience more worry or anxiety about being judged and evaluated negatively in class (Limeri et al., 2023). Disciplines in which members endorse brilliance beliefs, such as physics and mathematics, tend to have more severe underrepresentation of women and racial/ethnic minorities (Leslie et al., 2015; Meyer et al., 2015; Rutten et al., 2024). Evidence suggests that this effect is driven by the existence of cultural stereotypes that white men are more likely to be “brilliant.” For example, Bian et al. (2018) experimentally found that in classes where STEM professors endorsed brilliance beliefs, the women became less interested in pursuing that field, while men became more interested. They also found that when participants were made to believe that a certain job required a great degree of intellectual ability, they were less likely to refer a woman.

Previous work demonstrates that these three beliefs are distinct and each impacts students’ outcomes in different ways (Limeri et al., 2023). However, mindset is the most well-studied belief, and there is comparatively much less known about universality and brilliance. It is important for future research to further explore what these three beliefs share in common, what distinguishes them, and the mechanisms through which they influence different student outcomes. For example, research is beginning to explore how these beliefs affect students indirectly through shaping the classroom climates and cultures that student experience.

Classroom Climate

In classroom settings, motivational climate theory focuses on how students perceive motivational supports (Robinson, 2023; Kim et al., 2024). Peers (Sheffler and Cheung, 2020; Muenks et al., 2021a; Muenks and Yan, 2024) and instructors (Muenks et al., 2021a; Muenks et al., 2024) are important socializing agents whose behaviors and beliefs shape the classroom climate. One aspect of classroom climate is the mindset culture.

Mindset Culture

Mindset culture is a coherent system of meaning that includes instructors’ beliefs about intelligence and learning, their behaviors, and students’ perceptions of the classroom environment (Murphy et al., 2021). A growth mindset culture incorporates growth mindset messages and practices into classroom interactions (Murphy et al., 2021). Studies have observed a recursive negative relationship between psychological distress and perceived fixed mindset classroom culture in undergraduate STEM classrooms, in which perceiving a fixed mindset predicts later psychological distress, which in turn also predicts later perceiving a more fixed mindset classroom culture (Kroeper et al., 2024). A similar trend is observed in elementary and secondary school classrooms, where a sample of 2665 students and 195 math teachers showed that student-perceived instructor mindset was related to various student well-being outcomes (Wang et al., 2024). The Global Mindset Initiative is a major effort to increase the adoption of growth mindset-supportive teaching practices and to create growth mindset classroom cultures (Dweck and Yeager, 2021). This initiative envisions a growth mindset classroom culture as one in which instructors 1) espouse a growth mindset, 2) set mastery learning goals that focus on improvement and learning, rather than on performance goals, 3) help foster positive beliefs about error and failure in students, and 4) emphasize the importance of effort (Trzesniewski et al., 2021). Importantly, growth mindset cultures help support the success of all students, resulting in more equitable classroom outcomes (Hecht et al., 2023a, 2023b, 2023c). For example, Canning et al. (2024) found that designing an intervention in which instructors sent out emails containing growth mindset messages to introductory biology students improved everyone's grades, especially for first-generation college students. Training can help instructors build a more positive mindset culture. For example, Hecht et al. (2023a) found that training on a growth mindset with a focus on values alignment for secondary school teachers enhanced their motivation to use growth-mindset supportive practices, which increased students’ course performance and pass rates.

The seed and soil metaphor posits that a supportive environment (e.g., a growth mindset culture) is needed to cultivate students’ personal growth mindset beliefs, thus generating positive academic outcomes for all students. In the seed and soil metaphor, the seed is the student's belief, and the soil is the student's broader learning environment (Yeager et al., 2019; Walton and Yeager, 2020). This highlights the importance of the mindset culture and may apply to other aspects of classroom climates as well (Yeager et al., 2019; Walton and Yeager, 2020; Hecht et al., 2021). Furthermore, this metaphor relates to the anti-deficit model, which focuses on interrogating the learning environments and structures that students navigate rather than focusing blame for negative outcomes on students (Hecht et al., 2021; Canning and Limeri, 2023).

Instructor Beliefs Shape the Classroom Climate and Impact Student Outcomes

Instructors’ beliefs shape the classroom climate and impact student outcomes. A foundational study of 150 STEM instructors and over 15,000 of their students found that students taught by instructors with a growth mindset had better overall performance and reduced racial achievement gaps than students who had instructors with fixed mindsets (Canning et al., 2019). This effect was due to instructor beliefs impacting the classroom climate; in course evaluations, students taught by growth mindset instructors reported greater motivation to do their best work, felt that more emphasis was placed on learning and development, and were more likely to recommend the class (Canning et al., 2019). Later work also revealed that when instructors signal a fixed mindset, students report feeling less sense of belonging and that their instructor is more biased (Canning et al., 2022). A meta-analysis examined associations between students’ academic achievement and the mindsets of three different socializers: parents, peers, and educators (Fong et al., 2025). They only found an association between students’ achievement and the mindsets of educators, but not parents or peers. Further, this association was stronger for college students than for high school students.

Recent studies have investigated the impact of undergraduates’ perceptions of their instructors’ mindsets (Canning et al., 2019; Muenks et al., 2020; LaCosse et al., 2021; Rattan et al., 2012a; Canning et al., 2022, 2024; Kattoum et al., 2024; Kim et al., 2024; Muenks et al., 2024) and universality beliefs (Rattan et al., 2018) on their academic and psychosocial outcomes. When students perceive that their instructor has a fixed mindset, they tend to have decreased motivation (Rattan et al., 2012a; Canning et al., 2019; Muenks et al., 2020; LaCosse et al., 2021) and a lower sense of belonging (Muenks et al., 2020; LaCosse et al., 2021). These students also anticipate and actually experience a greater degree of psychological vulnerability, that is, imposter feelings, evaluative concerns, negative affect, and a lower sense of belonging (Muenks et al., 2020, 2024). These effects can be disproportionately large for minoritized groups; women anticipated having lower grades if their professor held fixed mindset beliefs (LaCosse et al., 2021), and another study found that women's grades were, in fact, lower when they perceived their instructor to have a fixed mindset (Canning et al., 2022). In an experiment that added fixed mindset messages in a calculus syllabus, women anticipated significantly more gender stereotyping from the professor and also anticipated significantly lower sense of belonging than men. When the syllabus contained growth mindset messages, these two gender differences disappeared. Furthermore, only women's performance was negatively affected in the fixed mindset condition (Canning et al., 2022). Growth mindset-supportive messages in the syllabus improved both men's and women's anticipated sense of belonging and especially benefited women's performance (Canning et al., 2022).

Studies have found similar trends for instructors’ universality beliefs (Rattan et al., 2018). When students perceive their instructors’ universal beliefs, they have a greater sense of belonging to STEM, and these effects are stronger for women and students with underrepresented racial identities. Students’ perceptions of their instructors’ beliefs matter, but leveraging these effects would require a clear understanding of how to communicate these beliefs effectively to students.

How Students Perceive the Classroom Culture and Instructor Beliefs

How students perceive their instructor's actions and beliefs shapes the classroom climate they experience (Litwin and Stringer, 1968; Robinson, 2023). Students’ perceptions of their instructors’ beliefs can affect their outcomes more directly than their instructors’ actual self-reported beliefs or the students’ own personal beliefs (Kim et al, 2024; Wang et al., 2024). There is some previous work on how students perceive their instructors’ beliefs, and it primarily focuses on mindset beliefs. Importantly, one study found that instructors’ messages about offering help and being conciliatory, but not the instructors’ personal beliefs, were related to students’ own mindset beliefs at the end of the semester (Barger, 2019). This suggests that instructors personally holding a growth mindset is not sufficient for students to detect it without specific cues and messages. This may explain why there can be a disconnect between what instructors report believing and what students report perceiving their instructor to believe (Kim et al., 2024; Muenks et al., 2024). For example, Kim and colleagues (2024) surveyed 94 instructors and more than 5000 of their students and found no correlation between instructors’ self-reported fixed mindset beliefs and students’ perception of instructors’ fixed mindset beliefs (r = 0.02, n.s.). Thus, it is important to identify the cues that communicate instructors mindsets to students so that instructors have the tools necessary to effectively communicate supportive messages and build a positive classroom climate.

Previous work has explored how instructor talk (i.e., noncontent language) plays an important role in classrooms (Seidel et al., 2015). One manifestation of instructor talk is in instructor feedback, and studies have identified instructor feedback as a way students interpret instructors’ beliefs (Barger, 2019; Lou and Noels, 2020; Rattan et al., 2012a). For example, Rattan et al. (2012a) found that when instructors communicate comforting or conciliatory messages (e.g., “it's okay, not everyone can be good at math” and assigning them less challenging work going forward), students sensed the instructors’ fixed mindset, lowered their expectations for the course, and reported decreased motivation. In fact, a study found that growth mindset messages, even if delivered with a cold tone, are still superior to fixed mindset messaging (White et al., 2024). In another foundational study, Kroeper et al. (2022a, 2022b) took a student-centered approach to identify how students perceive their instructors’ mindset beliefs. Through focus groups and surveys, they identified four types of instructor messages that communicated an instructor's mindset belief to their students: messages about progress and success, provision of opportunities for practice and feedback, instructors’ response to struggle, and placing value on student learning and development. They found that instructor messages asserting that all students can learn, giving feedback, providing more resources for struggling students, and emphasizing the value of learning signaled a growth mindset. On the other hand, instructor messages stating that only some students can learn, not providing feedback, reacting negatively to students’ struggles, and emphasizing performance over learning signal a fixed instructor mindset (Kroeper et al., 2022a, b). In their follow-up work, they identified specific practices that could communicate a growth mindset, including feedback that is strategy-oriented (vs. comfort-oriented), active learning and guided-inquiry teaching practices, providing opportunities for students to revise and improve their work, and exam debriefing, in which the instructor takes responsibility for communal student struggles and takes the time to review challenging concepts (Muenks et al., 2021b; Kroeper et al., 2022a, b). These practices emphasize student learning and growth while fostering students’ ownership of their learning. More recently, a study explored how students perceive their instructors’ brilliance beliefs, finding that this occurred through both explicitly stated messages from instructors and through more implicit messages, such as encouraging help-seeking (Rutten et al., 2024). This body of work also highlights how instructor talk is an important conveyor of instructor beliefs.

Current Study

We aim to identify the precise mechanisms through which instructors can communicate positive beliefs to students and foster a positive classroom climate, building on the strong foundation established by Kroeper et al. (2022a, 2022b) in two key ways. First, we will expand the scope of the focus to include not just mindset beliefs but also universality and brilliance beliefs. In particular, we will explore whether the same messages communicate all three beliefs, or whether the different beliefs are communicated through different messages. Second, we will focus not just on the content of the instructor messages but also on the mechanism through which these messages are communicated. We will explore whether there are mechanisms beyond explicit statements that might communicate instructor beliefs, such as instructor actions or course policies. To address these questions, we pursued two research goals:

• Research goal 1: Characterize the 1) content of and 2) mechanism through which instructor messages are communicated that shape students’ perceptions of instructors’ beliefs.

