California Association for the Gifted 58th Annual Conference

Is my child gifted?  This question, frequently posed to educators, is typically premised on the assumption that giftedness is a trait that individuals are born with.  However, consider any gifted adult that you know in any domain of endeavor from academia to the athletic field, the concert hall to the art gallery, and look at their history.  Their adult performance was the result of many years of study and work.  Adult success requires potential in a domain, good teachers, and long-term effort on the part of the individual.  In other words, no matter how bright or gifted you appear to be as a child, without talent development, there will not be a gifted adult.  In this presentation, Dr. Worrell will use the talent development megamodel (Subotnik, Olszerwski-Kubilius, & Worrell, 2011, 2018) as a backdrop to discuss the psychology of outstanding performance.  This presentation will provide an overview of the talent development elements that increase the probability of gifted performance in adulthood.