Changing cancer mindsets: A randomized controlled feasibility and efficacy trial

OBJECTIVE

A cancer diagnosis and subsequent treatment can disrupt the full spectrum of physical, social, emotional, and functional quality of life. But existing psychological treatments are focused primarily on specific psychological symptoms as opposed to improving the overall patient experience. We studied the feasibility and efficacy of a novel digital intervention targeting patient mindsets-core assumptions about the nature and meaning of illness-designed to improve overall health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in newly diagnosed cancer patients undergoing treatment with curative intent.

METHODS

Recently diagnosed (≤150 days) adult patients with non-metastatic cancers undergoing systemic treatment (N = 361) were recruited from across the United States to participate in this decentralized clinical trial. Patients were randomized 1:1 to receive the Cancer Mindset Intervention (CMI) or Treatment as Usual (TAU). Participants in the CMI group completed seven online modules over 10 weeks (2.5 h total) targeting mindsets about cancer and the body. The primary outcome was overall HRQoL, and secondary outcomes were coping behaviors and symptom distress.

RESULTS

Patients in the CMI group reported significant (p < 0.001) improvements in adaptive mindsets about cancer and the body over time. Compared with the TAU condition, the CMI group reported significant improvements in overall HRQoL (B = 0.60; 95% CI 0.34-0.85; p < 0.001), increased engagement in adaptive coping behaviors (B = 0.03; 95% CI 0.02-0.04; p < 0.001), and reduced distress from physical symptoms (B = -0.29; 95% CI -0.44 to -0.14; p < 0.01). Effect sizes of these changes ranged from d = 0.42-d = 0.54.

CONCLUSION

A brief mindset-focused digital intervention was effective at improving physical, social, emotional, and functional HRQoL, increasing adaptive coping behaviors, and reducing physical symptom distress in newly diagnosed cancer patients.

Shifting the mindset culture to address global educational disparities

Educational outcomes remain highly unequal within and across nations. Students' mindsets-their beliefs about whether intellectual abilities can be developed-have been identified as a potential lever for making adolescents' academic outcomes more equitable. Recent research, however, suggests that intervention programs aimed at changing students' mindsets should be supplemented by programs aimed at the changing the mindset culture, which is defined as the shared set of beliefs about learning in a school or classroom. This paper reviews the theoretical and empirical origin of the mindset culture and examines its potential to reduce group-based inequalities in education. In particular, experiments have identified two broad ways the mindset culture is communicated by teachers: via informal messages about growth (e.g., that all students will be helped to learn and succeed), and formal opportunities to improve (e.g., learning-focused grading policies and opportunities to revise and earn credit). New field experiments, applying techniques from behavioral science, have also revealed effective ways to influence teachers' culture-creating behaviors. This paper describes recent breakthroughs in the U.S. educational context and discusses how lessons from these studies might be applied in future, global collaborations with researchers and practitioners.

How Do We Motivate People? Connecting to People’s Existing Goals and Values

Recent successful interventions work by capitalizing on motivations that already exist within individuals, particularly within the field of adolescent behavior change. This approach is illustrated through interventions that taught adolescents a growth mindset about their abilities, encouraged healthy eating, infused schoolwork with more personal interest and meaning, and fostered “empathic discipline” among teachers of adolescents. In all of these cases, it was the connection to existing goals and values that appeared to help newly learned (or newly activated) beliefs and behaviors take root and bear fruit. This successful approach can be contrasted against the more common unsuccessful approach that tells people what they should think or do.

What Is Motivation, Where Does It Come from, and How Does It Work?

Motivation is the process that drives, selects, and directs goals and behaviors. Motivation typically arises out of the person’s needs, and it then comes to life through the person’s specific goals. In this essay, the authors examine the concept of “needs” as the crucible from which motivated behavior arises because all individuals are born with needs that jump-start the goal-oriented, motivated behaviors that are critical to survival and thriving. These are both physical needs (such as hunger and thirst) and psychological needs (such as the need for social relationships, optimal predictability, and competence). The aim of motivation is therefore to bring about a desired (need, goal) state. Motivation underlies and organizes all aspects of a person’s psychology. As it does so, motivation “glues” a person together as a functioning individual in their culture and context.

The Next Decade

Researchers must recognize anew that motivation is the foundation of psychology. Currently, the field of psychology tends to carve people into different pieces according to subdisciplines that focus separately on cognition, emotion, social behavior, personality traits, psychopathology, and so on. Sharing a vision of neuroscience and personality psychology, this author argues for motivation as the animating and organizing force behind behavior and as the basis for a unified perspective on psychological processes. The centrality of motivation will produce two new future developments. First, in neuroscience, motivation will better explain how the brain works, as during goal pursuit and intelligent decision-making. Second, motivation will better explain how children develop their personality, as new needs emerge and through the motivations these produce and the choices they present.