• Research goal 2: Compare and contrast the content of instructor messages and mechanisms that communicate the three instructor beliefs. In particular, we explore whether the same contents and mechanisms of instructor messages communicate all three lay theories or whether different lay theories are more effectively communicated through particular messages or communication mechanisms.

METHODS

We conducted an exploratory phenomenological study. We interviewed 24 undergraduates enrolled in introductory biology courses at four American institutions. All procedures underwent limited review and were determined exempt by an Institutional Review Board (#IRB 2022-130).

Participants and Recruitment

We recruited undergraduates enrolled in introductory biology courses from four universities in the United States serving diverse student bodies: a historically Black university, an Asian and Pacific Islander Serving Institution, an urban technology-focused university, and a predominantly white institution with high enrollment of first-generation students. We recruited participants by distributing a screening survey with demographic questions to students in the target courses. Following purposeful maximum variation sampling (sampling to purposefully maximize variation in the sample), we selected participants with varied identities and backgrounds (e.g., gender, race, and major) to ensure that diverse perspectives were included in our study (Creswell and Poth, 2018). A large number of students who completed the screening survey to indicate their interest in interviewing did not respond to our attempts to schedule an interview. We sent up to two follow-up emails, then selected another volunteer to invite to the interview. In total, we received 325 responses to the screening survey, invited 171 students to interview, and completed interviews with 24 participants (Table 1).

TABLE 1.

Demographic information of interview participants.

Demographic metric	Participants n = 24
Gender
Woman	12
Man	9
Non-binary	2
Gender-fluid	1
Race/Ethnicity
White	8
Asian	6
African American/Black	5
Mixed/multiracial	4
Latin(x)/Hispanic	1
Major
Life Sciences	12
Engineering	4
Computer science (CS)	3
Non-STEM major (not specified)	2
Psychology	1
Finance	1
N/A (no response)	1
Generation status
Continuing generation	17
First-generation*	7

^*First-generation status denotes that neither parent/guardian earned a four-year college degree.

Data Collection Methods

We conducted semi-structured cognitive interviews using as prompts 25 survey items that were designed to measure what students perceive their instructor believes. During the interview, students were asked to read each item, explain how they interpreted the item, rank how strongly they agreed or disagreed with it, and explain why they perceived their instructor to have (or not have) that belief. We created these items by adapting the Undergraduate Lay Theories of Abilities (ULTrA) survey (Limeri et al., 2023), which is designed to measure students’ personal beliefs about their abilities. The items were adapted by adding the prefix “My instructor seems to believe that …” to each item and adjusting referents in the item text to “their students” when appropriate. For example, the original ULTrA growth mindset item, “I can become excellent at applying knowledge to solve challenging problems,” was adapted to “My instructor seems to believe that their students can become excellent at applying knowledge to solve challenging problems.” Participants were asked to indicate a response on a 5-point response scale of agreement (1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree), and follow-up questions asked participants to explain why they selected this rating. The interviewer asked further probing questions as needed, including asking for specific examples of things the instructor said or did that gave them this perception. The original ULTrA and adapted student perceptions of instructor beliefs versions both contain 25 items, five each measuring growth mindset, fixed mindset, universal belief, nonuniversal belief, and brilliance belief. The interview protocol, including the full text of the adapted items, is available in Supplemental Material.

In each interview, we asked participants to select a particular STEM instructor to answer the interview questions about. Thus, although participants were recruited from four introductory biology classes, the responses were about a variety of instructors teaching classes within STEM: introductory biology (n = 11), mathematics (n = 3), introductory chemistry (n = 2), engineering (n = 2), nutrition (n = 1), entomology (n = 1), behavioral biology (n = 1), computer science (n = 1), organic chemistry (n = 1), and introductory physics (n = 1). During the study, we noticed that most participants chose to respond about an instructor with whom they had had a positive experience. To solicit a range of experiences and learn about how negative instructor beliefs are communicated, we began asking participants in later interviews to think of an instructor with whom they had had a less-than-positive experience. We asked seven participants (Edward, Tommy Shelby, William, CJ, Mateo, Riah, and Gabriela) to specifically choose a professor in whose class they had an overall negative experience, and one participant (Natasha) selected a negative experience to focus on without prompting. Regardless of whether the overall experience was negative or positive, participants generally discussed a range of positive and negative experiences.

Interviews lasted 45–60 min, were conducted via Zoom, audio recorded, and transcribed verbatim. Transcripts were checked against the recording for accuracy and anonymized by a research team member. Pseudonyms were assigned to each transcript, either chosen by the research participant or, if they declined to select their own pseudonym, the researcher assigned one that reflected their gender and racial/ethnic identity.

Qualitative Analysis Approach

We used a hermeneutic phenomenological approach to characterize the content and mechanism of messages that communicated instructor beliefs (van Manen, 1990; Creswell and Poth, 2018). Hermeneutic phenomenology was appropriate for this study because it focuses on individuals’ interpretation of their lived experiences (van Manen, 1990). The general framework of this approach is to identify the phenomenon (in our study, student perceptions of their instructors’ beliefs), reflect on critical themes (codes), and describe the phenomenon. This approach also maintains the interpretive aspect of this process, rather than very strict bracketing, which is characteristic of the transcendental phenomenology approach (Moustakas, 1994). This interpretive process is critical for identifying the types of messages instructors send to their students. These messages bear a theoretical underpinning (e.g., achievement goal theory and attribution theory), and students do not explicitly use terms such as “mastery goals” in their responses, relaying the responsibility onto the researcher for interpreting messages as accurately as possible, given the depth and breadth of student responses. The first research question addresses the content of messages students receive from instructors that inform students’ perceptions of their instructor (the textual description) and the mechanism of communication of these messages (the structural description). The second research question addresses how the three distinct lay theories (mindset, universality, and brilliance) are communicated similarly or differently, and it involves us examining and comparing code frequencies between the three beliefs.

To analyze data, we used the horizontalization procedure, in which we first developed a list of significant statements (relevant quotes from interview transcripts), and then organized ideas into themes by clusters of meaning (identified “codes” representing identified themes; Creswell and Poth, 2018).

Data Analysis Methods

We used mixed coding, with both inductive and deductive approaches (Bingham, 2023). A priori codes included the four themes previously identified by Kroeper et al. (2022b) as the content of messages. We allowed themes relating to the mechanisms of message communication to emerge from the data, and also remained open to the possibility of new themes of content of instructor messages.

Analysis occurred in two stages: open coding followed by pattern coding (Saldaña, 2015). Open coding is an inductive process of pulling meaningful units or ideas from the data, and pattern coding involves taking these meaningful units and synthesizing them into broader themes. During open coding, we used a constant comparative method to find statements in each transcript that were representative of the codes (Glaser, 1965). Members of the research team iteratively read transcripts and identified themes (i.e., assigned “codes” to portions of text) independently, then engaged in team discussion to reach consensus (dialogic consensus). Whenever the team agreed on a new theme, it was added to the codebook, and previously analyzed transcripts were re-analyzed with the updated codebook. Thus, this process was highly iterative with continuous refinement of the codebook.

Seven members of the research team participated in open coding of the interview transcripts. To balance the diversity of perspectives on the analysis team with time constraints, different team members analyzed different transcripts. To ensure consistency, the first author, A.C., was involved in the full analysis process of all transcripts, whereas I.B., A.G.C., N.H., G.Y.K., A.M., and D.V. all analyzed overlapping subsets of the transcripts. All transcripts were analyzed by A.C. and at least two other research team members.

After open coding was complete, A.C. and L.B.L. engaged in pattern coding by discussing codes and their relationship to higher-level themes. During pattern coding, some codes were combined to reflect a core, higher-order theme.

Most responses to each survey item were assigned codes relating to both the content and the mechanism of the message. However, there were some participant responses where either the content or mechanism of the message could not be identified (e.g., when the participant's response was too vague to determine the content or mechanism). Out of 315 total quotes that we coded, there were 16 quotes where the mechanism of communication was labeled too vague, and there were 55 quotes where the content of instructor messages was labeled too vague. We had 13 instances where we identified two communication mechanisms in the participant's response, and one instance where we identified two content themes of instructor messages in the participant's response.

Once this analysis was complete, we addressed our second research question by comparing the beliefs by disaggregating the frequency of codes by the three beliefs. Each response was identified as a source of a specific belief based on the survey item being responded to. For example, a participant's response to an item measuring growth mindset was considered a source of perceiving their instructor's growth mindset. By counting the frequency of codes, we quantified our qualitative dataset, which poses a number of limitations. Rather than interpret the frequencies as precise counts, we looked for broad trends. Our goal in reporting these frequencies is to identify general patterns in our qualitative data and to serve as heuristic descriptors or summaries of the data, rather than precise information.

RESULTS

We analyzed interview transcripts with two research goals in mind: (1) to characterize the content and mechanism of instructor communication that students use to infer instructors’ beliefs, and (2) to examine whether students use the same or different messages to infer different lay theories.

Research Goal 1A: Characterizing the Content of Instructor Messages that Communicate their Beliefs

We identified four types of content of messages that students used to infer their instructors’ lay theories: affordances for student success, goal orientation, distribution of student achievement, and attributions for student performance (Table 2). These categories corresponded to the themes previously identified by Kroeper et al. (2022a, 2022b). In our analysis, we also found connections between these ideas and other constructs present in the literature, such as achievement goal theory and attribution theories (Weiner, 1986; Elliott and Dweck, 1988).

TABLE 2.

Themes of the content of instructor messages that signal their lay theories to students.

Message	Definition	Subcodes	Example quote
Goal orientations	Messages explaining what goals the instructor prioritizes and what success looks like to the instructor.	- Performance orientation - Mastery orientation	“It really didn't seem like she cared about whether or not we learned, more about what our test scores were because she would give us study guides [to] try to improve our test scores. She would give extra credit, so she would give a lot of stuff geared towards grades, but not necessarily towards learning.” - Riah explaining why she agreed that her instructor held a fixed mindset
Affordances for student success	Messages communicating what traits or characteristics enable success.	- Effort-based affordances - Talent-based affordances - Strategy-based affordances	“My professor has said publicly or implied publicly multiple times that any given student should be able to assume that if they tried hard enough, they could become successful in STEM.” - Sora explaining why she agreed that her instructor held a universal belief
Distribution of student achievement	Messages identifying what portion of students are likely to succeed or fail.	- Selective distribution - Non-selective distribution	“I remember my instructor telling all of us that all of us have the capability of reaching our goals and learning new things and becoming successful from it.” - Jazz explaining why she disagreed that her instructor held a fixed mindset
Attribution for student performance	Messages communicating the reason for high or low student achievement outcomes.	- Internal attribution - External attribution	“Let's just say I've gone through a breakup or a family death or something severe enough that they weren't able to perform well… I don't think that that was ever brought up in her mindset of why students might not be performing well. In some cases, [they would] be scrutinized for something like that, which is obviously out of their control.” - Edward explaining why he agreed that his instructor held a brilliance belief

Goal Orientations.

