Implicit Theories about Writing Processes: The relation between the conceptions of Elementary Childhood Education Students and the quality of their Texts

Abstract

This research explores the implicit theories of writing held by students enrolled in Elementary Education and the relation of these theories with their writing performance. The study and description of implicit theories is relevant because their description allowed us to reconstruct the mental configuration, the particular type of implicit theory, that students have about this knowledge, its relation and impact on the quality of writing (Miras, Solé & Castells, 2013), and its influence on behavior (Hernández, 2008, 2012). The analysis performed had quantitative and qualitative features, and was applied to 19 students through the application of a questionnaire, focus groups, and an analysis of their writing output. The results of this study confirm that students hold both transmission and transactional theories, and that those that achieve a better level of performance in writing tend to hold transactional implicit theories.