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Learning and growth

Carol Dweck

Ability can grow

Carol Dweck (2006 · Stanford) — Ability can grow.

Learning and growthModernAbility can grow

What actually happened?

The correction matters as much as the finding. Over the last decade several large replication studies have measured mindset interventions at a fraction of the effect the popular version implies, close to zero in some populations, with the clearer benefits concentrated among disadvantaged students. Dweck herself has spent years arguing against the version of her own idea that spread, in particular against 'false growth mindset' — schools putting the words on a wall, praising effort that produced nothing, and treating the belief as a substitute for teaching.

Praise the move, not the label

'You're clever' is a label and labels need protecting. 'You went back through every wrong answer' is a move and can be repeated. The test: can they do this praise again next time?

The moment of failure decides the direction

In good weather the two mindsets look identical. The watershed is the instant something fails: one reads 'I can't', the other reads 'that approach can't'. The difference is whether anyone goes looking for the cause.

Mild and real, not a master switch

Knowing the boundary is what makes it usable. It is worth the cost of one sentence — change how you praise, add the word 'yet' — and it is not worth a training programme. Treat it as a master key and you'll ignore resources, teaching and sleep.

How do I use it today?

Giving feedback, check whether you're praising talent or a specific move, and whether they could do it again. And when someone explains a result as a problem of attitude, ask whether the heavier variables have been checked first. Attitude is the laziest available attribution and the least fair to anyone short of resources.

Deep read

Praise the process, not the talentPraising cleverness makes people avoid challengeThe children praised as clever chose the easy setThe effect is much smaller than the popular storyThe boundary worth drawingA mild real factor, not a master switch

Read alongside

Lev VygotskyBoth about where learning happens. He locates it in the task's difficulty, she locates it in the reading of failure.

Further

Lev Vygotsky Excellent Sheep

Lines to keep

Praise for talent makes people avoid challenge. Praise for process doesn't.

In a growth mindset failure is information. In a fixed one it's a verdict.

Replications find the effect far smaller than the book conveyed.