Instructors communicated the goals they prioritize for students (i.e., their goal orientations) when they described how they view success in their class or in STEM overall and/or conveyed what goals they have for their students. This theme corresponded to Kroeper et al. (2022a) theme “value placement,” which they conceptualized as when teachers place value on student learning (or conversely, flawless performance). We found that instructors communicating their value placement echoed the goals they have for their students and communicated their beliefs to their students. Achievement goal orientation theory was initially developed to describe the goals that students prioritize in their academic efforts (Elliott and Dweck, 1988). Mastery goals describe when an individual's highest priority is mastering a task and gaining new skills, whereas performance goals describe when an individual's top priority is achieving normative indicators of success, such as earning high grades and receiving positive judgments from others (Elliott and Dweck, 1988). We found that instructors communicated the goals they hold for students (i.e., their goal orientation) that aligned with mastery goals when they emphasized their goals for students to learn and goals that aligned with performance goals when they emphasized their focus on students’ grades. Instructors’ goal orientations were mentioned by nearly all (22 of 24) of our participants.

Generally, we found that students associated mastery goals with positive instructor beliefs (and that denying mastery goals communicated negative beliefs). Instructors conveyed mastery goal orientation by communicating that their primary goal is for their students to learn effectively. In contrast, instructors denied mastery goals whenever they deprioritized student learning in favor of test scores, which communicated negative beliefs. We found that performance goal messages were interpreted by participants in mixed ways; some students inferred positive instructor beliefs, and others inferred negative instructor beliefs. Instructors communicated performance goals when they emphasized grades. For example, Riah agreed that her professor held a fixed mindset and explained it was because her professor would “try to improve our test scores, so she would give extra credit and stuff like that. So she would give a lot of stuff geared towards grades, but not necessarily learning.” Riah described her instructor's emphasis on boosting grades in a way that was disconnected from learning as a signal of a negative instructor's belief. In contrast, instructors denied performance goals by discouraging students from focusing on grades, which communicated positive beliefs. For example, Jelani, a life sciences student, disagreed that their introductory biology professor held a brilliance belief and explained, “he tells us to never focus on our grades and to focus on why we are in the class or what interests we have in the class, and I feel like that has nothing to do with natural talent.” Jelani described their instructor denying performance goals, which communicated their instructor would disagree with the brilliance belief.

Affordances for Student Success.

Instructor messages communicated affordances for student success when they indicated what traits or characteristics they believe enable students’ success. This theme is related to Kroeper et al. (2022a) theme “messages about success,” which included messages about characteristics affording success as well as messages about whether they expected all or only some students to be successful. We identified these as distinct messages in our dataset and split them into separate themes (see “distribution for student achievement”). Affordances were mentioned by almost all (20 of 24) participants as informing their perceptions of their instructors’ beliefs. We identified three types of affordances that instructors communicated: effort, talent, and strategy. Generally, students associated both effort and strategy affordances with positive instructor beliefs (growth and universal beliefs), whereas talent affordances were associated with detrimental instructor beliefs (fixed, nonuniversal, and brilliance beliefs).

Effort-based affordances (mentioned by 16 participants) are messages emphasizing that effort enables success. An example of an effort-based affordance came from Jayla, who disagreed that her instructor has a fixed mindset, explaining,

Throughout the class, I remember him telling us how everything we do is going to improve in some way or another and it just depends on how much we invest in the class… how much time you put into the class.

Jayla explained that she believes her instructor does not endorse a fixed mindset because he attributes their success to how much effort they invest in the class (as opposed to unchangeable abilities).

Strategy-based affordances (mentioned by 12 participants) are messages emphasizing that good study strategies and learning approaches (e.g., time management, help-seeking, and asking questions) enable success. An example of a strategy-based affordance came from Julia, who strongly agreed that her biology instructor endorses a growth mindset and explained it was because her instructor would “emphasize personal initiative, coming to office hours, studying for tests, and showing up prepared to lab.” Julia's instructor focused not just on effort, but on specific strategies, including help-seeking and preparing for class.

Talent-based affordances (mentioned by eight participants) are messages emphasizing that talent and innate abilities enable success (or conversely that they are not necessary). As an example, Jelani agreed that their life sciences instructor has a nonuniversal belief, explaining,

He does encourage us to fully pursue what we want, but also he has hinted that if you have a natural talent for it, it's going to come easier and be more straightforward of a path for you to go there.

Jelani's instructor, stating that having natural talent would make success easier, communicated to Jelani that the instructor believes that some students have more potential than others (a nonuniversal belief).

Distribution of Achievement.

Instructors communicated their expectations for the distribution of achievement in the class when they made statements about whether they expected all students would be successful or whether they expected only some students to do well. This theme is related to Kroeper et al. (2022a) theme “messages about success,” which included messages about characteristics affording success as well as messages about whether they expected all or only some students to be successful. We identified these as distinct messages in our dataset and split them into separate themes (refer to “affordances”). The distribution of achievement was mentioned by many (17 of 24) of our participants. Messages that the instructor expects only a subset of students would succeed (selective distribution statements) generally communicate negative instructor beliefs, particularly strong brilliance beliefs. Conversely, messages that many or all students can succeed (nonselective distribution statements) generally conveyed positive instructor beliefs.

Instructors communicated a nonselective distribution when they indicated that they expect all students could be successful. For example, Shivani strongly disagreed that her instructor had a brilliance belief and explained by describing a time her programming professor talked about a mechanical engineering TA who had less background compared with other students in programming and still succeeded in the class. Shivani relayed that her professor said, “if she [an engineering TA] can do it, she's not even a CS major. You have definitely taken more CS classes than her. A lot of people can do it.” To Shivani, this comment from the instructor, communicating a nonselective distribution, indicated that he does not hold a brilliance belief. The instructor gave an example of a student with less preparation being successful and explicitly stated their belief that a lot of people can be successful.

In contrast, instructors communicating that they expect only some students to be successful (a selective distribution) tended to communicate negative instructor beliefs. For example, William described a time his engineering professor communicated a selective distribution, which caused William to strongly agree that his instructor has a nonuniversal belief. William explained:

Another thing he would say is, “This isn't cut out for everyone… Like, you need to make it through this class to start your STEM degree and it's not made out for everyone.” So that sentence definitely indicates that he only believes some people have the ability to become a STEM professional.

William's instructor explicitly stated that he expects only some students to be successful, which strongly communicated the nonuniversal belief.

Attributions for Student Performance.

Instructors communicated messages about attributions for student performance when they indicated whether they believed their students’ success or failure was due to factors internal or external to the students. This theme is related to Kroeper et al. (2022a) theme “response to struggle,” which they conceptualized as whether instructors respond to student confusion or poor performance with additional support or frustration/resignation. We found that instructors’ responses to student success also communicated beliefs to students and that the attribution of an academic outcome (success or failure) to factors internal or external to their students was a key element. This theme is related to attribution theory, which refers to perceived causes of outcomes and occurs when people review an outcome and determine why it occurred (Heider, 1958; Kelley, 1967; Weiner, 1986). Attributions can be grouped by the perceived locus of control as internal (controllable) or external (uncontrollable; Heider, 1958). Attributions for student performance were the content type mentioned by the fewest participants: eight out of 24. Generally, we found that positive instructor beliefs are communicated when instructors credit students’ success to their internal, controllable factors (e.g., by applauding their hard work) but defer “blame” for poor academic outcomes to factors that are external to the students (e.g., experiencing extenuating circumstances). In contrast, negative instructor beliefs are communicated when instructors blame students’ failure on their internal, controllable factors and do not acknowledge the role of external, situational factors (e.g., high task difficulty, extenuating life circumstances). Attributions were primarily communicated through explicit statements.

Instructors making internal attributions were positive when they were crediting students for success. For example, Allen perceived that his general biology professor rejected a fixed mindset and explained,

Whenever he found out the grades, within five minutes he would send out an email to the whole class and say, “Wow I'm so proud of all of you here. This average was the highest of any quarter and I am very happy for you all.” Stuff like that rather than saying, “Oh maybe I need to make the test harder or something.”

Allen explained that his instructor crediting students’ success to their internal factors communicated that his instructor did not believe that students’ abilities were fixed. Allen acknowledges the instructor could have attributed their success to factors external to the students (e.g., the ease of the test), but the instructor's choosing to credit the students was meaningful to Allen.

In the context of poor academic outcomes, it was external attributions that communicated positive instructor beliefs. For example, Amber agreed that her introductory biology professor has a universal belief and explained,

With one of the midterms, the average was a bit lower than the other exams and in return, the [professor] was like, “Oh yeah, I noticed that this exam has a lower average, but I think that everyone tried their best and it's just that this specific content is a bit harder.”

Amber's instructor attributed lower-than-average exam performance to a factor external to the students (high task difficulty), which communicated to Amber her professor's universal belief.

Research Goal 1B: Characterizing the Mechanism of Instructor Messages that Convey Lay Theories

We identified three broad categories of mechanisms of communication (parent codes): explicit statements (Table 3), course policies and structure (Table 4), and instructor actions (Table 5). The more specific themes or ideas within these three broad parent codes are child codes. We also identified an emergent theme that students frequently make assumptions about instructors’ beliefs unrelated to any instructor statements, actions, or course policies (Table 6).

TABLE 3.

Themes of explicit statements that students use to infer instructors’ beliefs.

