The current study intended to model the link between implicit theories of intelligence (ITI) and students' academic achievement, within a meta-analytic review procedure. To assess studies' effect ...size, the Pearson's correlation coefficient (
) was used. The review of 46 studies (94 effect sizes) with 412,022 students presented a low-to-moderate association between the ITI and students' academic achievement. The results indicated that incremental theorists are more likely to have higher grades in specific subjects (verbal and quantitative) and in overall achievement. The entity beliefs were positively associated with students' specific verbal and quantitative domains but at a lower magnitude than incremental beliefs. Moreover, the moderator effect analyses results indicated that the link between ITI and students' achievement was not moderated by gender, but there was a moderate association in student's middle school grade. Additionally, the ITI assessment based on the most recent versions of Dweck's scales, the use of specific academic scales instead of general ITI scales, and the use of the original measures rather than adapted versions strongly moderated the link between ITI and achievement. Moreover, students from Eastern continents (Asia and Oceania) reported a positive association between incremental beliefs and achievement, Europe displayed a positive link between entity beliefs and achievement, whereas North America presented negative correlations between entity perspectives and academic achievement. This meta-analysis updates the current evidence supporting the direct link of ITI and students' academic achievement and acknowledges specific effects that ITI could have in different academic outcomes.
Mind-sets (aka implicit theories) are beliefs about the nature of human attributes (e.g., intelligence). The theory holds that individuals with growth mind-sets (beliefs that attributes are malleable ...with effort) enjoy many positive outcomes—including higher academic achievement—while their peers who have fixed mind-sets experience negative outcomes. Given this relationship, interventions designed to increase students’ growth mind-sets—thereby increasing their academic achievement—have been implemented in schools around the world. In our first meta-analysis (k = 273, N = 365,915), we examined the strength of the relationship between mind-set and academic achievement and potential moderating factors. In our second meta-analysis (k = 43, N = 57,155), we examined the effectiveness of mind-set interventions on academic achievement and potential moderating factors. Overall effects were weak for both meta-analyses. However, some results supported specific tenets of the theory, namely, that students with low socioeconomic status or who are academically at risk might benefit from mind-set interventions.
People differ in their implicit theories about the malleability of key individual attributes. While some people hold the view that traits are fixed (entity theorists), others believe that they can be ...changed (incremental theorists). As these beliefs set up an interpretive framework for forming impressions and shaping attributions, they may affect victims’ responses to interpersonal transgressions. With two studies, we investigate how victims’ implicit theories of personality influence forgiveness following a transgression. Using an autobiographical narrative method, Study 1 (N = 82, college students) shows that having a fixed view of personality is associated with a lower willingness to forgive. In Study 2 (N = 181, adult workers), using a standardized hypothetical scenario of a transgression, we measure three motivations associated with forgiving: avoidance, revenge, and benevolence. Our results provide evidence that attributions of behavioral stability to the offender play a mediating role in the relationship between implicit theories and forgiveness. Having an incremental view of personality leads to lower attributions of behavioral stability to offenders. Such attributions in turn reduce victims’ motivations to avoid offenders and also improve positive feelings toward them. However, stability attributions do not decrease the victims’ desires to seek revenge against offenders.
Introduction
Pre-service teachers should be prepared to face the emotionally demanding situations associated with the profession. The previous literature suggests that two variables are important for ...managing teaching demands: emotional intelligence (EI) or the ability to perceive, facilitate, understand, and manage emotions and implicit theories (ITs). ITs refer to the beliefs about the malleability of various life domains. Individuals can be divided into incremental theorists (believing that attributes are malleable) and entity theorists (attributes are fixed).
Objective
This study aimed to evaluate the influence of ITs of intelligence and EI on self-report and ability EI in a sample of female preschool pre-service teachers.
Method
In total, 224 participants (
M
= 21.27, SD = 4.72) were assessed on ability EI (performance and self-report instruments), ITs of intelligence, ITs of EI, age, and parental education.
Results
In our sample, incremental EI—but not intelligence—theories predicted higher scores on self-report and ability EI. In particular, being an incremental theorist of EI predicted 11 and 20% of the variance of the global EI and the managing branch of the ability EI, respectively.
Conclusion
Our findings suggest the importance of ITs of EI for pre-service teachers’ emotional intelligence and open the door to implementing ITs of EI training in this population. These theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
•ESL students’ perceived competence, language anxiety, and contact avoidance interact in a vicious cycle.•Low-competence students are more likely to experience this vicious cycle.•A social ...interaction task, a randomized experiment, and a survey tested the hypothesized model.•Growth mindsets mitigate low-competence students’ perceived rejection and contact avoidance.•Growth mindsets break this vicious cycle and contribute to ESL students' resilience.
