Alice

Change your Brain Change your Life

(before 25)

Jesse Payne, Ed.D.

Chapter 16

Working the Brain to be Smarter

pg. 216 

Researchers at Columbia University compared hundreds of fifth grade children who were praised for their intelligence with those who were praised for their efforts and hard work. The study (1998) showed that the kids who were praised for being smart became more performance oriented and were less prepared to deal with setbacks. When faced with a challenging task, they were less likely to tackle it with persistence, they exhibited less enjoyment and they did less well on it than the children who were praised for their efforts and hard work. Also, the kids who earned praise for being smart tended to say that intelligence couldn't be improved or developed. Students who were praised for their efforts and hard work believed that they could learn strategies to improve their intelligence and performance.

An important element of intelligence is self-control. Research shows that preschoolers who know how to delay gratification achieve higher academic performance, cope better with stress and frustration, and have better social and cognitive skills as adolescents. Psychology professor and researcher Walter Mischel's famous "marshmallow experiment" illustrates how this works. In the late 1960's Mischel and his colleagues invited dozens of preschoolers into a laboratory room one at a time and had them sit down at a table on which there was a single marshmallow. The researchers told each child that he or she could either eat the marshmallow right away or wait for several minutes and get two marshmallows. Some of the children couldn't wait and ate the marshmallow right away. Other children came up with ways to distract themselves, such as clapping their hands, or to manipulate the environment, such as turning their chair so they faced away from the marshmallow, to keep themselves from eating it.

Mischel followed these children for fourteen years and found that those who were able to delay gratification, to wait for two marshmallows, fared much better in life than those who ate the marshmallow right away. The "waiters" had higher self-esteem, were better at coping with stress and frustration, performed better academically, scored an average of 210 points higher on their SATs and were more socially adept than the "gobblers."

October 19 2013

Potholderz Stacey Peter