Theme	Definition	Example quote
Stating beliefs	Verbal or written statements from instructor about their beliefs about ability, intelligence, and success.	“He [the instructor] specifically mentioned that problem solving does not have to do with natural talent. You just have to work your way through.” - Han explaining why he disagreed that his instructor held a brilliance belief
Role modeling	Instructor showcases an example of a successful student with desirable qualities or a cautionary tale.	“He actually brought back some of the TA's and the TA's he brought were some of his really successful STEM students, chemistry students... he would talk about how they spent years adjusting their learning, the way they learn, formulating a plan of how to learn just so they could pass the class and actually understand what they're doing at the same time and not just passing the class in order to pass the class.” - Jayla explaining why she agreed that her instructor had a universal belief
Encouraging help-seeking	Instructor encourages students to seek help from themselves (e.g., ask questions) or other support resources (e.g., tutoring).	“He was always very, very nice and always would say like, ‘You can totally learn this. If you're struggling on something, come to office hours and we can help.’” - Allen explaining why he agreed that his instructor held a growth mindset
Providing study strategy advice	Instructor shares information about effective study strategies and resource use.	“They [the professor] outright said that the point of making the note cards is not so we have that to reference during the test, it's because the process of making it will help us learn.” - Isaac explaining why he disagreed that his instructor held a brilliance belief
Making career connections	Instructor offers career-related information and advice to students relevant to the course material.	“My instructor talks a lot about our future careers, or we will be doing something in class and if you're becoming doctors or researchers, just like him showing us the projection of our future that we could have. I think it's very much a testament to him realizing that we are going to go on from this class and build knowledge from this foundational class to use in our careers.” - Julia explaining why she disagreed that her instructor held a fixed mindset

TABLE 4.

Themes of course structure and policies that students use to infer instructors’ beliefs.

Mechanism	Definition	Example quote
Course difficulty	The level of difficulty of the course, including factors such as the pace of the course and the amount of independent work students are responsible for.	“I think also with some of their examples, they're a lot more complex than I've seen in normal biology classes; they are not super cut and dry. So, I think the introduction of those specific examples, as well as the laboratory stuff, is indicative of them wanting us or knowing that we could one day become better at solving those problems and applying the knowledge that we learn in this class to those different problems.” - Anya explaining why she agreed that her instructor held a universal belief
Course scaffolding	Course content builds on itself and becomes progressively more difficult and complex over time.	“They give us the information, they start asking more complex and more in-depth questions, they're different scenarios, and they expect us to be getting better at understanding things and applying that stuff. So, everybody could answer complex questions that we couldn't have answered when we first started learning the material… They'll give us more and more complex questions, so I assume that they all think that: Okay, you've learned that stuff, now you're going to get better and be able to answer these kinds of questions.” - Isaac explaining why he disagreed that his instructor held a brilliance belief
Opportunities for practice, feedback, and revision	The course structure provides opportunities for students to practice mastering course material, feedback from the instructor, and multiple opportunities to demonstrate mastery on assessment.	“Because it's just throughout the whole quarter he was just constantly forcing us to apply knowledge by doing problem sets.” - Han explaining why he disagreed that his instructor held a fixed mindset
Measuring learning gains	Instructors administer the same assessment multiple times to measure and showcase student learning.	“My professor sent out surveys specifically to assess our information-gathering ability before and after the course. So, he seemed fairly against stagnation.” - Allen explaining why he disagreed that his instructor held a fixed mindset
Message integration into class activities	Instructors incorporate messages about learning or abilities into an instructional activity.	“He (the instructor) had us read a study on how changing the way studying can change the way you learn and memorize, and is constantly encouraging us to find what works.” - Jelani explaining why they disagreed that their instructor held a non-universal belief

TABLE 5.

Themes of instructor actions that students use to infer instructors’ beliefs.

Mechanism	Definition	Example quote
Favoritism	Instructor gives some students preferential treatment or gives up on certain students.	“She basically treated us all the same, not as if she already expected us to be good at it and already know what was going on naturally. She expected us to need help but to also be growing, if that makes sense.” - Stacey explaining why she disagreed that her instructor held a brilliance belief
Responsive explanations	Instructor provides extra or alternative explanations in response to student confusion.	“The students that ask questions ask pretty good questions and she answers them pretty well, so they understand… she'll go into great detail which leads to further questions and then with further questions there's better understanding. She's actually excited to answer the questions when we do ask them.” - Natasha explaining why she agreed that her instructor held a universal belief
Providing resources	Instructor offers supplemental resources to students.	"My instructor posts a lot of additional resources for students [that] they've mentioned a few times and they've pushed [to] people, if they need more time or more assistance with learning. The textbook has never been a required part of the course, but they always make sure at the beginning to mention it and tell students… [that] if they aren't learning as well as they could be, that there's additional resources for them.” - Anya explaining why she agreed that her instructor held a growth mindset
Enthusiasm	Instructor displays enthusiasm or apathy about students' learning experience and course content.	“She does not show that she cares about us, that she cares enough about us to even push us to be a STEM student, since it is a generic course… she doesn't even know our names.” - Natasha explaining why she disagreed that her instructor held a universal belief
Instructor accessibility	Instructor makes themselves available to students in a way that is convenient for students.	“They set up a whole thing for students to be in direct contact, not just through email with the professor… it's still like a text chat, but it's still like a more direct connection to professors.” - Anya explaining why she disagreed that her instructor held a non-universal belief
Connecting class to student interests	Instructor connects the class material to the expertise or interests or students in various majors in the class.	“She also acknowledged that not all of us were biology majors, but she still tried to apply it to different fields, making it useful for different fields… I'm not a biology major and I loved that class so much, but I actually felt encouraged.” - Stacey explaining why she agreed that her instructor held a universal belief

TABLE 6.

Themes of assumptions about instructors’ beliefs.

Code	Definition	Example quote
Assumption based on educator identity	The student assumes that all educators would hold positive beliefs about student growth and potential.	“I don't think there's ever been [an] instructor… that really believes people are just naturally talented.” - Gabriela explaining why she disagreed that her instructor held a brilliance belief
Assumption based on class context	The student assumes the instructor's beliefs based on the educational context the student is situated in (e.g., institution, course, and student characteristics).	“I think that he implied that we would never go that far because it was a ‘non-science’ biology class. So, I think that he was implying that it's mostly STEM students that go further with this kind of material… I'm inferring and it's mostly an opinion that I thought about him and not something he specifically said or did to make me believe that.” - Jamie explaining why they agreed that their instructor held a brilliance belief
Assumption based on instructor's academic background and experiences	The student assumes the instructors’ beliefs based on what they know about their instructor's academic background and experiences.	“There are people who really want to learn, but it takes them a lot longer to understand concepts…genetics could play into it… He studies genetics in the brain and a lot of bio stuff; he knows the biology of this as well.” - Julia explaining why she disagrees that her instructor holds a universal belief
Assume shared beliefs	The student assumes their instructor holds the same belief as the student themself does.	“I believe a lot in personal initiative and personally having determination and persistence. So I think that is something my instructor also would emphasize is that, it is going to be hard, but if we want to, like if the students want to and we have that inside of us, then we will become efficient as STEM experts.” - Julia explaining why she believes her instructor would agree with the growth mindset

Explicit Statements.

Explicit statements describe when an instructor explicitly says something either verbally (e.g., a statement during class) or in writing (e.g., in course announcements or emails). Explicit statements were referenced by almost all (22 of 24) of our participants. We identified five types of explicit statements (child codes) that communicated instructor beliefs: stating beliefs, role modeling, encouraging help-seeking, offering study strategy advice, and making career connections (Table 3). Participants referenced their instructors’ explicit statements as communicating all four types of content of instructor messages.

Stating beliefs describes when an instructor explicitly states a belief, either a lay theory directly or a theme of content of instructor messages that implies a lay theory, either verbally or in writing. Stating beliefs was the most common type of explicit message, referenced by 19 of the 24 participants. Participants described stating beliefs as communicating all four types of content of instructor messages.

Stating beliefs could be as simple as an instructor explicitly stating their lay theory belief directly. For example, Riah disagreed that her introductory biology instructor had a universal belief and explained:

She [the instructor] would just say stuff like, “Some people aren't as bright,” or “Some people can't handle certain information,” or she would just say “Some people can't handle such and such and such” a lot of times and I feel like that points to not having that belief that anyone could have that level of intellectual ability.

Riah's instructor explicitly stated her belief that some students do not have the capacity to rise to difficult challenges. The belief that some people do not have the same potential as others is antithetical to the universal belief, so this statement communicated disagreement with the universal belief to Riah.

Students also described instances of well-meaning instructors saying things that inadvertently communicated negative beliefs. For example, Allen inferred that his general biology instructor strongly agreed with the nonuniversal belief based on his statements:

He has made comments about some people just get this info better than others. Never in a mean way, but he would say “If you're one of those people that struggles to pick up this kind of thing, e-mail me, reach out and we can figure something out.”

Allen consistently described his instructor as extremely encouraging, kind, and supportive in his interview. Yet, his well-meaning instructor stated his belief that some students understand the content more readily than others. While this statement was likely meant to encourage students to seek help, it also communicated a nonuniversal belief to Allen.

Role modeling describes when an instructor showcases examples of individuals who illustrate a desirable quality, such as high ability or overcoming a challenge, or a cautionary tale of a student with undesirable qualities, such as low motivation. Role modeling was mentioned by about half (11 of 24) of our participants. Students interpreted role modeling as conveying three types of content of instructor messages: affordances, goal orientations, and distribution of success. Instructors highlighting role models who had overcome difficulties communicated positive instructor beliefs. For example, Han disagreed that his instructor had a nonuniversal belief and said,

He [the instructor] brought up a few questions in class where this math prodigy encountered this problem and nobody could solve it, not even him. But when you look at it from a different perspective, you actually can solve it, right? Basically, the idea is that you don't have to be the smartest person in the room in order to solve the most difficult problems. It depends [on] how much effort you put in, a little bit of luck, and how you look at the problem.

Han's instructor used a role model to illustrate an effort and strategy affordance, and explicitly downplayed the need for being “smart.” Highlighting how students can solve a problem that was very difficult for a “math prodigy” communicated to Han that his instructor disagrees with the idea that only some students have potential.

In contrast, sometimes anti-role models were described as a cautionary tale and communicated a negative instructor belief. For example, Jamie agreed that their instructor holds a nonuniversal belief and said,

He definitely emphasized how hard it was to do this as a job and continue further with it. So, I definitely think that with the language that he used, it implies that some students just can't do it … He talked about his personal experience with it and his PhD project, which I thought was really cool. But he talked about how a lot of people just quit on him when they felt like it didn't benefit them or like they were just bored with it.

Jamie's instructor repeatedly emphasized how difficult it is to continue in his field and shared examples of former students who had been unsuccessful, which communicated that he believed some students had more potential than others (the nonuniversal belief).

Sometimes, instructors sharing their own past experiences served as role modeling. For example, Jamie agreed that their instructor held a brilliance belief, explaining, “He really talked about how he loved bugs as a kid and how that developed more into this. So, I just think that that's a natural aptitude and you can't really teach those.” The instructor, conveying enthusiasm and sharing his lifelong interest in the subject, perhaps inadvertently communicated to students that his ability was due to a natural aptitude he had had since childhood, rather than skills that developed over time.