Implicit theories of opportunity: When opportunity fails to knock, keep waiting, or start cultivating?

We live in a time of disappearing professions, pandemic-related upheaval, and growing social inequality. While recognizing that good opportunities are unequally distributed in society (an injustice that requires rectification), can beliefs about the nature and workings of opportunities help people see the door to their goals as more open than closed, and can these beliefs influence the likelihood of goal attainment? Seven studies (N = 1,031) examined people's beliefs about whether or not opportunities can be changed (growth vs. fixed theory of opportunity). In Studies 1a-4, participants responded to scenarios about competent people (or themselves) with challenging, long-term aspirations. When opportunities were available, both theories predicted high expectations for success and a preference for active strategies to pursue the goal, like being persistent. By contrast, when opportunities seemed unavailable, a stronger fixed theory predicted lower expectations for success and a preference for passive strategies, like simply waiting. We also established the implicit theories' causal role and demonstrated processes explaining how a growth theory leads to higher anticipated success. The final two studies examined unemployed people. In Study 5, those with a stronger growth theory chose to engage more in a task about cultivating new opportunities for employment. Study 6 showed that those with a stronger growth theory were more likely to report securing employment 5 months later, even when controlling for motivation-relevant variables, education, and socioeconomic status. They also engaged in more active job-search strategies. These studies offer a novel perspective on when, how, and why people initiate and maintain goal pursuit. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

The amygdala and the prefrontal cortex: The co-construction of intelligent decision-making

A revised view of the amygdala, its relationship with the prefrontal cortex (PFC), and its role in intelligent human decision-making is proposed. Based on recent findings, we present a framework in which the amygdala plays a central role in the value computations that determine which goals are worth pursuing, while the PFC plays a central role in generating and evaluating possible action plans to realize these goals. We suggest that the amygdala and PFC continuously work together during decision-making and goal pursuit as individuals compute and recompute the value and likelihood of different goals while interacting with a dynamic world. Once seen as chiefly involved in simple stimulus-outcome associative learning, the amygdala is shown to play a sophisticated role in human decision-making by contributing to the moment-by-moment integration of multiple costs and benefits to determine optimal choices. We discuss implications of the framework for brain development, emotion regulation, intelligence, and psychopathology. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Believing that prejudice can change increases children's interest in interracial interactions

Children begin interacting less across racial lines around middle childhood, but it remains unclear why. We examine the novel possibility that, at that time, children's prejudice theories-their understanding of prejudice as a fixed or malleable attribute-begin to influence their desire for interracial affiliation. We devise immersive behavioral experiences to evaluate when and how prejudice theories affect interracial affiliation. Study 1 measured prejudice theories among 8-13-year-olds (N = 152; 76 White, 76 racial minority) and observed children in a newly-developed social interaction task. In line with our hypothesis, children older than 10 years with stronger malleable-prejudice theories exhibited more interest and affiliation in a simulated cross- (versus same-race) interaction, regardless of their preexisting prejudice level. Study 2 randomly assigned children to listen to a fixed- or malleable-prejudice theory story before engaging in a real, first-time interaction with a same- or cross-race partner at a different school via live video-stream (N = 150; 96 White, 54 racial minority). The malleable theory increased children's interest in further interaction with their cross-race partner. These findings highlight the promise of malleable-prejudice theories for sustaining positive interracial relationships during a critical developmental window-when the frequency of cross-race friendships typically declines. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Teacher Mindsets Help Explain Where a Growth-Mindset Intervention Does and Doesn't Work

A growth-mindset intervention teaches the belief that intellectual abilities can be developed. Where does the intervention work best? Prior research examined school-level moderators using data from the National Study of Learning Mindsets (NSLM), which delivered a short growth-mindset intervention during the first year of high school. In the present research, we used data from the NSLM to examine moderation by teachers' mindsets and answer a new question: Can students independently implement their growth mindsets in virtually any classroom culture, or must students' growth mindsets be supported by their teacher's own growth mindsets (i.e., the mindset-plus-supportive-context hypothesis)? The present analysis (9,167 student records matched with 223 math teachers) supported the latter hypothesis. This result stood up to potentially confounding teacher factors and to a conservative Bayesian analysis. Thus, sustaining growth-mindset effects may require contextual supports that allow the proffered beliefs to take root and flourish.

