The Mindsets
The author begins by describing an experiment that she conducted with children to measure their responses to challenging puzzles. She observed two different responses, with some being distressed by the difficulty, and others excited. Her interest became in what caused these two very different responses. She reminds us of the creator of the IQ test, whose intention with his test was to help determine ways to help children improve learning, not make a statement on their inherent intellect. Modern understanding of intelligence says that it is neither entirely innate nor entirely learned, but rather a combination of the two. A fixed mindset is the view that qualities are unchanging, and therefore you must “prove yourself over and over,” without a drive to improve. The growth mindset encourages taking chances and working through problems, as well as seeing bad situations as chances to improve. The two mindsets also result in differing abilities to asses one’s skill level, with those having a growth mindset being much better at the honest assessment than those with fixed mindsets, who were prone to seeing a lower rating as a failure.
Inside the Mindsets
The idea of learners and non-learners is introduced here to describe an important feature of mindsets. Individuals with fixed mindsets don’t seek out challenges that will help them learn and improve, whereas those with growth mindsets do. This is demonstrated in multiple studies, including a study involving young children and puzzles where the growth mindset children chose to complete more difficult puzzles and the fixed mindset children repeated puzzles they were already good at, as well as a study at the University of Hong Kong where students were offered remedial English classes, and those with growth mindsets took them where fixed mindsets did not. These ideas are supported by an analysis of brain activity. The author provides many examples of individuals who are held back by their fixed mindset, such as the CEOs of Chrysler and Sunbeam and the tennis player John McEnroe, as well as examples of individuals who flourish with a growth mindset, such as Michael Jordan, the CEO of IBM and Jim Marshall. The author reemphasizes the importance of effort, where accepting that effort improves you rather than seeing it as something that those without talent need can lead to greater success. She also provides an example of how the mindsets play out with emotions, speaking on how depression is handled differently by both groups and how choosing a growth mindset, which allows for flourishing through difficulties, can help people stay on track when experiencing depression. Another small but important detail mentioned is that external factors such as wealth and connections still play a role in how effective the effort is.
The Truth About Ability and Accomplishments
The first section focuses on success and achievement in the classroom. The first study was with young adolescents, and it showed that regardless of their grades in elementary school, those with growth mindsets outperformed their fixed mindset peers. She claims it is due largely to the “Low effort syndrome,” where students with fixed mindsets view effort negatively, as either useless or as a sign of weakness. Similar effects were found in college students. However, teachers such as Marva Collins and Jamie Escalante demonstrated that children who are labeled as less intelligent are no less capable of learning and can excel in an environment that emphasizes hard work as the key to success, rather than talent. The next sections focus on the impact that positive and negative labels have on student performance. Positive labels can have either a growth or fixed perspective. In an experiment, students were administered difficult problems and were praised for their performance after. Those who were complimented on their talent, a fixed mindset approach, later scored worse, were less likely to take on more challenging questions, and were more likely to lie about their performance than those who were complimented based on how hard they had worked. Negative labels impact those with different mindsets differently. Stereotypes and expectations, especially those based on race and gender, have an impact on all, but a greater impact on those with fixed mindsets since they are more likely to internalize these ideas that others have about them.
Sports: The Mindset of a Champion
This chapter seeks to break the myth that sports come down to inborn talent. This idea is prevalent in the language we use to talk about sports stars. Examples of sports stars with fixed mindsets are given to demonstrate how their overemphasis on their natural ability and tendency to blame others for failure got in their way. Billy Beane and John McEnroe are examples of this. Also given are the stories of people who became sports stars through lots of practice and determination to improve, such as Michael Jordan and Maury Wills. This chapter talks about the idea of character, saying that it comes from mindset, and that good character can be a more important predictor of sports success than performance. Those who lacked the character of a champion, who believed they lacked faults and could not lose and therefore did not seek to improve, such as Pedro Martinez, weren’t able to last forever, and their inability to play as part of a team brought the whole group down. There is an emphasis on using failure to motivate improvement and to adapt and overcome new challenges. Also, having a growth mindset will allow you to learn from those better than you, rather than being jealous of their success.