Encouraging help-seeking describes when an instructor urges students to seek help either from themselves (e.g., by encouraging students to ask questions and visit office hours) or from other resources (e.g., tutoring). Six of the 24 participants described this theme. These statements tended to be associated with perceptions of positive instructor beliefs and were associated primarily with conveying affordances and goal orientations. For example, Jayla disagreed that her chemistry instructor endorsed a brilliance belief and explained,

What he [the instructor] always said was, “If you don't understand something, you have to go up.” You could ask him or your TA; you can't just struggle by yourself. If you ever need help, there's always like tutoring sessions for chemistry.

Jayla's instructor regularly encouraged students to seek out help if they are confused and offered a variety of sources of support (themselves, teaching assistants, and tutoring), which suggested to Jayla that the instructor does not believe students have to be naturally brilliant to succeed.

Providing study strategy advice is referred to when instructors share information about effective study strategies and resource use with students. This theme was mentioned by six of the 24 participants, all indicating that it communicated positive instructor beliefs. Providing study advice typically communicates positive beliefs through strategy- and effort-based affordances for student success. For example, Allen perceived that his introductory biology professor did not endorse a fixed mindset and explained, “Before every midterm or big test, he would send out little tips on how to study for this specific section and he seemed to think that you could do better if you put more effort into it.” By sharing tips for studying specifically for the content on the upcoming assessment, Allen's instructor implied his belief that students could improve if they studied well and put in effort via a strategy-based affordance.

Making career connections is described when instructors offer professional or career-related advice, guidance, and mentorship to students that incorporate connections from the class content to the next step of their careers. Students interpreted these connections as evidence that the instructor believes in students’ potential to advance to higher levels and become professionals in the field. Instructors making career connections was mentioned by four of the 24 participants and was associated with communicating goal orientations and affordances. For example, Anya disagreed that her general biology professor has a fixed mindset, explaining,

[my professor] liked to bring up a lot of different opportunities… different career choices and stuff which they think might interest particular people in the class… And I think that really indicates that they truly believe that their students can do a lot of bigger things than just being in a general biology class.

Anya interpreted her instructor describing different careers related to the course material to mean that the instructor believed in their students’ potential to become successful in their careers related to the course.

Course Structure and Policies.

Course structure and policies refer to features of the class (presumably decided by the instructor) that influence students’ perceptions of their instructor. Nearly all (21 of 24) participants discussed course structure and policies as informing their perceptions of their instructors’ beliefs at least once. We identified five types of course structure and policies referenced by students (course policies and structure child codes; Table 4): course difficulty, scaffolding, opportunities for revision, practice, and feedback; measuring learning gains; and integrating messages into class activities. Participants referenced course structure and policies as communicating three of the four types of content of instructor messages: goal orientation, affordances for success, and distribution of success.

Participants frequently described how the course difficulty influenced their perception of their instructors’ beliefs, including the pace of the course and the level of independent work that was expected of them. Course difficulty was mainly associated with communicating goal orientations and, more rarely, affordances and distribution of success. More than half of the participants (14 of 24) mentioned course difficulty as informing their perceptions of their instructors’ beliefs. Participants described that a moderate level of course difficulty that challenged students in an attainable way communicated positive beliefs. For example, Anya agreed that her instructor has a universal belief and explained,

I think also with some of their examples, they're a lot more complex than I've seen in like normal biology classes, like they're not super cut and dry. I think the introduction of those specific examples … is indicative of them knowing that we could one day become better at solving those problems and applying the knowledge that we learn in this class to those different problems.

Anya saw a reasonable challenge and indicated the instructor's faith in their ability to rise to meet that challenge.

When the course was too difficult, students interpreted negative instructor beliefs because material that was so difficult it was out of reach for all except the most prepared students and communicated a “sink or swim” perspective of the instructor. For example, CJ explained why she perceived her instructor to agree with the fixed mindset,

He had to curve so many people's grades just so they could pass and so he wouldn't look like a horrible teacher for most of the class failing, if it wasn't for him to curve it. It is very difficult, especially if a lot of people are failing or on the verge of failing the class or dropping out of the class. I know multiple people who did that as well. So, I could see how it's hard for students to improve, if nothing is changing… I think that with a lot of people not doing well in his class, that he could definitely believe that their ability to apply knowledge does change very little over the course of time in the semester, if they continue to not do well.

On the other end of the spectrum, if the course is too easy, students could perceive that to mean the instructor lacks faith in their ability to rise to a challenge, which can communicate a lack of belief in students’ potential to grow. For example, Jamie agreed their instructor has a fixed mindset and explained,

It was definitely meant to be like the easy class of biology credits, and he really didn't make it that complicated or that stimulating for the mind… It was mostly just learning facts about insects, which I mean, yeah, it's fun and cool, but it's kind of just like a ‘memorize and then it leaves your brain as soon’ as you're done with an assessment… it didn't require a lot of brain work, at least for me it didn't. So, I think that he wasn't really focusing on any analytical skills, it was mostly just a “memorize and regurgitate” kind of model… he really didn't try to make us “learn” anything. It was mostly just attending lectures and taking notes and then regurgitating that information back in an exam. Which kind of sucked because it was a cool class in theory.

Jamie perceived that the ease of the course meant the instructor was not trying to help students improve their skills, perhaps because they did not believe it was possible.

Participants described how the level of independent learning expected of them influenced how difficult the course was and had varied interpretations of what this meant. When students felt the level of independence expected by their instructor was too high, they found the learning task to be too difficult and could feel abandoned by their instructor without sufficient support. In contrast, when instructors expected too little independence from their students, students felt coddled, not challenged, and a lack of faith in their instructor with a course that was too easy. The right amount of independent learning could communicate positive beliefs. William, an engineering student taking a linear algebra course, perceived his instructor to strongly hold a growth mindset because students were assigned many independent and challenging problems online to be done outside of class.

He really challenged us to solve things on our own, and a little too much on our own… He really wanted us to seize our full potential in that way. All of our homeworks were online. Sometimes, he wouldn't even finish the lecture that he had prepared for us, and we would have to [use] the notes online. We had an online textbook that would really allude to a lot of the homework problems that he wouldn't cover in class, so we had to learn that for ourselves, and I think that's why he knew we could become good at solving challenging problems.

William suggests that the level of independence expected was very challenging, and felt both a little abandoned by their instructor, but also challenged, attributing this to their instructor's belief that they could rise to the challenge.

Course scaffolding describes when the course content builds on itself and becomes more challenging, progressing from more basic to complex topics, over time. Students commented on how scaffolding illustrated how the complexity of concepts is scaled up throughout the course and emphasized their growth. Course scaffolding was discussed by 10 of the 24 participants and was primarily associated with goal orientations. For example, Jayla strongly disagreed that her instructor had a fixed mindset, and in explaining why, she described how her chemistry instructor helped students see the scaffolding by pointing out connections among the course material:

With the way he formatted the class and he taught the class, it seemed more about progression over time, and knowledge and understanding because he found a way to connect everything back… so what he was going over during the pre-lecture videos and during the class time itself.

Jayla associated scaffolding with a growth mindset because breaking down complex skills into manageable pieces and starting from the basics illustrated how learning is a process and skills grow. Other students noticed scaffolding when problems (e.g., test and in-class questions) became progressively more challenging. For example, Isaac disagreed that his instructor holds a fixed mindset and explained,

It [the instructor belief] is not really explicitly communicated, but it's throughout the material. It's like, here's say Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium. Right now, you need to know what it is, and here's some easy questions: Does it apply here? Why not? And then later, there'll be harder questions or questions that look different, like does the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium apply in this one? in something that isn't as obvious… but it's [the belief] not outright stated plainly on the syllabus or anything that I can remember.

Isaac explains how, even though his instructor never explicitly stated a belief in student growth, the increasing level of difficulty of the questions asked implied their expectation that students would grow.

Students also perceived scaffolding through clearly stated learning objectives, which communicate to students the growth that was anticipated. For example, Amber disagreed that her instructor has a fixed mindset and explained, “In every lecture, in the beginning of class, it would set out goals for the class, so that every lecture, they would expect us to know a bit more about the course.” Amber explained that the learning objectives in every class communicated to her that her instructor anticipated learning and growth in every class.

Opportunities for practice, feedback, and revision refer to the extent to which the course structure provides opportunities for students to practice mastering course material, receive feedback from the instructor, and have multiple opportunities to demonstrate mastery on assessments. This theme aligned with one theme originally identified by Kroeper et al. (2022a), “provision of opportunities,” which they conceptualized as including instructors providing opportunities for practice and feedback to students. We determined that this theme aligned better with a mechanism of communication than a type of content of instructor messages. We also found that student comments about having repeated opportunities to demonstrate their learning on an assessment (revision) aligned with this theme. Opportunities for practice, feedback, and revision were mentioned by 10 of the 24 participants, and were mentioned as communicating both goal orientations and affordances. For example, Isaac explained how assignments requiring them to practice communicated that his instructor disagrees with a brilliance belief:

They [the instructor] have encouraged us to study and put in the work instead of just relying on natural talent by having us make note cards for [and] having things like memory note cards for tests…. and there would be no point in trying to make us do extra effort and extra work to learn if they thought that it was just something natural that you had to have.

Isaac's instructor required students to complete assignments that would help them practice learning the material. Isaac felt that these assignments would not be necessary if the instructor believed students needed to be naturally talented to succeed in the class and communicated a strategy-based affordance.

Structuring the course in a way that provides students multiple opportunities to demonstrate their mastery without being penalized for not getting it the first time was a strong message to students. For example, Tommy Shelby perceived that his engineering mathematics instructor disagreed with the fixed mindset because of the course structure, explaining, “he created incentive structures whereby a negative performance – if you dedicate enough effort to overcome it, it would be cancelled out by a positive result later on in the course.” In Tommy Shelby's class, early setbacks could be overcome, and the course structure was designed to allow students to replace poor grades with rewards for their improvement. This emphasis on improvement embedded in the course grading structure communicated positive instructor beliefs.

The absence of opportunities for revision was noticed by Riah. She indicated that her instructor had a fixed mindset and explained:

There was a lot of apathy towards actual learning and when people didn't do well on tests or exams, there wasn't a chance to relearn the information. It was more of, like, “Here's an extra credit opportunity to improve your grade,” but not like, “Here's an opportunity to go back and learn what you actually missed or what you needed to know.”

Riah noticed that her instructor responded to poor performance by focusing on bolstering students’ grades, but not their learning, which communicated a performance goal orientation and fixed mindset to Riah.

Instructors can measure students’ learning gains by using an assessment before and after learning content in the course to measure and show improvements in student mastery. Three participants in our sample mentioned that their instructor measured student learning gains by communicating mastery goal orientation and positive instructor beliefs. For example, Alex disagreed that their instructor held a fixed mindset and explained,

When the quarter began, there was a little survey that went out where they just had us just list things that were animals. But then, at the end of the quarter, they sent out that exact same survey. But then they saw how our increase of knowledge was there.