How can we inspire nations of learners? An investigation of growth mindset and challenge-seeking in two countries

Here we evaluate the potential for growth mindset interventions (that teach students that intellectual abilities can be developed) to inspire adolescents to be "learners"-that is, to seek out challenging learning experiences. In a previous analysis, the U.S. National Study of Learning Mindsets (NSLM) showed that a growth mindset could improve the grades of lower-achieving adolescents, and, in an exploratory analysis, increase enrollment in advanced math courses across achievement levels. Yet, the importance of being a "learner" in today's global economy requires clarification and replication of potential challenge-seeking effects, as well as an investigation of the school affordances that make intervention effects on challenge-seeking possible. To this end, the present article presents new analyses of the U.S. NSLM (N = 14,472) to (a) validate a standardized, behavioral measure of challenge-seeking (the "make-a-math worksheet" task), and (b) show that the growth mindset treatment increased challenge-seeking on this task. Second, a new experiment conducted with nearly all schools in 2 counties in Norway, the U-say experiment (N = 6,541), replicated the effects of the growth mindset intervention on the behavioral challenge-seeking task and on increased advanced math course-enrollment rates. Treated students took (and subsequently passed) advanced math at a higher rate. Critically, the U-say experiment provided the first direct evidence that a structural factor-school policies governing when and how students opt in to advanced math-can afford students the possibility of profiting from a growth mindset intervention or not. These results highlight the importance of motivational research that goes beyond grades or performance alone and focuses on challenge-seeking. The findings also call attention to the affordances of school contexts that interact with student motivation to promote better achievement and economic trajectories. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Beliefs, affordances, and adolescent development: Lessons from a decade of growth mindset interventions

Beliefs play a central role in human development. For instance, a growth mindset-a belief about the malleability of intelligence-can shape how adolescents interpret and respond to academic difficulties and how they subsequently navigate the educational system. But do usually-adaptive beliefs have the same effects for adolescents regardless of the contexts they are in? Answering this question can reveal new insights into classic developmental questions about continuity and change. Here we present the Mindset×Context framework and we apply this model to the instructive case of growth mindset interventions. We show that teaching students a growth mindset is most effective in educational contexts that provide affordances for a growth mindset; that is, contexts that permit and encourage students to view ability as developable and to act on that belief. This evidence contradicts the "beliefs alone" hypothesis, which holds that teaching adolescents a growth mindset is enough and that students can profit from these beliefs in almost any context, even unsupportive ones. The Mindset×Context framework leads to the realization that in order to produce more widespread and lasting change, we must complement the belief-changing interventions that have been aimed at students with new interventions that guide teachers toward classroom policies and practices that allow students' growth mindset beliefs to take root and yield benefits.

Gender Categories as Dual-Character Concepts?

Seminal work by Knobe, Prasada, and Newman (2013) distinguished a set of concepts, which they named "dual-character concepts." Unlike traditional concepts, they require two distinct criteria for determining category membership. For example, the prototypical dual-character concept "artist" has both a concrete dimension of artistic skills, and an abstract dimension of aesthetic sensibility and values. Therefore, someone can be a good artist on the concrete dimension but not truly an artist on the abstract dimension. Does this analysis capture people's understanding of cornerstone social categories, such as gender, around which society and everyday life have traditionally been organized? Gender, too, may be conceived as having not only a concrete dimension but also a distinct dimension of abstract norms and values. As with dual-character concepts, violations of abstract norms and values may result in someone being judged as not truly a man/woman. Here, we provide the first empirical assessment of applying the dual-character framework to people's conception of gender. We found that, on some measures that primarily relied on metalinguistic cues, gender concepts did indeed resemble dual-character concepts. However, on other measures that depicted transgressions of traditional gender norms, neither "man" nor "woman" appeared dual-character-like, in that participants did not disqualify people from being truly a man or truly a woman. In a series of follow-up studies, we examined whether moral norms have come to replace gender role norms for the abstract dimension. Implications for the evolution of concepts and categories are explored.

What can be learned from growth mindset controversies?