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Business: Mindset and Leadership
This chapter focuses on the importance of running a business with a growth mindset. The “talent mindset,” a corporate-speak term for fixed mindset, is to be avoided since it stunts company growth. Much of this chapter is based on the work of Jim Collins in his book Good to Great, which compares companies that were successful with those that were not to find the key to success. Companies that were brought down by fixed mindsets such as Chrysler, Scott Paper, and Enron suffered from similar problems. Their CEOs focused on their glory rather than the long-term health of the company, they were resistant to change, showed off wealth, and created a corporate environment that focused on the talent of the CEO rather than the work of the group. In contrast, GE, IBM, and Xerox all flourished when growth-minded CEOs took their position. They were focused on working to improve the company as a whole, open to criticism, and emphasized the importance of group effort over individual achievement. In each case, the once-struggling company saw success. This brings up another important idea, groupthink, where members of a group do not challenge a leader’s idea because they believe in the leader. A growth mindset encourages challenging ideas, whereas a fixed mindset discourages them, sometimes even with the threat of penalties.
Relationships: Mindsets in Love (or Not)
Here, relationships of all kinds are shown to be improved with the growth mindset. In a rejection study, individuals with fixed mindsets felt defined as failures in relationships and were less likely to have moved on from the breakup. Mindsets are also very important during relationships, with the author defining two main issues with fixed mindsets here: they believe that requiring effort means that a relationship is not good enough and that issues are “character flaws,” unchangeable. The issue with the first statement is that all relationships need effort to help grow together and be successful, with open communication being key. The same is true for the second idea, where talking about issues with one another as they arise prevents partners from demonizing the other when they become upset and allows both partners to be sensitive to one another’s needs. In friendships, the same is true, and having friends with a growth mindset allows you all to become better people, whereas if one or more have a fixed mindset, there will always be a need for hierarchy and unnecessary competition and putting down. Concerning shyness, an experiment by Jennifer Beer found that, among shy people, those with fixed mindsets felt more judgment and therefore were less likely to have successful interactions with strangers. Bullying also exists due to fixed mindsets, since bullies feel better when they put others down. Victims with fixed mindsets also suffer more, since they take insults personally, and are more likely to react aggressively to the bullying. Schools should aim to develop an atmosphere that promotes a growth mindset to reduce incidences of bullying.
Parents, Teachers, and Coaches: Where do Mindsets Come From?
This chapter highlights how various adults can help develop growth mindsets in children. Regarding parents, the author begins by describing different types of compliments, showing that it is important to use them to motivate a growth perspective for children by highlighting their efforts instead of their talent or intelligence. It is important to teach children how to deal with failure productively since they will face it in their lives. In criticism, it is also important to keep growth in mind, turning misbehavior into a time to learn to do better. Also not having a fixed mindset as a parent can help you be more compassionate and less judgmental of your child. Parents must remember that their child’s lives, needs, and desires may be different from their own. Teachers also interact with children for much of their developing years and should aim to create a classroom environment that encourages achievement through growth, rather than innate ability. Teachers who accomplished this include Marva Collins, Rafe Esquith, and Dorothy DeLay, who all teach different age levels but apply the same mindset to help their students flourish. Coaches should also help students achieve success in their sport by allowing students to try difficult things and to fail without judgment, as long as the effort was made to improve.
Changing Mindsets: A Workshop
The final chapter focuses on learning the growth mindset, how to do it ourselves, and how to teach it to others. There is a qualifier about changing from a fixed to a growth mindset, that it does not happen completely or without effort, and that the fixed mindset thoughts will still be there, but they must be looked past to find a solution to issues. Learning the growth mindset is shown helpful through examples from students and athletes Dweck has taught. She also describes an experiment that she conducted where some students took part in a mindset workshop, and others took part in a study skills workshop. Teachers were not informed who had done which but reported the most positive changes in the students who had been in the mindset workshop, and at the end of the year, those students showed an improvement in math scores where the others did not. She developed a learning software, Brainology, to teach the growth mindset to children, and received positive feedback from teachers and students alike. To learn the growth mindset yourself, there are various example scenarios provided for practice, where the “fixed mindset reaction” is given, followed by the “growth mindset step.” These cover issues in school, sports, career, and family relationships. There is a reminder that the idea of willpower is flawed since it reinforces the fixed mindset idea that some people have it and others do not and that it dictates what can be achieved. This means that a growth mindset is needed for things like weight loss and anger management. Finally, the last reminder is that this change requires constant upkeep and effort to see benefits.
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