Praising Your Child's Effort Over Intelligence Reaps Greater Benefits, Study Finds

Jet, March 6, 2000

In the name of boosting their children's self-confidence, many parents heap on adulation when their son or daughter brings home a stellar report card or performs a task exceptionally well.

But when those same children do less-than-best work, how many parents praise them for at least giving it their best shot?

According to research published by Dr. Carol Dweck, Ph.D., professor of psychology at Columbia University, and Dr. Claudia Mueller, Ph.D., a former student of Dweck, only complimenting children's successes alone and not their willingness to try hard can set them up for frustration when they fail to do well, reports Marek Fuchs in the New York Daily News.

The researchers studied over 400 fifth-graders from diverse social economic backgrounds. Each of the students was given a task to perform, then praised either for intellectual ability or effort.

The study, which was published in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, found that "praise for their intelligence, even when it follows a genuine success, teaches children that they can measure how smart they are from how well they do. Therefore, if they subsequently do poorly, children may remeasure their ability from this low performance."

In other words, if you only tell children they are smart when they do well, they'll assume the opposite is also true: When they don't do well, they'll think they aren't smart. This can cause them to give up in the face of challenges.

"Our findings don't say that you can't praise enthusiastically and often," Dweck told the Daily News. They do suggest, however, that you should praise a child's effort, strategy and concentration. Simply fawning over what you perceive to be your little one's raw brain power may undermine future performance, the newspaper reports.

Dweck says praising only your child's successes is just one mistake. According to the psychology professor, tagging certain children as "gifted" also can have an unintended consequence.

School-children labeled as "gifted" sometimes become incredibly vested in the label itself, which can make them afraid of learning opportunities that might challenge it, even temporarily, Dweck told the newspaper. The sheer thought of making a mistake becomes detestable, which results in certain gifted children refusing to stretch themselves intellectually.

However, if you praise your child's hard work, even if it doesn't bring the desired result, your child will be more apt to take on challenging tasks. And if your child should fail or fall short, instead of giving up, he or she simply will work harder and will develop a resiliency that will take him or her far in life.