The growth mindset is the belief that intellectual ability can be developed. This article seeks to answer recent questions about growth mindset, such as: Does a growth mindset predict student outcomes? Do growth mindset interventions work, and work reliably? Are the effect sizes meaningful enough to merit attention? And can teachers successfully instill a growth mindset in students? After exploring the important lessons learned from these questions, the article concludes that large-scale studies, including preregistered replications and studies conducted by third parties (such as international governmental agencies), justify confidence in growth mindset research. Mindset effects, however, are meaningfully heterogeneous across individuals and contexts. The article describes three recent advances that have helped the field to learn from this heterogeneity: standardized measures and interventions, studies designed specifically to identify where growth mindset interventions do not work (and why), and a conceptual framework for anticipating and interpreting moderation effects. The next generation of mindset research can build on these advances, for example by beginning to understand and perhaps change classroom contexts in ways that can make interventions more effective. Throughout, the authors reflect on lessons that can enrich metascientific perspectives on replication and generalization. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

A strategic mindset: An orientation toward strategic behavior during goal pursuit

Many attractive jobs in today's world require people to take on new challenges and figure out how to master them. As with any challenging goal, this involves systematic strategy use. Here we ask: Why are some people more likely to take a strategic stance toward their goals, and can this tendency be cultivated? To address these questions, we introduce the idea of a domain-general "strategic mindset." This mindset involves asking oneself strategy-eliciting questions, such as "What can I do to help myself?", "How else can I do this?", or "Is there a way to do this even better?", in the face of challenges or insufficient progress. In three studies (n = 864), people who scored higher on (or were primed with) a strategic mindset reported using more metacognitive strategies; in turn, they obtained higher college grade point averages (GPAs) (Study 1); reported greater progress toward their professional, educational, health, and fitness goals (Study 2); and responded to a challenging timed laboratory task by practicing it more and performing it faster (Study 3). We differentiated a strategic mindset from general self-efficacy, self-control, grit, and growth mindsets and showed that it explained unique variance in people's use of metacognitive strategies. These findings suggest that being strategic entails more than just having specific metacognitive skills-it appears to also entail an orientation toward seeking and employing them.

Preschoolers find ways to resist temptation after learning that willpower can be energizing

Children's tendency to delay gratification predicts important life outcomes, yet little is known about how to enhance delay of gratification other than by teaching task-specific strategies. The present research investigated the effect of exposing children to a model who experiences the exertion of willpower as energizing. In two experiments, 86 4- to 5-year olds were read a story that represented the exertion of willpower as energizing or a control story before taking part in a delay of gratification task. Children exposed to a storybook character who struggled with waiting, but eventually found it energizing, spontaneously generated more delay strategies, which enhanced delay. By promoting the search for effective strategies, this approach provides a promising direction for efforts to foster self-regulation early in development.

Cultures of Genius at Work: Organizational Mindsets Predict Cultural Norms, Trust, and Commitment

Three studies examine how organizational mindset —whether a company is perceived to view talent as fixed or malleable—functions as a core belief that predicts organizational culture and employees’ trust and commitment. In Study 1, Fortune 500 company mission statements were coded for mindset language and paired with Glassdoor culture data. Workers perceived a more negative culture at fixed (vs. growth) mindset companies. Study 2 experimentally manipulated organizational mindset and found that people evaluated fixed (vs. growth) mindset companies as having more negative culture norms and forecasted that employees would experience less trust and commitment. Study 3 confirmed these findings from more than 500 employees of seven Fortune 1000 companies. Employees who perceived their organization to endorse a fixed (vs. growth) mindset reported that their company’s culture was characterized by less collaboration, innovation, and integrity, and they reported less organizational trust and commitment. These findings suggest that organizational mindset shapes organizational culture.

A national experiment reveals where a growth mindset improves achievement

A global priority for the behavioural sciences is to develop cost-effective, scalable interventions that could improve the academic outcomes of adolescents at a population level, but no such interventions have so far been evaluated in a population-generalizable sample. Here we show that a short (less than one hour), online growth mindset intervention-which teaches that intellectual abilities can be developed-improved grades among lower-achieving students and increased overall enrolment to advanced mathematics courses in a nationally representative sample of students in secondary education in the United States. Notably, the study identified school contexts that sustained the effects of the growth mindset intervention: the intervention changed grades when peer norms aligned with the messages of the intervention. Confidence in the conclusions of this study comes from independent data collection and processing, pre-registration of analyses, and corroboration of results by a blinded Bayesian analysis.

Mindsets: A View From Two Eras

A growth mindset is the belief that human capacities are not fixed but can be developed over time, and mindset research examines the power of such beliefs to influence human behavior. This article offers two personal perspectives on mindset research across two eras. Given recent changes in the field, the authors represent different generations of researchers, each focusing on different issues and challenges, but both committed to "era-bridging" research. The first author traces mindset research from its systematic examination of how mindsets affect challenge seeking and resilience, through the ways in which mindsets influence the formation of judgments and stereotypes. The second author then describes how mindset research entered the era of field experiments and replication science, and how researchers worked to create reliable interventions to address underachievement-including a national experiment in the United States. The authors conclude that there is much more to learn but that the studies to date illustrate how an era-bridging program of research can continue to be generative and relevant to new generations of scholars.

