Why I stopped praising my daughters’ intelligence?
Learning from “Mindset” by Carol Dweck
I have two daughters. Saachi is eleven years old and Siddhi is eight. Both of them are intelligent, beautiful and talented. Not a day passed when I didn’t praise one of their natural, born traits. Then, one day about a year and a half earlier, I stopped praising them for being smart, pretty or gifted.
One of my friends and a couple of podcasts that I had been listening to at the time had strongly recommended the book “Mindset” by Carol S. Dweck. Finally, around October 2018, I read the book.
Here’s what I learnt from the book which also explains why I stopped praising my daughters’ intelligence and other natural qualities.
- Fixed mindset vs. growth mindset
People have two types of mindsets. Some people believe that you are born with your share of intelligence, creativity or leadership. Such people see any instance where their trait will be used as an opportunity to prove that they posses the trait. So, any failure is crushing. This is the fixed mindset. Others believe that their basic qualities can be cultivated through their efforts, strategies and help from others. Such people see any failure as an opportunity to improve and try again. This is the growth mindset.
2. Behavior demonstrated based on mindset
Mindset is a belief. This belief in turns affects how one behaves. Let’s consider two students, say FM and GM who possess the fixed mindset and growth mindset respectively. Here are three ways in which we can expect them to behave differently.
i) Desire — Say that both FM and GM are good students academically speaking and are participating in the same academic test. FM might think, “This is my opportunity to prove how intelligent I am.” GM might think, “This is my opportunity to see how well have I learnt.”
ii) Effort — FM might want to ace the test and boast how little he studied to do well, thereby implying that his natural intelligence in the most important factor. GM might want to put in enough effort to do well looking at effort as the most important factor in doing well.
iii) Failure — Say, the test was really tough and both FM and GM didn’t do well. FM might react to his failure by thinking that perhaps he is not good at the subject which was tested. So, he should focus on other subjects for his future career. GM might react to her failure by thinking that perhaps she needs to put in more effort, say practice solving more questions. So, she will try again using different tactics to do well the next time round.
3. How do you change mindset?
In her book, Carol describes that to change from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset is a journey of four steps as follows:
Step 1: Accept that all of us have both the mindsets. Denial will not help.
Step 2: Recognize the triggers for fixed mindset. Is it a failure, someone’s criticism or a disagreement?
Step 3: Name your fixed mindset as a persona. This will help you to recognize it objectively as being separate from you.
Step 4: Invite your fixed mindset persona to join on the growth mindset journey.
The above is a summary of my learning from “Mindset” by Carol Dweck. Now, coming specifically to her advice to parents. Carol advises parents to appreciate their children for the growth-oriented process of practice, study, persistence and good strategies instead of praising their in-born qualities of intelligence, beauty or talent. That’s why I stopped praising my daughters’ intelligence and started praising their effort.
