Using Harter's ("Child Dev" 53(1):87-97, 1982) perceived competence scale, this study integrates several paradigms related to the issues of self-perceived competence, stability or change and attributional theory. It examines how 268 Belgian and Portuguese fifth graders consider their scholastic, social and physical competence at present and in a retrospective or prospective time perspective. The children were also asked to rate the causes of their self-perceived competence-related stability or change. Nearly all of the children who saw change indicated that they had changed/would change in a positive way. Children more often thought that they would change in the future than that they had changed in the past. Children who saw change also made more internal attributions (effort and ability) than children who saw only stability. Finally, the results varied consistently between the Belgian and the Portuguese samples, indicating cross-cultural differences which are tentatively illuminated by macro-systemic considerations referring to educational policy in the two countries.