A Growth Mind-Set Intervention Improves Interest but Not Academic Performance in the Field of Computer Science

We investigated whether a growth mindset intervention could be leveraged to promote performance and interest in computer science, through what mechanisms it might do so, and whether effects were stronger for women than for men. In particular, we explored whether the growth mindset intervention improved academic performance and career interest by increasing intrinsic value. We developed and tested a scalable, online, 4-session growth mindset intervention at 7 universities, across 16 introductory computer science classes ( N = 491). The intervention did not have a significant total effect on academic performance, although it indirectly improved grades via value. Additionally, the intervention, relative to the control, improved interest in the field and value also mediated this effect. Counter to expectations, the intervention worked equally well for women and men. Theoretical and practical applications are discussed.

Implicit Theories of Interest: Finding Your Passion or Developing It?

People are often told to find their passion, as though passions and interests are preformed and must simply be discovered. This idea, however, has hidden motivational implications. Five studies examined implicit theories of interest-the idea that personal interests are relatively fixed (fixed theory) or developed (growth theory). Whether assessed or experimentally induced, a fixed theory was more likely to dampen interest in areas outside people's existing interests (Studies 1-3). Individuals endorsing a fixed theory were also more likely to anticipate boundless motivation when passions were found, not anticipating possible difficulties (Study 4). Moreover, when it became difficult to engage in a new interest, interest flagged significantly more for people induced to hold a fixed rather than a growth theory of interest (Study 5). Urging people to find their passion may lead them to put all their eggs in one basket but then to drop that basket when it becomes difficult to carry.

Is Psychology Headed in the Right Direction? Yes, No, and Maybe

In this piece, I first celebrate the growing contribution of psychology to the understanding and solution of pressing social issues. Then, despite these exciting developments, I worry about whether we have created a field that our students want to spend their lives in, and I suggest concerns that might fruitfully be addressed. Finally, I worry about the potential fragmentation of psychology and applaud programs of research that have shown the unique and important contributions to be made when the methods and perspectives of neuroscience, cognitive science, and computational modeling are integrated with those of social, personality, and developmental psychology. In sum, although this is an exciting time for our field, we can do more to ensure its vigor and its truly interdisciplinary nature as we move forward.

What happens after prejudice is confronted in the workplace? How mindsets affect minorities' and women's outlook on future social relations

Organizations are increasingly concerned with fostering successful diversity. Toward this end, diversity research has focused on trying to reduce prejudice and biased behavior. But what happens when prejudice in the workplace inevitably occurs? Research also needs to focus on whether recovery and repair of social relations after expressions of prejudice are possible. To begin investigating this question, we develop a new framework for understanding reactions to prejudice in the workplace. We hypothesized that when women and minorities choose to confront a prejudiced comment in a workplace interaction (vs. remain silent) and hold a growth (vs. fixed) mindset-the belief that others can change-they remain more positive in their subsequent outlook in the workplace. Studies 1a, 1b, and 2 used hypothetical workplace scenarios to expose participants to someone who expressed bias; Study 3 ensured real-world relevance by eliciting retrospective accounts of workplace bias from African American employees. Across studies, women and minorities who confronted the perpetrator of prejudice exhibited more positive subsequent expectations of that coworker when they held a growth mindset. It is important that these more positive expectations were associated with reports of greater workplace belonging (Study 2), ratings of improved relations with coworkers who had displayed bias (Study 3), and greater workplace satisfaction (Studies 2-3). Thus, a growth mindset contributes to successful workplace diversity by protecting women's and minorities' outlook when they opt to confront expressions of bias. (PsycINFO Database Record

Why Interventions to Influence Adolescent Behavior Often Fail but Could Succeed

We provide a developmental perspective on two related issues: (a) why traditional preventative school-based interventions work reasonably well for children but less so for middle adolescents and (b) why some alternative approaches to interventions show promise for middle adolescents. We propose the hypothesis that traditional interventions fail when they do not align with adolescents' enhanced desire to feel respected and be accorded status; however, interventions that do align with this desire can motivate internalized, positive behavior change. We review examples of promising interventions that (a) directly harness the desire for status and respect, (b) provide adolescents with more respectful treatment from adults, or (c) lessen the negative influence of threats to status and respect. These examples are in the domains of unhealthy snacking, middle school discipline, and high school aggression. Discussion centers on implications for basic developmental science and for improvements to youth policy and practice.

