Mindsets A view from two eras Presented by

“Mindsets: A view from two eras” Presented by Christine Lindstrøm at PERf. ECT Journal Club 10 August 2020 Dweck & Yaeger (2019). Perspectives on Psychological Science, 14(3), 481– 496.

Growth vs. fixed mindset “People can believe that a particular attribute, such as intelligence or personality, is simply fixed. Or they can believe that it can be shaped and developed. ” (p. 481) • Fixed mindset about intelligence: “the belief that intelligence cannot be developed” (p. 482) • Growth mindset about intelligence: “the belief that intelligence can be developed, for example, through personal effort, good learning strategies, and lots of mentoring and support from others” (p. 482) The theory of growth mindset started out being focused on intelligence, but later broadened out to other attributes (such as whether people are inherently good or bad).

Origins • Developed by Carol Dweck, Professor of Psychology at Stanford University. • Dweck “entered graduate school in the late 1960 s, as behaviorism was losing its supremacy in psychology and the cognitive revolution was dawning. ” (p. 482) • Behaviourism (or behavioural psychology)---in large part led by B. F. Skinner---focused on the measurables of stimulus and response. • It treated the brain as a black box that should not be theorized about due to the impossibility of obtaining experimental evidence about what went on inside it. • Behaviourism was the dominant psychological theory from 1912 until the 1960 s.

Early focus of Dweck • Attribution theory, developed in the 1970 s, looked at how people’s explanations for what happens to them shape their reactions. • E. g. , “students who explain their failure as being due to a lack of ability may well react differently to a failure than students who blame their effort, something that is typically more under their control (…). [C]hildren’s attributions could in fact predict a ‘helpless’ or ‘mastery-oriented’ response to setbacks, even in children with equal ability on a task. Depending on who they interpreted failure, some children simply wilted, whereas others showed a remarkable tendency to relish the challenge. ” (p. 483) • Dweck subsequently contributed to building the foundation for achievement goal theory (associated with Duda and Nicholls).

'Mindsets’ as a broader idea • The broader idea of ‘mindsets’ crystallise in the period mid-90 s to mid-00 s, culminating in the terms ‘fixed vs. growth mindset’ being formulated in 2006. • “[M]indsets create meaning systems”, which “serve an organizing function, bringing together goals, beliefs, and behaviors”. (p. 483) • “[W]hen people view ability as fixed, then validating their ability (by pursuing performance goals or by avoiding challenges) can take on more importance, high effort may more readily be seen as indicating low ability, and setback are more easily attributed to low ability. When this happens, persistence can be curtailed. In contrast, when people view ability as something that can be improved, then developing that ability (by taking on challenging learning goals) can become more important, effort may be seen as a tool in this process, and setbacks can more readily be seen as information about the learning process. When this happens, persistence can be sustained. ” (p. 483)

Experimental results • As an overview paper, this article does not report on detailed experimental procedures. Rather, it summarises results from experiments published elsewhere. • “The findings from correlational and experimental research [show] that a growth mindset can predict and promote more challenge seeking, resilience, and positive outcomes (…) [and] suggest that a growth mindset can form the core of a larger meaning system that can, under favorable conditions, help people engage in thoughts and actions that lead them closer to their goals. ” (p. 484)

Where do the mindsets come from? • Dweck et al. ’s studies “demonstrated that after a success, praise for intelligence (person praise), compared with praise for effort (process praise) or praise for outcome, was more likely to induce a fixed mindset, along with its old friends: performance goals, low-ability attributions for failure, and impaired performance (helpless reactions) following failure. ” (p. 484) • Mindsets are learnt and therefore can also be changed. • In recent years, the concept of growth mindset has flooded into classrooms. (Rustin, The Guardian, 10/5/2016)

“False growth mindset” • Teachers who espouse a growth mindset that does not comply with Dweck’s full conceptualisation. (p. 490) • Simply equating growth mindset with effort. This can leave students feeling incompetent. • Ignoring the key roles of good strategies, mentorship, connections, and access to resources in success. • Telling students that they can do anything without providing the necessary strategies, guidance or information about resources. • Merely lecturing about a growth mindset without incorporating it into the whole approach to learning.

Problems with the growth mindset theory • The mindsets cast a very wide net that cover attributes that have been shown by individual psychology to cover both relatively fixed and malleable traits. • E. g. , intelligence and working memory capacity are relatively fixed, whereas learning strategies and resilience can be significantly developed. • Examples of items used to evaluate people’s mindsets: • “the kind of person someone is is something very basic about them and it can’t be changed very much” vs. “everyone, no matter who they are, can significantly change their basic characteristics”. (p. 486)

Problems with the growth mindset theory • Hardly anyone apart from Dweck and her collaborators have been able to replicate the findings from growth mindset studies. • E. g. , Li and Bates’ (2019) descriptive paper: “You Can’t Change Your Basic Ability, but You Work at Things, and That’s How We Get Hard Things Done: Testing the Role of Growth Mindset on Response to Setbacks, Educational Attainment, and Cognitive Ability” Li & Bates (2019). “You Can’t Change Your Basic Ability, but You Work at Things, and That’s How We Get Hard Things Done: Testing the Role of Growth Mindset on Response to Setbacks, Educational Attainment, and Cognitive Ability”. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 148(9), 1640– 1655.

Reflections • The early developments of Dweck’s theory must be seen in light of the broader developments in psychology in the 1960 s and 70 s. • More recent work is psychology and education about sources of achievement gaps go well beyond what is covered by mindsets and also sometimes contradict claims in Dweck’s theory. • While comprising worthwhile ideas, educators should be very knowledgeable about what the research findings do and don’t imply before implementing ‘growth mindset education’ more broadly.