I preloaded on steam i was looking through folders and there is one called dx10 so does this mean dx10 for higher settings?

That's what using DX10 means

Seems like it, I remember them saying Skyrim also takes advantage of DX11 for performance gains.

I thought it was purely a dx9 game. Can anyone actually confirm this?

if DX11 optimization features are included it supports and requires a DX9 card and recommends a DX10 card its DX9-11 supported