Adjustment Problems and Multiple Intelligences among Gifted Students in Hong Kong: the development of the revised Student Adjustment Problems Inventory

Abstract

Six hundred and thirty-nine Chinese primary and secondary gifted students were assessed on their adjustment problems using the revised Student Adjustment Problems Inventory (SAPI-24). Students' responses indicated that intense involvement, perfectionism, unchallenging schoolwork, multipotentiality, and parental expectations could be relatively common problems among gifted students. Less salient was the problem of poor interpersonal relationships. While the notion linking giftedness and vulnerability to adjustment problems was not borne out by the data with traditional IQ measure, specific adjustment problems were found to be associated with specific intelligences, which conferred both increased and reduced vulnerability dependent on the adjustment problems involved. Implications of the findings for future research into the complex relationships between adjustment problems and giftedness or multiple intelligences are discussed.