Who's getting the grades and who's keeping them? A person-centered approach to academic performance and performance variability

The current study used a person-centered approach to explore individual differences in academic performance, as a compliment to traditional variable-centered approaches. Personality traits, intellectual ability, and more mutable study skills, habits, and attitudes were used to predict academic performance as indexed by GPA and variability in grades across classes (academic variability). Conscientiousness, intellectual ability, motivation, and anxiety were identified as the strongest predictors of GPA and academic variability using a variable-centered approach. These factors were included in an exploratory cluster analysis to extract four distinct student profiles: High-Achievers, Low-Achievers, Strugglers, and Settlers. These achievement profiles, and particularly Strugglers and Settlers, express complex within-profile variable interactions that the traditional variable-centered approach failed to capture. Our findings speak to research and practice on academic interventions, and provide fodder for future research on individual differences and performance.