For migrant students enrolled in a postsecondary institution where the language of instruction is not their native language, experiencing anxiety using a new language can manifest in their daily social interactions, and lead them to avoid using the target language, thereby undercutting their academic and social adaptation. We propose that this vicious cycle of language anxiety and intercultural experiences is influenced by language mindsets (i.e., beliefs about the extent to which language learning ability is fixed versus malleable). We conducted three studies (N = 581), including a social interaction task, a double-blind randomized experiment, and a preregistered cross-sectional survey, to test the role of language mindsets on English-as-a-second-language (ESL) students’ rejection sensitivity, perceived rejection, self- and experimenter-reported contact avoidance, willingness to interact with peers, and the amount of time in using English. We found that fixed (vs. growth) language mindsets were linked to negative perceptions of language-based rejection and self- and experimenter-reported contact avoidance. Importantly, growth language mindsets mitigated perceived language-based rejection and encouraged future communication among those with low (but not with high) perceived English competence. The findings highlight that growth mindsets contribute to the resilience of language minority students during their university experience, especially for those with low English competence.
While most people are aware of the importance of sleep for their health, well‐being, and performance, bedtime procrastination is a pervasive phenomenon that can be conceptualized as a case of ...self‐control failure (Kroese et al., Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 2014, 1). Two daily diary studies (N1 = 185, N2 = 137) investigated beliefs about willpower and stress as interactive predictors of bedtime procrastination. Beliefs about willpower capture whether people think of their willpower as limited resource that gets easily depleted (limited theory) or as something that remains regardless of previous acts of self‐control (non‐limited theory). Results show that after a stressful day, people with a limited versus non‐limited theory procrastinate more on going to bed, while there is no difference in bedtime procrastination on less stressful days. Thus, ironically, limited theorists who should be more concerned with recovering their resources after a stressful day sleep less the following night.
Robots designed with artificial intelligence (AI) can be regarded as either humans' competitors or cooperators. Previous research has mainly focused on how robot-related factors, especially robots' ...mental capacities or mind, influence human−robot interactions. However, inspired by the perspective that robots can inform us about the nature of human mind, we argue that people's implicit theories of the human mind, namely, beliefs about the malleability of the human mind, predict their competitive and cooperative responses to AI robots. Accordingly, among British (Study 1) and Chinese participants (Study 2), we measured implicit theories of the human mind and examined their roles in predicting perceived competitiveness and cooperativeness in and intentions to compete and cooperate with AI robots. We also explored the mediating roles of performance and mastery goals. The results revealed that a malleable theory of the human mind was negatively associated with performance-avoidance goals, which in turn, positively predicted competitive responses to robots. A malleable theory of the human mind was also positively associated with mastery goals, which in turn, positively predicted cooperative responses to robots. Further, Chinese participants reported less competitive and more cooperative responses to AI robots than British participants. The present research extends our understanding of human−robot interactions and has implications for facilitating the adoption of innovative technology.
•People hold different implicit theories of human minds.•A malleable theory of human minds negatively predicted competitive responses to robots.•A malleable theory of human minds positively predicted cooperative responses to robots.•Chinese participants expressed more positive responses to robots than UK participants.
According to mindset theory, students who believe their personal characteristics can change-that is, those who hold a growth mindset-will achieve more than students who believe their characteristics ...are fixed. Proponents of the theory have developed interventions to influence students' mindsets, claiming that these interventions lead to large gains in academic achievement. Despite their popularity, the evidence for growth mindset intervention benefits has not been systematically evaluated considering both the quantity and quality of the evidence. Here, we provide such a review by (a) evaluating empirical studies' adherence to a set of best practices essential for drawing causal conclusions and (b) conducting three meta-analyses. When examining all studies (63 studies, N = 97,672), we found major shortcomings in study design, analysis, and reporting, and suggestions of researcher and publication bias: Authors with a financial incentive to report positive findings published significantly larger effects than authors without this incentive. Across all studies, we observed a small overall effect: d¯ = 0.05, 95% CI = 0.02, 0.09, which was nonsignificant after correcting for potential publication bias. No theoretically meaningful moderators were significant. When examining only studies demonstrating the intervention influenced students' mindsets as intended (13 studies, N = 18,355), the effect was nonsignificant: d¯ = 0.04, 95% CI = −0.01, 0.10. When examining the highest-quality evidence (6 studies, N = 13,571), the effect was nonsignificant: d¯ = 0.02, 95% CI = −0.06, 0.10. We conclude that apparent effects of growth mindset interventions on academic achievement are likely attributable to inadequate study design, reporting flaws, and bias.
Public Significance Statement
This systematic review and meta-analysis suggest that, despite the popularity of growth mindset interventions in schools, positive results are rare and possibly spurious due to inadequately designed interventions, reporting flaws, and bias.
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