Role Models

The impact of being gifted or talented on the development and well-being of individuals has been thoroughly discussed and speculated on by scholars, educators, and parents. Some believe that being gifted or talented leads to additional barriers that negatively impact well-being, while others believe that being gifted or talented is actually a protective factor for children and adolescents. Generally, the latter idea is more accepted within the psychology literature. Although gifted students encounter the same challenges as their non-gifted peers, in addition to other barriers specific to being gifted (i.e., feeling isolated in school, feeling unmotivated or unchallenged in course work, etc.), being gifted or talented provides children with more internal resources to cope with such barriers. Though gifted and talented children may have the ...