The instructor used a simple pre- and post-course test to show students that they acknowledge that students’ knowledge had increased. This demonstration of student learning communicated to Alex that their instructor believes in student growth.

Integrating messages into class activities is described when instructors incorporate messages about learning or abilities into an instructional activity, such as an activity about reading primary literature that features a study about the effectiveness of study strategies. Two participants described a message being integrated into a class activity and perceived this as conveying strategy-based affordances and positive beliefs. Han disagreed that his instructor has a nonuniversal belief and a brilliance belief. In explaining his responses to these two items, he talked about how his instructor explicitly taught a lesson about problem-solving ability:

He [the instructor] mentioned that there was a gap in math education here in the United States, which is just that they never really truly teach us problem-solving techniques, and that's why a lot of people struggle with those more complicated topics because we were never taught problem solving … One of the whole ideas of him teaching us problem-solving [was] that as long as we're taught problem solving, we practice it, we're probably going to be able to solve the problems that these STEM professions are probably going to encounter. … He gave a lecture about problem solving, and that kind of set the foundation for the whole quarter. He specifically goes about the methods of problem solving, the nature of problem solving, and so on and so forth, and that's why he's teaching problem solving in the first place.

Han's instructor dedicated a whole lesson about problem-solving strategies to students and explained to them why he feels it is so important to do so. Han's instructor explicitly states a strategy-based affordance, that students struggle because they're not taught problem-solving, not because of their ability. Incorporating this as part of the class material, combined with explicit statements explaining the reasoning, communicated multiple positive instructor beliefs to Han.

Instructor Actions.

Instructor actions refer to things done, rather than said, by the instructor. We identified six types of actions that communicated instructors’ beliefs to students (action child codes; Table 5): favoritism, responsive explanations, providing resources, enthusiasm, instructor accessibility, and connecting class to student interests. More than half (17 of 24) of participants referenced instructor actions as informing their perceptions of their instructor's beliefs. Participants referenced instructor actions as communicating three of the four types of content of instructor messages: goal orientation, affordances for success, and distribution of success.

Favoritism refers to displaying a preference for certain students or giving up on some students. Favoritism was mentioned by nearly half of the participants (10 of 24), who described favoritism as communicating harmful instructor beliefs, while the absence of favoritism communicated positive instructor beliefs. Favoritism was primarily associated with messages about the distribution of success and was also associated with affordance and goal orientations messages. For example, Edward described how his instructor expressed preferential treatment for more talented students, leading him to agree that she held a brilliance belief:

She certainly reinforced that idea that having a natural talent was something that would kind of set you apart, whether you excel or whether you performed or whether you failed, or not failed but did not perform to a certain degree. I think she kind of catered to those who did have the natural talent, as kind of a guide mark throughout the entire semester as how the whole class was doing. If you take a look at the average on the exams, we were not doing as well as the guy you know [or] the reference people that she was falling back on.

Edward explained that his instructor displayed favoritism by only gauging the success of the class based on students who were perceived as having natural talent, creating the perception that she had a brilliance belief.

Other students described favoritism manifesting as the instructor giving up on some students. For example, Riah agreed that her biology instructor has a nonuniversal belief and explained,

She would give up on certain students and only put effort into the kids that she believed in or that she cared about personally. She put in certain emails that, “Oh, certain kids who don't come to class” and how she wasn't going to put in more effort than them. Or she would say, like, “I'm not going to put in more effort than you guys,” or “I'm not going to keep trying if you guys don't care.”

Riah's instructor may have been venting frustration with low student engagement, but her actions communicated to Riah that she would give up on certain students, which Riah interpreted as signaling a negative instructor belief.

In contrast, some participants noticed a lack of favoritism as equal treatment, which communicated positive instructor beliefs. For example, Stacey strongly disagreed that her behavioral biology instructor had a nonuniversal belief and explained,

She acknowledged that we all came from different backgrounds. A lot of us took this as a major-related elective course. So not all of us have the same natural talent for biology, but she challenged us all equally to apply knowledge for the hard problems.

Stacey's instructor communicated a positive belief by acknowledging that students have variable backgrounds, while still holding all of them to the same high expectations.

Responsive explanations are referred to when instructors spend extra time and effort to explain concepts multiple times in different ways in response to student needs. Responsive explanations were mentioned by eight of the 24 participants as communicating primarily mastery goal orientations and occasionally affordances and distribution of success. For example, Jelani agreed that their introductory biology instructor has a growth mindset and explained,

After every exam and all of our in-class assignments, the instructor always makes sure that questions where everyone struggled or there was a low average, he explains it to the point until majority of the class is able to answer it, basically whenever.

Jelani's instructor was willing to spend additional class time clarifying content to the class until they could successfully answer a question. Jelani interpreted their instructor's extra time and effort as communicating the instructor's belief in their potential to grasp the material.

In contrast, when instructors did not take time to address questions or confusions, students felt that the instructor was not invested in their understanding. For example, Natasha agreed that her instructor has a fixed mindset and explained,

Because when we do take those pop quizzes and she doesn't take the grades because they are so bad, clearly she thinks that it's probably difficult for us to improve instead of really going in on the questions so that we can have a better understanding.

Simply dropping low grades rather than focusing on correcting the mistakes communicated to Natasha that her instructor does not believe in student growth.

Providing resources described instructors offering multiple, additional supplemental materials to students to support their learning. Seven of the 24 participants referenced their instructor providing resources as communicating their beliefs. Providing resources tended to communicate positive instructor beliefs through strategy-based affordances and a non-selective distribution for student achievement. For example, Alex disagreed that his instructor has a fixed mindset and explained,

He provides a lot of resources to help… so he thinks that all of us are capable of doing better, or at least obtaining more information. If the resources were not helpful, he was also available, or the TAs were … it [the types of resources offered] was lecture notes and videos, and then also access to him with office hours and talking to him after lecture.

Alex described multiple types of learning resources offered by the instructor and inferred that the instructor would not bother providing ample resources if they didn't believe they would help, indicating a strategy-based affordance and growth mindset.

In one case, a participant commented on how the lack of resources from the instructor communicated a negative instructor belief. Natasha disagreed that her instructor had a universal belief and explained, “If she [the instructor] believed that every student had the potential to be a successful STEM professional she would… have some supplemental information for us to look over.” Natasha felt that their instructor not providing enough resources communicated that they did not believe that every student has the potential to be a successful STEM professional.

Instructor enthusiasm about the students’ learning experience or course content was mentioned by four participants. Instructors displaying enthusiasm were associated with positive beliefs, whereas apathy communicated negative instructor beliefs. For example, Stacey disagreed that her instructor had a fixed mindset and explained,

You could tell she had a passion for her behavioral biology, animals, and nature, all that stuff. She loved it so much. She was almost like, ‘I am going to show you why this is interesting.’ Not in a mean way, but ‘you will love this too’. It was sweet.

Stacey's instructor, displaying enthusiasm for the course content, communicated to Stacey that her instructor felt it would be contagious to students, implying the instructor's belief that students would grow.

Instructor accessibility refers to when instructors make an effort to be available in a way that is convenient to students. This was mentioned by only two of the 24 participants. Shivani strongly disagreed that her programming instructor has a fixed mindset because he offered additional availability and even customized his availability according to students’ needs and schedules. She explained,

He also made sure that everyone in the class knew what they are doing, and he offered office hours very freely. It was not like we had to choose a time when he was available. “You email me three times when you are available, and you will pick one out of that.” That is very much in the student's favor. It is according to the student's convenience, not according to the professor's convenience although he has more work than us, of course.

Shivani's instructor went above and beyond to make himself available to students at times that are convenient for their schedules. The instructor working around the student's schedules sent a strong message to Shivani that counteracted a fixed mindset. Shivani likely inferred that an instructor who thinks students cannot improve would not spend their time and effort attempting to help their students.

Connecting class content to students’ interests refers to when instructors recognize the expertise or interests of students in various majors in the class. Two participants described their instructor connecting to student interests as informing their perceptions of their instructors’ universal beliefs. Allen strongly agreed that his instructor held a universal belief and explained,

[my instructor would] love to bring out majors in class. Like are there any [neurology] majors… If it was something related to brains in the animals, and he would try and get us to answer certain questions before he even taught it just because he liked to bring out outside information or and stuff like that.

Allen describes how his instructor engages and honors the expertise of students from different majors in the class by asking them questions and connecting the class content to their interests. Engaging students from different backgrounds may communicate a non-selective distribution of success and thus positive instructor beliefs.

Emergent Finding: Students Made Assumptions.

During our analysis, we noticed that students frequently made assumptions about their instructor's beliefs that were not based on their instructor's words, actions, or class structure. Sixteen of 24 students mentioned assumptions about their instructors’ beliefs. We identified four types of assumptions students made (Table 6): assumptions based on educator identity, class context, professor's academic background experience, and shared belief.

Some students made assumptions based on the instructor's identity as an educator; that is, they assumed that educators generally have positive beliefs about student abilities. Nine of the 24 participants made this kind of assumption. For example, Jayla disagreed that her instructor had a fixed mindset and said,

Why would he be a teacher if he doesn't believe in students? Why would he be a professor if he doesn't believe in students? You have to have at least some faith in your students to want to be a professor.

In this case, Jayla did not reference anything the instructor said or did but stated that she would make this assumption about the beliefs of any professor because choosing to be a professor inherently implies a belief that students will learn and grow.

Assumptions based on the class context were based on the characteristics of the student's educational context, such as characteristics of the institution (e.g., prestige), or the course (e.g., course level, non-major vs. major). Seven of the 24 participants made assumptions based on class context in explaining how they perceived their instructor's beliefs. Three students mentioned the prestige or reputation of their institution, but did not draw the same conclusions about what it means. For example, Edward explained why he perceives his instructor to have a brilliance belief:

I think she definitely thought that you had to have some natural talent … I went to [institution] and there's a lot of number one programs for [the] undergrad level in the country. You obviously know what you're doing. You obviously would be able to like get through this and apply what you did in high school. That got you here to get you through this course.

Edward made an assumption about what his instructors believe based on the prestige of the institution he attends, specifically referencing the high ranking of programs at his institution. However, a different student at a prestigious institution came to the opposite conclusion. Alex explained why he perceives his instructor to have a universal belief, “he sees that even just being in [institution], then that's already an accomplishment itself, and it's already evidence that being able to study and learn is already something that everyone was already successful in.” Alex and Edward both thought that the prestige of their institution meant that the students there had very high ability. However, Edward thought this meant his instructors would believe in only the brightest students, whereas Alex thought that it meant his instructors would believe all of the students in the class had high ability and potential.

