From The Power Within, John Marshall discusses a growth mindset and its importance for coaches. He shares some of the most powerful studies conducted by Carol Dweck. John writes:
“As part Dweck’s extensive research she carried out two simple experiments on the topic of mindset, both of the studies have great relevance to coaching and the way coaches interact with athletes.
In the first experiment Dweck took over three hundred students of similar age and range of ability, and gave them a questionnaire which tested their mindset. The group was split into two; those with a growth mindset, and those possessing a fixed mindset. Each group was then given the same task, a series of increasingly difficult problems. What happened next was extremely interesting.
The fixed mindset group became disheartened extremely quickly when the problems they were given got harder. They started to blame their lack of intelligence for their failure stating, “I guess I’m not good at this type of thing” or “I never had a good memory”. As a result, the majority of the fixed mindset group abandoned the task and failed to solve the set problems.
The findings from the growth mindset group could not have been more different. Despite also struggling with the more difficult problems, they did not appear to blame themselves for their lack of success in failing to solve the more difficult problems. Indeed most did not seem to consider themselves to be failing instead considered themselves as “not yet successful”. In contrast to the other group, more than eighty percent of the growth mindset group maintained or improved their performance and applied strategies that helped them solve the more complex problems.
The results from this experiments shows that the difference in success was solely down to the students’ mindset. Those who possessed a growth mindset, and believed their performance could be improved simply through effort significantly outperformed those who believed that their talent was fixed.
Therefore if coaches want to help their players improve, then a good starting point might be to help them generate a growth mindset.
So how do you help foster a growth mindset? This is obviously a vital question. The findings from the second experiment carried out by Dweck may shed some light on this. Four hundred students were given a series of simple puzzles. When finished each student was given his or her score, alongside some praise.
Half the students were praised for their intelligence, i.e. “you must be good at this” while the other half were praised on their effort i.e. “you must have worked hard at this”. Dweck was testing whether the subtle difference in the language used could make a difference to the mindsets of the students.
Following this the students were given the choice to take either a difficult or an easy test. Two thirds of the group that were praised for “being good” at the previous task opted for the easy test, to protect their “good” status. In contrast, 90% of the group praised for effort choose the harder test.
The second experiment shows how a simply changing our language can influence the mindset of the recipient. There was a clear propensity for the participants to develop a fixed mindset if praised for being “good” or “talented” at something, while participants displayed a growth mindset when being praised for effort….”
Read the full story at The Power Within.
Very inspiring post, and so true! You hit the nail on the head with this one.
The growth mindset plays an important role in everyone’s life. They can easily able to get along with hard situations while people with a fixed mindset give up on such situations. I would love to include a quote here, “To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.”
Thanks for sharing this article! I think the results from the experiment were very interesting. It’s amazing how much power is within our choice of a few words.