Perfectionism is a widely studied construct in gifted education. As such, multiple perspectives on different types of perfectionism, its origins, its prevalence in the gifted population, and its effects on students are prominent in the literature.

Perfectionism Typologies

Various typologies of perfectionism have been proposed. Inherent within this discussion is the implicit understanding that different types of perfectionism are associated with varying attitudes and behaviors. Wayne Parker identified three groups of gifted students: nonperfectionists, healthy perfectionists, and dysfunctional perfectionists. Parker described the nonperfectionists as having low levels of conscientiousness, personal standards, parental expectations, and organization as well as an overall low score on the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS)–Frost, a measure of perfectionism that breaks the construct into six factors: personal standards, organization, concern for mistakes, doubts ...

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