Three students made assumptions based on the level of the course (e.g., introductory vs. upper-level). For example, Edward disagreed that his engineering professor had a fixed mindset and said, “This is an intro course, so the assumption is that you'll build on the foundation that the professor is presenting.” Edward explicitly stated that he was making this assumption based on the level of the course, not anything his instructor said or did.

Some of our participants made assumptions based on their instructor's academic background and experiences, such as their academic background, research or leadership positions on campus. Five participants made this kind of assumption. As an example, Edward, across all three beliefs, consistently described his perception of being influenced by his instructor's involvement with diversity initiatives for women in engineering. He explained,

Given this professor's specific engagement with other departments and initiatives on campus, I certainly believe that they felt students would be able to reach their highest level of intellectual ability. Like I mentioned, they were the head of the women in engineering program on our campus, so they put a lot of time and energy in ensuring that people in that demographic were able to reach their highest level of intellectual ability.

Edward assumed this involvement in diversity initiatives meant his instructor had positive beliefs.

Five participants assumed shared belief, meaning they assumed their instructor held the same belief as themselves. For example, Mateo agreed that his instructor holds a nonuniversal belief and said,

I think she strongly agrees with this because not everyone has the same mental capacities or memory, or problem solving, or reasoning. So, she probably thinks that natural talent is going to help you through them. … Well, actually, that's my personal opinion, but she probably… from her point of view, she agrees with this, and she probably thinks that.

Mateo recognized as he was talking that he was primarily operating off of his own beliefs that some people have innately higher intellectual abilities than others, and felt that his instructor would agree with this perception of how human abilities work.

These four types of student assumptions about their instructors’ beliefs indicate that there are factors beyond the instructor's actual classroom behaviors and statements, and outside of the instructors’ locus of control, that can inform students’ perceptions of their instructor's beliefs.

RESEARCH GOAL 2: Are the three beliefs communicated through similar or distinct content of instructor messages and message mechanisms?

Our second research goal was to compare and contrast the content of instructor messages and message mechanisms that communicate the three beliefs to students. The goal is to uncover whether certain lay theories are more effectively communicated through certain messages and communication methods or whether the same types of messages communicate all beliefs equally well.

Research Goal 2A: Different Beliefs are Communicated through Different Content of Messages

We compared and contrasted how often participants cited each type of content in the instructor message as communicating each belief (Figure 1A). Students mentioned all four types of content of instructor messages (affordances, distribution of potential, goal orientation, and attribution) for all three beliefs, but with different frequencies (Figure 1A). Overall, universality and brilliance seemed to be informed by similar types of content in instructor messages, but mindset appeared to have a distinct pattern. Goal orientation messages were most commonly cited as informing students’ perception of their instructors’ mindset belief and much less often for brilliance or universality. In contrast, the distribution of success was often cited for both universality and brilliance, but rarely for mindset. Attribution of student performance was rarely mentioned for all three beliefs.

FIGURE 1.

Participants’ responses disaggregated by lay theory. Responses are disaggregated for content of instructor messages codes (A), message mechanisms parent codes (B), and the child codes of message mechanisms: explicit statements (C), instructor actions (D), and course policies and structure (E).

Content of Instructor Messages Informing Perceptions of Mindset Beliefs.

Mindset was predominantly informed by goal orientation messages, which were much less commonly cited as sources of the other two beliefs. For example, Han perceived his instructor to strongly agree with the growth mindset, mentioning a belief that his instructor explicitly said:

He [the instructor] said, “we are going to be able to apply all the things that we learned. That's why we're in college in the first place.” … But he also did talk about the fact that all the stuff we learned this quarter and future quarters is stuff that we can very well apply to a lot of scenarios. It's not like we came here and didn't learn anything. We were going to learn how to apply our knowledge and there is no reason why we would be different from these experts because they probably went down the same path as us.

Han's instructor stated that their goal is for students to master the material and be able to apply it to new situations (mastery goal orientation), which communicated to Han that experts who can do that went through the same learning process. Thus, the instructor's statement of mastery goal orientation communicated a growth mindset to Han.

Content of instructor messages informing perceptions of universality and brilliance beliefs.

Messages about affordances for success were most commonly mentioned as informing students’ perceptions of their instructors’ universality and brilliance beliefs. These messages also communicated mindset messages fairly often, but made up a larger proportion of messages communicating brilliance and universality. Messages about factors that afford success inherently relate to the brilliance belief, which centers on the extent to which natural talent affords success. For example, Stacey indicated that she thought her instructor strongly disagreed with the brilliance belief and explained, “because she was more like, ‘Hard work, practice, practice, practice. You will get it.’” Thus, it was not necessary to directly downplay the role of talent to dissuade the brilliance belief; making effort-based affordances implies that success is not dependent on natural talent.

Affordance messages also strongly communicated instructors’ universal beliefs. For example, Shivani said,

He [the instructor] always thought that anyone can do it if they want to. That was the thing. He was like, “If you want to and if you have the motivation to, no one can stop you. You need to work hard. Even if you have talent and if you keep lazying around, it's not going to help.”

Shivani's instructor explicitly states that with enough effort and motivation, any individual has the potential to succeed, which is in line with a universal belief.

Messages About the Distribution of Potential Were one of the Largest Differences Among the Beliefs.

Messages about distribution were referenced only rarely for mindset, but were approximately one-quarter of the messages informing universality and brilliance beliefs. For example, Allen explained why he agreed with his instructor has universal belief, saying:

He would give us some complicated charts at times that would be results of a certain study and give us time during class to figure those out, but he was always confident that we would be able to, and usually we did. Results would come in from a poll. Typically, we were in a big lecture hall and he would have a whole PowerPoint up and he's like, “Alright, I'll give you time to figure this out. I think most of you will get it, but I'll give you a minute just in case.” He would kind of assume we knew it and he was pretty certain we would get it. Results would come in from a poll and it would be like 80% of people got the right answer and he'd be like, “Yeah, that's kind of what I thought.”

Allen's instructor, saying that he believes most of the students can successfully complete a challenging task, analyzing authentic scientific data, communicated his instructor's universal belief in all students. By using a live-response system during class to gauge student understanding and making encouraging statements regarding his beliefs about student ability, Allen's instructor conveyed confidence in his students and conveyed agreement with the universal belief.

Distribution of potential messages also frequently informed students’ perceptions of their instructors’ brilliance beliefs. Isaac indicated his instructor disagrees with the brilliance belief and explained,

If they [the instructor] thought that only naturally talented people could do it, then they wouldn't bother trying to have us learn through different means. They will do things like provide graphs, examples. [In] the lecture format, sometimes he will write on the board the stuff and will teach in a variety of different ways, and that shows that they're trying to make sure that everyone, regardless of learning style, can learn the material.

Isaac described how his instructor used several alternative approaches and learning modalities to ensure clarity of his explanation for all students. This communicates to Isaac that the instructor believes that natural talent is not required to learn the material.

Research Goal 2B: Different Instructor Beliefs are Communicated Through Different Communication Mechanisms

We compared and contrasted how frequently participants cited different message mechanisms as informing their perceptions of each of the three instructor beliefs (Figure 1B). All three mechanisms (explicit statements, instructor actions, and course policies and structure) were cited as informing all three instructor beliefs. We again observe that universality and brilliance seemed to follow similar patterns, whereas mindset appeared to be slightly distinct. Explicit statements were the most common message mechanism across beliefs; however, they made up the greatest proportion of sources of brilliance beliefs and the lowest proportion of sources of mindset beliefs. Instructor actions were cited in about equal proportion across the three beliefs, constituting approximately a quarter for each belief. Course policies showed the greatest contrast, constituting about 1/3 of the message types communicating mindset, but only infrequently as a source of universality or brilliance. We also compared and contrasted the frequency of the child codes within each parent code to investigate more nuanced contrasts among the three beliefs (Figure 1, C–E). Within explicit statements, we saw relatively similar patterns across all three beliefs (Figure 1C).

Instructor actions as a whole were referenced with comparable frequencies for the three beliefs, but the types of actions differed considerably among the beliefs (Figure 1D). Universality and brilliance were predominantly informed by instructor favoritism (or lack thereof), but only one student mentioned favoritism as informing their mindset. The extent to which instructors treat students equally inherently relates to universality and brilliance beliefs, which have to do with whether all students have similar potential for high ability and success, or whether some individuals possess special abilities or potential. Therefore, it makes sense that instructor actions displaying favoritism (or not) directly communicates universality and brilliance beliefs to students. In contrast, mindset was most often informed by instructors’ providing resources and responsive explanations.

Course structure and policies predominantly communicated mindset beliefs, and the types of course structure varied among the three beliefs (Figure 1E). Brilliance was rarely communicated by the course structure and policy at all, mentioned only by three students. Course difficulty communicated both mindset and universality. Opportunities for practice, revision, and feedback were primarily associated with a growth mindset, and were never mentioned for universality, and only once for brilliance.

DISCUSSION

We characterized the types of instructor messages (in terms of both content and mechanism of communication) that inform students’ perceptions of their instructors’ beliefs. We identified four types of content of instructor messages that communicate instructor beliefs (affordances for success, goal orientation, distribution of success, and attributions for performance) and three types of communication mechanisms (explicit statements, instructor actions, and course policies and structure).

We then compared and contrasted the types of messages that communicate the three beliefs. We found both some commonalities and contrasts in the messages students use to infer different beliefs held by their instructor. In the big picture, all of the types of content of instructor messages and mechanisms of communication were associated with all three beliefs. Generally, messages about affordances for student success or failure and instructor actions tended to communicate all three beliefs at about the same frequency. We also noticed broad differences in the trends in how students inferred their instructor's beliefs. In particular, universality and brilliance beliefs tended to be communicated by similar types of content and mechanisms of instructor messages, while mindset seemed to be more distinct. Goal orientation messages and course policies and structure predominantly communicated mindset beliefs. While types of instructor actions were fairly consistent across the three beliefs, there was variation among the beliefs in the types of instructor actions and course structure, and policies. For example, favoritism actions more readily communicated universality and brilliance beliefs, whereas providing resources was more strongly associated with mindset beliefs.

While we identified many instructor statements, actions, and course policies and structures that may be in an instructor's locus of control, we also identified students frequently making assumptions about instructor beliefs based on factors that are outside of an instructor's control. More than half of our participants (16 of 24) made assumptions based on factors such as the institutional context and the instructor's identity. It may be important for instructors to acknowledge that, while some intentional and targeted actions can influence student perceptions, it will, of course, not be possible to ensure a particular perception from students. We also had some participants (5 of 20) who stated they assumed that their instructors would share their own personal beliefs about abilities. This highlights an important potential limitation; it appears difficult for students to disentangle their own beliefs from what they perceive their instructor to believe. While many students were explicit about their assumptions, it's possible that some, or many, responses were influenced by students’ own beliefs and assumptions, but they generated explanations post-hoc to explain their already-formed perception. The applicability of qualitative methods may be limited if students are being subconsciously influenced by assumptions and their own beliefs. Future quantitative research should be sure to measure and control for students’ personal beliefs in their analyses.