Emotion theories and adolescent well-being: Results of an online intervention

Individuals' theories about emotions-the beliefs about the nature of emotions and the ability to influence them-have been linked to well-being. However, their causal role is not clear. To address this issue, we delivered a randomized controlled intervention to 1,645 middle school students that targeted their theories of emotion through interactive online modules. Students were taught that they could modify their emotions, get better at modifying their emotions with practice, and use strategies to improve their well-being. One month later, we found that students assigned to the intervention condition (compared to an active control condition) reported more adaptive theories of emotion and greater emotional well-being in school, although well-being outside of school was unchanged. Secondary analyses showed that these effects were present regardless of students' race, gender, or grade level. These findings suggest that theories of emotion may be a promising target for improving adolescent well-being. (PsycINFO Database Record

Parent praise to toddlers predicts fourth grade academic achievement via children's incremental mindsets

In a previous study, parent-child praise was observed in natural interactions at home when children were 1, 2, and 3 years of age. Children who received a relatively high proportion of process praise (e.g., praise for effort and strategies) showed stronger incremental motivational frameworks, including a belief that intelligence can be developed and a greater desire for challenge, when they were in 2nd or 3rd grade (Gunderson et al., 2013). The current study examines these same children's (n = 53) academic achievement 1 to 2 years later, in 4th grade. Results provide the first evidence that process praise to toddlers predicts children's academic achievement (in math and reading comprehension) 7 years later, in elementary school, via their incremental motivational frameworks. Further analysis of these motivational frameworks shows that process praise had its effect on fourth grade achievement through children's trait beliefs (e.g., believing that intelligence is fixed vs. malleable), rather than through their learning goals (e.g., preference for easy vs. challenging tasks). Implications for the socialization of motivation are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record

From needs to goals and representations: Foundations for a unified theory of motivation, personality, and development

Drawing on both classic and current approaches, I propose a theory that integrates motivation, personality, and development within one framework, using a common set of principles and mechanisms. The theory begins by specifying basic needs and by suggesting how, as people pursue need-fulfilling goals, they build mental representations of their experiences (beliefs, representations of emotions, and representations of action tendencies). I then show how these needs, goals, and representations can serve as the basis of both motivation and personality, and can help to integrate disparate views of personality. The article builds on this framework to provide a new perspective on development, particularly on the forces that propel development and the roles of nature and nurture. I argue throughout that the focus on representations provides an important entry point for change and growth. (PsycINFO Database Record

Is Education a Fundamental Right? People's Lay Theories About Intellectual Potential Drive Their Positions on Education

Does every child have a fundamental right to receive a high-quality education? We propose that people's beliefs about whether "nearly everyone" or "only some people" have high intellectual potential drive their positions on education. Three studies found that the more people believed that nearly everyone has high potential, the more they viewed education as a fundamental human right. Furthermore, people who viewed education as a fundamental right, in turn (a) were more likely to support the institution of free public education, (b) were more concerned upon learning that students in the country were not performing well academically compared with students in peer nations, and (c) were more likely to support redistributing educational funds more equitably across wealthier and poorer school districts. The studies show that people's beliefs about intellectual potential can influence their positions on education, which can affect the future quality of life for countless students.

The Origins of Children's Growth and Fixed Mindsets: New Research and a New Proposal

Children's mindsets about intelligence (as a quality they can grow vs. a trait they cannot change) robustly influence their motivation and achievement. How do adults foster "growth mindsets" in children? One might assume that adults act in ways that communicate their own mindsets to children. However, new research shows that many parents and teachers with growth mindsets are not passing them on. This article presents a new perspective on why this is the case, and reviews research on adult practices that do instill growth mindsets, concluding that a sustained focus on the process of learning is critical. After discussing key implications and promising future directions, we consider the topic in the context of important societal issues, like high-stakes testing.

Static Versus Dynamic Theories and the Perception of Groups: Different Routes to Different Destinations

Research on lay theories suggests that people who begin the task of social perception with different starting assumptions follow different cognitive paths and reach different social endpoints. In this article, we show how laypeople's fixed (entity) versus dynamic (incremental) theories of human nature foster different meaning systems for interpreting and respondingto the same group information. Using research with adults and children, in the United States and East Asia, and concerning familiar and novel groups, wedocument how these theories influence susceptibility to stereotyping, perceptions of group homogeneity, the ultimate attribution error, intergroup bias,and discriminatory behavior. Further, we discuss social-cultural factors that produce and perpetuate these theories as well as why and when these theories are maintained and changed. The implications of this work for reducing stereotyping and intergroup conflict are considered.

