3 Things Everyone Should Know Before You Growing Up #2. You should think of intelligence as something you develop. Is a persons intelligence a fixed quantity theyre born with? Or is it something malleable, something that can change throughout the lifespan? The answer is probably a bit of both. But a large body of research suggests youre better off thinking of intelligence as something that can grow — a skill you can develop — and not as something set in stone. Psychologist Carol Dweck and her colleagues have been studying implicit theories or mindsets about intelligence for decades, and they find that mindset really matters. People who have a growth mindset typically do better in school and beyond than those with a fixed mindset. One reason mindset is so important is because it affects how people respond to feedback. Suppose George and Francine both do poorly on a math test. George has a growth mindset, so he thinks to himself: Id better do something to improve my mathematical ability. Next time Ill do more practice problems! Francine has a fixed mindset, so she thinks to herself: I guess Im no good at math. Next time I wont bother with the honors course! And when George and Francine are given the option of trying to solve a hard problem for extra credit, George will see it as an attractive invitation to grow his mathematical intelligence and Francine as an unwelcome opportunity to confirm shes no good at math. Small differences in how George and Francine respond will, over time, generate big differences in the experiences they expose themselves to, their attitude toward math and the proficiency they ultimately achieve. (The gendered name choices here are not accidental: Girls often have a fixed mindset when it comes to mathematical ability; mindset probably accounts for some of the gender gap in girls and boys performance in mathematics in later school years.) The good news is that mindsets are themselves malleable. Praising childrens effort rather than their intelligence, for example, can help instill a growth mindset. And simply reading about the brains plasticity might be enough to shift peoples mindsets and generate beneficial effects. Thats enough to convince me that whether or not intelligence is malleable, our skills and achievements — the things we do with our intelligence — certainly are. Lets do what we can to grow them. media.npr.org/assets/img/2014/06/30/istock-42196406-woman-swing_wide-e74d34e314f7853759176b4ea499c7e0ebfb735f-s40-c85.jpg
Posted on: Wed, 02 Jul 2014 20:33:50 +0000
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