Our study was built on previous work by Kroeper et al. (2022b), who previously identified four ways instructors communicate their beliefs to students: messages about success, provision of opportunities, response to struggle, and value placement. We found all of these themes present in our data and also found connections to other motivational theories. We found that our participants’ statements about value placement also contained themes relating to goal orientation theory (Elliott and Dweck, 1988). We found that students discussed whether instructors placed value on student learning (mastery goals) or earning good grades (performance goals). Mastery goals are known to relate to a growth mindset, so it was not surprising that messages about instructors’ goal orientations would communicate their mindset beliefs.

Our participants described ideas related to Kroeper and colleagues’ code messages about success, but we found two themes within this umbrella that we felt were distinct: messages about whether the instructor expected that all or only some students would be successful (distribution of success messages) and messages about the traits and characteristics that would afford success (affordances for success). Kroeper and colleagues had included both of these ideas within their definition, but we opted to split them into separate codes because our participants talked about them in distinct ways. Affordances for success relate to students’ effort beliefs, which describe whether students interpret investing effort as a sign of low ability or as necessary for improving ability (Dweck and Master, 2009). Positive effort beliefs (i.e., that effort is necessary and good) are associated with students’ growth mindset, whereas negative effort beliefs (i.e., that requiring effort signifies lack of talent or low ability) are associated with fixed mindset. Thus, it makes sense that instructors telling students that investing effort affords success would be associated with a growth mindset message. We also find that this message communicates universal and anti-brilliance beliefs. This suggests that effort beliefs may also relate to universality and brilliance beliefs; future research should investigate this possibility further.

When our participants talked about their instructors’ response to student struggle, they tended to center on how their instructor attributed their struggle as being internal or external to the students. We also noticed that some participants commented on how instructors attributed students’ success. Therefore, we decided to re-frame this theme as attribution, relating to Weiner's (1986) attribution theory.

Finally, we found that provision of opportunities aligned with a mechanism of communication (specifically, a course structure theme) rather than a type of content of instructor messages. We also broadened the theme to include opportunities to revise work in addition to opportunities for practice and feedback. Thus, we corroborated all of the themes identified by Kroeper et al. (2022b) and expanded on them in several key ways.

Some of the themes that emerged in our study relate to existing constructs in the literature (e.g., goal orientation, attribution theory, and effort beliefs). Connections between these theories and mindset are consistent with the framework of the ‘meanings system’, which explains how mindset relates to other motivational constructs (Hong et al., 1999; Molden and Dweck, 2006, 2019). However, the meaning system framework has not previously been applied to universality or brilliance beliefs. Our findings suggest that the meaning system framework is broad and includes other types of lay theories beyond just mindset, including universality and brilliance beliefs. We found in this study that instructors’ messages about goal orientation informed students’ perceptions of their instructors’ mindset beliefs more often than universality or brilliance beliefs. Previous quantitative work found that students’ personal goal orientation related to their personal mindset beliefs, but not their universality or brilliance beliefs (Limeri et al., 2023). Thus, it is interesting that goal orientation messages from instructors were more strongly associated with students’ perceptions of their instructors’ mindset beliefs than their universality and brilliance beliefs in this qualitative study. This corroboration suggests there may be distinct associations between the three beliefs and other related motivation constructs that warrant further investigation.

Our results also relate to the instructor's talk literature. Explicit statements, when stated verbally in class, would constitute instructor talk, which is noncontent language used by instructors (Seidel et al., 2015). Traditionally, instructor talk is used to refer to statements verbally said by an instructor. In our explicit statements theme, we included both verbal statements that would constitute instructor talk as well as written statements, such as in emails or in class announcements on the Learning Management System. Most of the participant quotes in the explicit statements theme referred to verbal statements that their professors made during class. It is not surprising to us that instructor talk is a dominant way in which students perceive their instructors’ beliefs. Muenks et al. (2024) encourage instructors to not only deliver such messaging during class, but also to supplement it in emails, syllabi, and office hours. Instructor talk shapes classroom cultures and the instructor-student relationship (Seidel et al., 2015; Harrison et al., 2019; Lane et al., 2021; Ovid et al., 2021). Prior work has shown that instructor talk influences students’ learning environments (Ovid et al., 2021), and our work shows that one way it does so is through instructors’ explicit statements, shaping students’ perceptions of instructors’ beliefs.

Instructional Practices may have Multiple Benefits

Many of the instructional practices we identified as communicating positive instructor beliefs also have other positive effects on students. In particular, many of the course structure and policies themes dovetail with practices that would support better learning. For example, scaffolding helps students build increasingly complex mental models and can help students develop their own growth mindsets (Yu et al., 2022).

Some of the practices also benefit students’ psychosocial experiences in other ways as well, such as reducing stress and building student-instructor rapport. For example, promoting effective study skills can reduce student stress (Hsu and Goldsmith, 2021). In our study, we found that instructors promoting effective study strategies to students communicated their beliefs to students in several ways. First, providing study strategy advice (e.g., sending out emails with advice before exams or assessments) was a type of explicit statement. Study strategy advice also communicated the message content of strategy-based affordance statements by emphasizing that using good strategies causes success. One student also reported an example of their instructor integrating information about study strategies directly into instructional activities (an instructor action). Each of these examples likely carried multiple benefits for students in communicating positive instructor beliefs while also lowering student stress and building student-instructor rapport.

Another example of a practice with multiple benefits is instructor role modeling. We found that instructors sharing that they experienced and overcame struggles in their past (i.e., role modeling) communicated all three types of instructor beliefs. Others have found that instructors sharing about their experiences and past struggles can also build rapport, immediacy, and personal connections with students (Hsu and Goldsmith, 2021). In our study, role modeling also included instructors featuring others’ experiences overcoming challenges and improving, which communicated positive instructor beliefs. Research on Scientist Spotlights (short assignments that feature scientists from diverse backgrounds) illustrates that showcasing others’ experiences can shift students’ stereotypes and strengthen their science identity (Schinske et al., 2016; Yonas et al., 2020). Thus, incorporating role modeling, either of the instructors’ own personal experiences or by showcasing others’ experiences overcoming struggle, may have multiple benefits for students beyond just communicating positive instructor beliefs.

Different Interpretations of the Same Instructional Practice

In some cases, our participants described the same instructional practice but inferred different instructor beliefs from it. One example is being expected to work independently (an aspect of course difficulty). The right amount of independent work and challenge is optimal for student growth, according to the zone of proximal development model (Vygotsky, 1978). Many effective instructional practices include independent student work, such as requiring preparation work before class and the “flipped” classroom model. Some students viewed this as a sign that their instructor believes in them to rise to the challenge and that they are capable of figuring it out. However, other students felt abandoned by their instructor and thought that it meant their instructor believed that the intelligent students would figure it out and that they did not care about the rest. This divergent interpretation highlights the importance of explaining the purpose of intentional instructional decisions. Transparency about pedagogical decisions has been previously recommended (Winkelmes et al., 2023), particularly to help address systemic inequities, and may help students interpret instructors’ practices as having the benefits the instructor intended. Being transparent about pedagogical decisions helps explicate learning processes for students, thereby boosting their confidence and achievement (Winkelmes et al., 2016, 2023).

Future Directions

Generalizability of findings is always limited with qualitative studies due to the relatively small sample size and inability to incorporate all existing perspectives, experiences, and identities in the dataset. Our results create a foundation that future work can build on to explore how themes generalize or vary across different student populations. Kroeper et al. (2022a) established a model that could be followed. They used the social classification paradigm with a larger student sample to test if instructor behaviors consistently convey the same instructor mindset. This approach could now be extended to ways instructors could consistently communicate universality and brilliance beliefs.

Our sample included students focused on both positive and negative experiences with instructors in order to solicit a range of experiences. It was outside the scope of our study to directly compare these groups. Future work could explore whether students’ overall experiences as mostly positive or negative, shape which experiences or factors they most strongly rely on to infer their instructors’ beliefs. This could provide useful information about the interactions or processes that play out iteratively to shape students’ experiences in the classroom.

We found that students sometimes assume their professors hold the same beliefs that they hold. This raises the idea of integrating interventions targeting both students’ perceptions of instructor beliefs and their personal beliefs. We know that both personal lay theories and perceptions of instructors’ beliefs have consequences for students’ academic and psychosocial outcomes, so interventions should ideally aim to target both. Studies should examine if such dual-targeted interventions are more effective than interventions focusing solely on meta-lay theories or solely on students’ personal lay theories.

Our study focused on instructors, who make up just one part of the broader classroom climate. There could be other important sources of messages that shape the classroom climate students experience. For example, in a study of students’ brilliance beliefs, Rutten et al. (2024) found that professors sending explicit messages concerning the importance of effort versus talent was uncommon. Rather, students reported receiving more implicit messaging about brilliance beliefs (e.g., judgment from peers, high workloads). In contrast, in our study, explicit statements were the most common modality with which instructor brilliance beliefs were communicated. These messages are coming from different sources (instructors in the present study, peers, and institutional structure in Rutten et al.’s study). Thus, future research could explore the impact of messages coming from multiple sources.

These findings can also be translated into faculty-directed professional development aimed at facilitating effective communication between instructors and students. It is challenging to create wide-scale changes across the educational system, and there are several psychological factors that can encourage or discourage instructors from adopting growth mindset classroom practices, such as level of motivation, time availability, lack of resources, and level of administrative support (Bryan et al., 2021). Previous work has successfully shifted instructors’ practices by helping instructors see the alignment between their core values about teaching and learning with their actual pedagogical practices (Hecht et al. 2023b).

CONCLUSION

Previous research established that student perceptions of instructor beliefs impact their academic and psychosocial outcomes. We characterized the content and mechanism of instructor messages that shaped these student perceptions. While prior work has primarily focused on mindset beliefs, we also explored how universality and brilliance instructor beliefs are communicated. We identified how the content of instructor messages communicates different beliefs to students (e.g., what does success look like vs. what factors afford student success), and that these messages can be communicated through multiple different mechanisms (e.g., through statements, actions, and course policies and statements). By doing so, we highlight the role that instructors play in creating a supportive environment to foster student success. This approach shifts away from the deficit mindset model, which places responsibility for student performance on their holding the “correct” beliefs, and instead emphasizes how instructors can create environments that support students (Canning and Limeri, 2023). By examining the ways instructors can intentionally build supportive classroom climates, we can foster student success in an antideficit perspective (Hecht et al., 2021; Canning and Limeri, 2023).