Making Intergroup Contact More Fruitful

For decades, increasing intergroup contact has been the preferred method for improving cooperation between groups. However, even proponents of this approach acknowledge that intergroup contact may not be effective in the context of intractable conflicts. One question is whether anything can be done to increase the impact of intergroup contact on cooperation. In the present study, we tested whether changing perceptions of group malleability in a pre-encounter intervention could increase the degree of cooperation during contact encounters. Jewish and Palestinian-Israeli adolescents ( N = 141) were randomly assigned either to a condition that taught that groups are malleable or to a coping, control condition. During a subsequent intergroup encounter, we used two behavioral tasks to estimate the levels of cooperation. Results indicated that relative to controls, participants in the group malleability condition showed enhanced cooperation. These findings suggest new avenues for enhancing the impact of contact in the context of intractable conflicts.

Implicit Theories Individual Differences in the Likelihood and Meaning of Dispositional Inference

In their research, the authors have identified individuals who believe that a particular trait (intelligence, personality, or moral character) is a fixed disposition (entity theorists) and have contrasted them with those who believe the trait to be a malleable quality (incremental theorists). Research shows that an entity theory consistently predicts (a) global dispositional inferences for self and other; even in the face of limited evidence, as well as (b) an over reliance on dispositional information in making other judgments and decisions. An incremental theory, by contrast, predicts inferences that are more specific, conditional, and provisional The implicit beliefs seem to represent not only different theories about the nature of traits but also different mental models about how personality works-what the units of analysis are and how they enter into causal relations. Implications for the literature on person perception are discussed.

Differential Use of Person Information in Decisions about Guilt Versus Innocence: The Role of Implicit Theories

The authors hypothesize that different people would use information differently in their social decision making depending on their implicit theory about human character traits. Past research has shown that entity theorists (who believe traits are fixed entities) tend to make more rapid, global trait judgments and to accord traits greater weight in explaining behavior as compared to incremental theorists (who believe traits are more malleable qualities). This article examines how potentially trait-relevant information might influence the decision making (verdicts in a fictitious murder case) of entity versus incremental theorists. Results from three studies showed that such information (e.g., the defendant’s dress at the crime) had a marked effect on entity theorists’ verdicts but little effect on incremental theorists’ verdicts. In addition, entity theorists were more likely than incremental theorists to request additional character information. Implications for the role of implicit theories in social decision making are explored.

Parents’ Views of Failure Predict Children’s Fixed and Growth Intelligence Mind-Sets

Children's intelligence mind-sets (i.e., their beliefs about whether intelligence is fixed or malleable) robustly influence their motivation and learning. Yet, surprisingly, research has not linked parents' intelligence mind-sets to their children's. We tested the hypothesis that a different belief of parents-their failure mind-sets-may be more visible to children and therefore more prominent in shaping their beliefs. In Study 1, we found that parents can view failure as debilitating or enhancing, and that these failure mind-sets predict parenting practices and, in turn, children's intelligence mind-sets. Study 2 probed more deeply into how parents display failure mind-sets. In Study 3a, we found that children can indeed accurately perceive their parents' failure mind-sets but not their parents' intelligence mind-sets. Study 3b showed that children's perceptions of their parents' failure mind-sets also predicted their own intelligence mind-sets. Finally, Study 4 showed a causal effect of parents' failure mind-sets on their responses to their children's hypothetical failure. Overall, parents who see failure as debilitating focus on their children's performance and ability rather than on their children's learning, and their children, in turn, tend to believe that intelligence is fixed rather than malleable.

Using Design Thinking to Improve Psychological Interventions: The Case of the Growth Mindset During the Transition to High School

There are many promising psychological interventions on the horizon, but there is no clear methodology for preparing them to be scaled up. Drawing on design thinking, the present research formalizes a methodology for redesigning and tailoring initial interventions. We test the methodology using the case of fixed versus growth mindsets during the transition to high school. Qualitative inquiry and rapid, iterative, randomized "A/B" experiments were conducted with ~3,000 participants to inform intervention revisions for this population. Next, two experimental evaluations showed that the revised growth mindset intervention was an improvement over previous versions in terms of short-term proxy outcomes (Study 1, N=7,501), and it improved 9th grade core-course GPA and reduced D/F GPAs for lower achieving students when delivered via the Internet under routine conditions with ~95% of students at 10 schools (Study 2, N=3,676). Although the intervention could still be improved even further, the current research provides a model for how to improve and scale interventions that begin to address pressing educational problems. It also provides insight into how to teach a growth mindset more effectively.

