Abstract

The purpose of this study is to compare intellectual risk taking levels of middle school gifted students in learning science with their peers’ levels of intellectual risk taking; the peers have not been involved in any diagnosis procedure. The gifted participants in the study involved the students taking 130 or more point from WISC-R application. In total 350 participants were included in the study, 248 of them were the peers of gifted students while 102 were gifted middle school students. All of the participants were 6th, 7th or 8th grade students. As the data collection tools, “intellectual risk taking scale” and “personal information form” were used. In data analysis, t test for independent groups was applied. The results of the analysis revealed that there was no statistically significant difference between intellectual risk taking levels of middle school gifted students and their peers .

Key words: Gifted Students, Intellectual Risk Taking in Learning Science, Middle School