Renzulli’s three-ring model: what does it consist of?

This theory explains some particularities about intellectually gifted people.

Intelligence is one of the most important objects of study in psychology since its evaluation began to be considered in the last decade of the 19th century.

It is a capacity that every animal has to some degree. Its definition is by no means simple, and has often involved breaking it down into more discrete and quantifiable dimensions.

However, the construct of intelligence has been conditioned by skills mainly of an academic nature, ignoring other valuable expressions (such as creativity or cognitive flexibility).

In this article we will present a theoretical model aimed at exploring the way in which human beings develop creative productions, for which classical intelligence is only one more factor: the Renzulli three rings model.

Renzulli's three rings model

Joseph Renzulli is a professor of Educational Psychology in Connecticut (USA), and has devoted much of his professional career to the study of people with high abilities. That is why he is considered one of the world's leading authorities on the subject, and is also the director of the National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented. The theory of the three rings is one of his most recognized contributions.

This important author considers that high abilities cannot be understood as a stable dimension or trait, that is, as an attribute whose expression in a given subject manifests itself in a regular and unchanging way. It also rejects the idea that it is a phenomenon reducible to its psychometric properties, stressing that it is underpinned by the interaction of other factors that can be enhanced with the appropriate pedagogical resources.

For this reason, the concept of gifted behaviors as a way of acting that can occur in all individuals under specific conditions and at certain times of life. and at certain moments in life. In this same sense, he proposes that an educational macro-system aimed at stimulating the basic dimensions would promote a highly gifted decision-making process, not only among students, but also in the general population.

Renzulli recognizes intelligence as a multifaceted and complex construct, made up of practical as well as creative and analytical skills. However, he points out that giftedness is not a simple sum of all of them, but also requires a specific mode of management, regardless of the level at which they are present in a given individual.

His studies on the subject, which have lasted for decades, have concluded that this giftedness is expressed in two qualitatively different ways. Moreover, it involves the harmonic convergence of three dimensions (or rings): high abilities, creativity, and task commitment.. In the following we will proceed to detail all these issues, in order to shed light on Renzulli's interesting three-ring model.

Two types of Giftedness

Renzulli and his team conceived of two types of gifted people: academics and productive creatives.

He considered that both were important, and that they could often be subject to close relationships with each other and be susceptible to significant improvement through timely training, this being the most basic purpose of his proposal (over and above classification or identification).

Academic talents

Those with this form of talent show an intelligence related to the solution of the demands that unfold in school or university environments, and which can be accurately measured.and which can be accurately measured by the use of standardized procedures (WISC, for example). It is, for this reason, the type of endowment that is most frequently detected in general. The identification of a high IQ would imply a special educational need that would have to be addressed with the design of curricular adaptations.

There is a close association between this particular type of intelligence and high academic results, since it is based on a theoretical model in which it is conceived as the adaptation to this particular type of environment. However, it does not necessarily have to be related to success in other areas of life, including personal and work. Thus, it is an aptitude that is not necessarily generalized, nor is it overly informative when understood separately.

Creative and productive talents

The intelligence of highly creative people, contrary to what was pointed out in the preceding assumption, is not represented in the classical evaluation tests (designed according to the skills of the academic curriculum). These are individuals who are internally motivated to develop their personal achievements, and who are often inspirational.They are individuals who are internally motivated to develop their personal achievements, and who also tend to be inspiring to others.

Thus, it describes any way of acting whose priority is oriented towards the development of original ideas, as well as novel solutions and genuine products; whose conception contemplates an impact on one's own life and that of others. It implies the abandonment of conventional paths through which success is expected to be achieved, in order to explore inhospitable paths (and not always obvious at first sight) through which high personal and social value will be obtained.

The three rings

Renzulli's theory of the three rings explores the constitutive dimensions of the second of the above-mentioned talents, the productive creative one, based on the interaction between the subject and his environment. All of them are variables that can be strengthened through concrete procedures, with the exception of the first one, rooted in genetic and neurodevelopmental aspects.

The following We proceed to describe the characteristics of each of the rings that make up this theoretical model. that make up this theoretical model.

1. High abilities

High abilities can be understood in two ways. The first describes the accentuated presence of traits whose effect is transversal (such as general intelligence) or more specific (mathematics, reading, etc.); while the second refers to the particular way in which all these skills are expressed in everyday life, in situations other than the controlled context of school assessment tests (generalization).

The author of this model understood as high skills the ability (or potential) to perform a particular task (requiring a specific cognitive domain) at least above the 80-85th percentile (in contrast to the reference group). This is a way of quantifying, in operational terms, what performance would be necessary to be considered as optimal functioning (given that these are skill sets that can be quantified with a traditional psychometric method). (given that these are sets of skills that can be quantified with a traditional psychometric method).

Although this type of ability is closely associated with achievements that are very relevant at school age, the literature on this issue indicates that they do not effectively predict the attainment of goals of greater social or personal relevance in adult life. In fact, classic works on this topic show that such skills only explain 10% of the variance in total (average) job performance.

2. Commitment to the task

This dimension refers to the way in which the person feels motivated to perform a specific task, showing perseverance and dedicating time to its development.. It is associated with other variables, such as self-efficacy, which describes the perceived ability to successfully carry out a particular activity. In this case, the motivation that emerges is purely internal, so that the behavior is maintained without the need for external incentives.

Internal or intrinsic motivation stimulates the fundamental need to feel useful, and is therefore directly related to self-efficacy and the generation of positive feelings such as self-satisfaction and competence. This degree of involvement has also been associated with a state of flow, that is, the fusion between thought and action that leads to the performance of a meaningful task in a deeply attentive and fluid way.

3. Creativity

Creativity can be understood as the recourse to original thinking that allows approaching the structural aspects of the problem to be addressedThe solutions are not limited to affecting its surface, but establish cognitive or behavioral alternatives from which a more efficient or effective product is derived. In many cases, it implies a deliberately naive look, devoid of conventionalisms, which harbors a constructive and innovative power.

In this way, creativity can be expressed as a questioning of the established, so that the discourse that is articulated when making decisions is built on transversal and divergent approaches. The result of creative thinking usually has a qualitative impact on the progress of the disciplines in which it is deployed, opening new paths that eventually become part of the normative heritage of its basic procedures.

Gifted Behavior

Creative and productive talents, as can be seen, also require high skills in conventional cognitive domains. For this reason, they represent the exact point where conventional intelligence converges with creativity and high task-oriented motivation, two dimensions that are particularly amenable to training. Thus, giftedness departs from the classical psychometric criterion (two standard deviations above the mean of population intelligence, which was equivalent to a raw score of 130).

Therefore, it would be possible to reinforce motivation and creativity, it would be possible to reinforce motivation and creativity by resorting to specific methods on the basis of which any person could carry out, under the right conditions, a behavior that isunder favorable conditions, a gifted behavior. In conclusion, high endowment would not be a stable trait, but an attitude or disposition that could fluctuate over time, and on which falls the responsibility of the professionals involved in the educational system.

Bibliographical references:

• Renzuli, J. (2005). The Three Ring Conception of Giftedness: A Developmental Model for Promoting Creative Productivity. In Reis, S.M. (Ed.) Reflections on Gifted Education, 55-86. Waco: Prufrock Press.
• Renzulli, J. and Gaesser, A. (2014). A Multi Criteria System for the Identification of High Achieving and Creative/Productive Giftedness. Journal of Education, 368, 96-131.