Implicit theories about willpower predict self-regulation and grades in everyday life

Laboratory research shows that when people believe that willpower is an abundant (rather than highly limited) resource they exhibit better self-control after demanding tasks. However, some have questioned whether this "nonlimited" theory leads to squandering of resources and worse outcomes in everyday life when demands on self-regulation are high. To examine this, we conducted a longitudinal study, assessing students' theories about willpower and tracking their self-regulation and academic performance. As hypothesized, a nonlimited theory predicted better self-regulation (better time management and less procrastination, unhealthy eating, and impulsive spending) for students who faced high self-regulatory demands. Moreover, among students taking a heavy course load, those with a nonlimited theory earned higher grades, which was mediated by less procrastination. These findings contradict the idea that a limited theory helps people allocate their resources more effectively; instead, it is people with the nonlimited theory who self-regulate well in the face of high demands.

Leveraging Mindsets to Promote Academic Achievement

The United States must improve its students’ educational achievement. Race, gender, and social class gaps persist, and, overall, U.S. students rank poorly among peers globally. Scientific research shows that students’ psychology—their “academic mindsets”—have a critical role in educational achievement. Yet policymakers have not taken full advantage of cost-effective and well-validated mindset interventions. In this article, we present two key academic mindsets. The first, a growth mindset, refers to the belief that intelligence can be developed over time. The second, a belonging mindset, refers to the belief that people like you belong in your school or in a given academic field. Extensive research shows that fostering these mindsets can improve students’ motivation; raise grades; and reduce racial, gender, and social class gaps. Of course, mindsets are not a panacea, but with proper implementation they can be an excellent point of entry. We show how policy at all levels (federal, state, and local) can leverage mindsets to lift the nation’s educational outcomes.

Changes in Self-Definition Impede Recovery From Rejection

Previous research highlights how adept people are at emotional recovery after rejection, but less research has examined factors that can prevent full recovery. In five studies, we investigate how changing one’s self-definition in response to rejection causes more lasting damage. We demonstrate that people who endorse an entity theory of personality (i.e., personality cannot be changed) report alterations in their self-definitions when reflecting on past rejections (Studies 1, 2, and 3) or imagining novel rejection experiences (Studies 4 and 5). Further, these changes in self-definition hinder post-rejection recovery, causing individuals to feel haunted by their past, that is, to fear the recurrence of rejection and to experience lingering negative affect from the rejection. Thus, beliefs that prompt people to tie experiences of rejection to self-definition cause rejection’s impact to linger.

A Blueprint for Social Cognitive Development

The field of social cognitive development (SCD) has historically failed to emerge as a dominant approach in developmental psychology. We take this opportunity to articulate the assumptions, goals, and contributions of SCD with the aim of invigorating research from this perspective. We begin by describing the current landscape of social and cognitive development, suggesting what they have and have not given us. We then outline major goals of the social cognitive developmental approach and walk through examples of successful SCD research. Finally, we examine the unique potential of the social cognitive approach to cross-fertilize social and cognitive development (as well as related fields such as social psychology and neuroscience) and to answer new questions about development.

Mind-Set Interventions Are a Scalable Treatment for Academic Underachievement

The efficacy of academic-mind-set interventions has been demonstrated by small-scale, proof-of-concept interventions, generally delivered in person in one school at a time. Whether this approach could be a practical way to raise school achievement on a large scale remains unknown. We therefore delivered brief growth-mind-set and sense-of-purpose interventions through online modules to 1,594 students in 13 geographically diverse high schools. Both interventions were intended to help students persist when they experienced academic difficulty; thus, both were predicted to be most beneficial for poorly performing students. This was the case. Among students at risk of dropping out of high school (one third of the sample), each intervention raised students’ semester grade point averages in core academic courses and increased the rate at which students performed satisfactorily in core courses by 6.4 percentage points. We discuss implications for the pipeline from theory to practice and for education reform.

Who Accepts Responsibility for Their Transgressions?

After committing an offense, transgressors can optimize their chances of reconciling with the victim by accepting responsibility. However, transgressors may be motivated to avoid admitting fault because it can feel threatening to accept blame for harmful behavior. Who, then, is likely to accept responsibility for a transgression? We examined how implicit theories of personality—whether people see personality as malleable (incremental theory) or fixed (entity theory)—influence transgressors’ likelihood of accepting responsibility. We argue that incremental theorists may feel less threatened by accepting responsibility because they are more likely to view the situation as an opportunity for them to grow as a person and develop their relationship with the victim. We found support for our predictions across four studies using a combination of real-world and hypothetical offenses, and correlational and experimental methods. These studies therefore identify an important individual difference factor that can lead to more effective responses from transgressors.