A muscular mind

Why does one 4-year-old try again and again to solve the toughest puzzle in the toybox, while another refuses to attempt the task even once? Why does a talented young athlete resist the practice that would take him from good to great? Why does a stereotypically "smart" middle-schooler hold back in group projects, while a low achiever nobody thought cared about school suddenly picks up steam?

Stanford University psychology professor Carol Dweck knows the answers to these questions and many more, thanks to three decades of systematic research on motivation, achievement and intelligence that helps explain why some children fulfill their potential while others of equal talent do not, why some give up rather than risk failure while others accept that mistakes are a natural part of the educational process and learn from them.

Her groundbreaking scholarly work has influenced educators around the world, and became accessible to the masses via her 2006 bestseller "Mindset: The New Psychology of Success," which lays out in layman’s terms why praising children’s innate talent and ability does not foster high self-esteem and accomplishment, and may actually jeopardize it.

Dweck has shown that motivation — whether in preschoolers or professional athletes — relates directly to how the person perceives intelligence. Simply put, those who perceive the brain as a muscle and believe that intelligence expands with effort are more likely to seek out challenges and persevere through setbacks; Dweck calls this a "growth mindset." By contrast, people who consider intelligence an immutable inborn trait are more likely to resist assignments they fear will expose their weaknesses and are more likely to be crushed by failure; Dweck calls this a "fixed mindset."

Children can learn to adopt a "growth mindset" even if they don’t come by this optimistic outlook naturally, Dweck said, and students who do so improve in academics and other activities; are more collaborative, resilient and empathetic; and are less likely to cheat. These findings hold true among all types of students: wealthy or poor, boys and girls, lofty scholars or near-dropouts.

"The work shows over and over that when children understand that they can grow their brains through hard work, study strategies and help from others, their motivation can be transformed and their achievement goes up," Dweck said during a telephone interview from Palo Alto, Calif. "With a fixed mindset, when you’re applying effort, when you’re working on something difficult, you feel dumb. But in a growth mindset, that’s when you are growing your brain, so it feels good, it’s exhilarating, you keep trying."

The research dating from the 1970s through the present day was conducted mainly among students in preschool through middle school, and has been so compelling that numerous schools have introduced Dweck’s "Brainology" interventions to transform how students view their own potential, and to heighten teachers’ expectations well. Most recently, seven of California’s largest school districts, comprising nearly 1 million students, moved to replace standardized test scores as the sole measure of school success with a new accountability system that gauges, among other things, whether students have been guided to adopt a growth mindset. Her research was cited in the 2013 U.S. Department of Education report "Promoting Grit, Tenacity and Perseverance: Critical Factors for Success in the 21st Century." "It’s quite gratifying that people who are putting this into practice in a really deep way are achieving success that has really been quite striking," said Dweck, a sought-after speaker in education circles and in the realms of business management, personal and family development, even professional sports. "The fixed mindset is a mental trap, it holds people back. When we teach kids this growth mindset, it really helps them fulfill their potential."

Now Dweck is bringing her insights to Honolulu, as the keynote speaker next month at Punahou School’s annual Brain Symposium, a two-day summer forum to explore neuroscience-based education. The symposium, now in itsfifth year, annually attracts several hundred teachers and administrators from private and public schools throughout Hawaii, as well as the leaders of other organizations, to learn about and discuss ways to improve education for all children. This year’s event includes a free evening lecture by Dweck, geared toward parents, that is open to the public (see box).

"We believe that understanding learning at its neurological foundation is the key to instructional improvement," said Michael Walker, the principal of Punahou’s K-8 Junior School. "This is what has motivated our interest in hosting the Brain Symposium."

Gail Mukaihata Hannemann, chief executive officer of Girl Scouts of Hawaii, has attended each of the past four symposiums, describing the participatory events "as a great resource for anyone who is interested in learning about neuroscience, which really gets into how all of us think and learn and process information. We use what we learn to help girls develop into leaders, and we integrate it into our own work with volunteers or collaborating with other organizations. I always feel like I walk away with very practical information that I can immediately apply in my own work."

Dweck, who earned her bachelor’s degree from Columbia University and her doctorate in psychology at Yale University and taught at the University of Illinois, Harvard University and Columbia before joining Stanford’s faculty in 2004, may prove to be the most engaging speaker yet, given the broad influence of her work and the research it has inspired among others. Among key findings over the past three decades:

» Fifth-graders were gauged on whether they tended to believe their own behavior determined their academic progress, or whether factors outside their control dictated the outcome. Then the children were given puzzles they could solve, followed by a long series of puzzles that were impossible to solve, and finally two that they had previously mastered. In the face of repeated failure on the impossible puzzles, children who believed external factors controlled their progress lost the ability to solve puzzles they had previously mastered, while the research subjects who credited their own effort for academic progress persevered through the repeated failures of the impossible puzzles and retained the ability to easily do the puzzles they had previously solved.

» In a landmark series of studies, Dweck and colleagues found that praising children for their innate intelligence, rather than persistent effort, stunted their desire for more challenging material. Students praised for intelligence focused more on how their performance compared with peers, rather than seeking ways to improve their own results. Moreover, 40 percent of the students praised for intelligence lied about their test scores to peers, overstating the results to maintain their status. By contrast, the vast majority of participants praised for effort opted for more challenging problems, and freely shared their actual scores.

» In a study of 4-year-olds, Dweck and her colleagues gauged children’s perceptions of whether intelligence was fixed or malleable, then offered them a chance to redo an easy jigsaw puzzle they had already mastered, or try a new, harder one. In general, the fixed-mindset kids chose the easy puzzle, while the growth-mindset kids sought out the new challenge.

» Math students at a predominantly poor, low-achieving junior high in East Harlem, N.Y., were split into two groups for an eight-session workshop on study skills. The control group was taught study skills, while the other group got study skills and two lessons describing the brain as a muscle that becomes stronger the more it is used; the lessons included details about how the brain grows new neurons when challenged. Within one semester, the seventh-graders who were taught that intelligence can be developed improved their study habits and their math grades. The control group did not.

» And more recently, Dweck and other researchers tracked more than 250,000 students learning fractions via the online Khan Academy and found that praising students for specific improvement, rather than offering general encouragement, improved student persistence and math achievement.

Over and over again, Dweck has shown that people who shake off the mental limits that others impose or that they impose on themselves can improve in academics, sports and the arts through sustained effort. The professor herself is living proof that intellect is malleable, having taken up piano as an adult and learned to speak Italian in her 50s.

"With a growth mindset you can achieve more in almost any area, yes, but even better, I’m convinced that you live a happier life."