Recent studies indicate that parents can increase the odds that their children will flourish in life simply by changing the way of how they praise them and talk about achievements. Praise is a powerful thing, and we should use it wisely.
“More than three decades of research shows that a focus on effort – not on intelligence – is key to success in school and life”
Have you ever thought about how you praise your children? Probably, often it’s something like “Well done!” or “Great job!”, or sincere praise like “What a beautiful picture – you are so good at drawing”, “You are so clever!” and so on. Come on. We’ve all been there – either an automatic response or praising our child’s ability thinking that this would foster their confidence and self-esteem. And logically, it makes sense.
But it turns out that by praising our children’s ability, we are actually putting them into a fixed mindset with all its consequences. Research suggests that if we want to foster a growth mindset in children, we should praise them for effort instead. And here is why.
Why you should praise effort, not ability
In her fascinating book Mindset Dr Carol Dweck reveals her research, showing the dangers of praising the ability and putting positive labels on children.
Dr Dweck and her team conducted a series of studies with hundreds of students (mostly early adolescents). Firstly, they gave children ten fairly difficult problems from a nonverbal IQ test. And mostly, they did pretty well on these. Then they praised them – and here is where all the fun starts.
The researches praised some of the children for their ability: “Wow, you got [say] eight right. That’s a really good score. You must be smart at this.” Other students have been praised for their effort: “Wow, you got [say] eight right. That’s a really good score. You must have worked really hard.” In this case, researchers praised kids for doing what it takes to succeed.
Dweck claims that at the beginning of the experiment, both groups of children were precisely equal. But after they’ve received different kinds of praise, the researchers have noticed significant differences in mindsets. As the second part of the experiment, they offered the children further tests (more challenging), which they didn’t do so well… let’s call it a controlled failure ☺
The researchers concluded that praising children’s ability and putting positive labels on them (like “smart”, “brilliant”, “talented”) led to a loss of performance and decreased willingness to choose more challenging activities. They also found that children praised this way felt less enjoyment of the activity that had been praised (technically, they’ve lost flow). When faced the failure on the second test, this group of children felt that they are not smart after all (they felt stupid). A fixed mindset with all consequences.
“Praising children for intelligence makes them fear difficulty because they begin to equate failure with stupidity.”
– says Dr Dweck.
On the other hand, when children were praised for their effort, they were put into a growth mindset. The researchers found that children in this group showed more interest in learning, demonstrated greater persistence, attributed their failure to lack of effort, and in general performed better in the subsequent test. They have also enjoyed the task more – they had more flow ☺ Interestingly, 90 per cent (!!!) of students praised for effort, wanted the new challenging task that they could learn from.
In the last part of the study, the researchers said to all the children that they are performing a similar test in another school. They asked them to share their thoughts on the problems, and at the end of the questionnaire, they’ve also left some space where kids could write the scores they had received. And here came a sad surprise – almost 40% of the ability praised kids lied about their scores!
“So telling children they’re smart, in the end, made them feel dumber and act dumber, but claim they were smart.”
– concluded Dr Dweck.
That’s mind-blowing! Praising effort vs praising abilities – what would you choose now when praising your child?
A better way to praise
Now you know – if we praise children merely for their innate abilities and putting positive labels on them such as “talented”, “gifted”, “smart”, we are pushing them into a fixed mindset trap. And in contrast, praising children for effort and working hard fosters growth mindset in them and boost their chances for success in school and life.
Below are a few ideas on how to use the words of praise wisely (growth mindset style):
- Try to direct your praise to child’s effort, attitude, responsibility, commitment, discipline, focus, decision making, compassion, generosity, respect, love, and so on. Something they can control. For example, “Great strategy: that took some creative problem-solving!”
- Think about what and why exactly your child did something well and specifically praise it. For example, instead of “What a beautiful painting!” try “I really liked the way you are blending the colours on this drawing”;
- Try to praise the process, but tie it to the outcome – child’s learning, progress or achievement. Help your child to understand that engaging in this process helped them learn. For example, “You worked really hard preparing for this exam,” or “You were so generous for sharing with your brother.”
We’ve also pulled together some more examples (a cheat sheet ☺) for praising children in a growth mindset style, which might be helpful for you:
Or you can download PDF and print: Growth mindset praise cheatsheet
It’s not easy and takes a lot of mindfulness in the beginning, but deliberate practice will make it ☺ Good luck to all of us!
Let us know in the comments your thoughts and how you praise people in your life.
Loads of love,
Irina & Dawid
