Abstract
Studies have shown that performance feedback provided by teachers can communicate mindset messages to students and subsequently impact students’ performance. We sought to examine whether non-feedback related comments could also influence students’ mindsets and performance. We utilized a sample of undergraduate students enrolled in a research pool (n = 106) and compared their mindset and quiz scores after receiving a statistics lesson under one of three conditions. In two conditions the instructor introduced the lesson making comments that communicated either a fixed or growth mindset. A third condition served as a control. Students receiving growth comments moved towards growth mindset beliefs more so than those who received fixed mindset comments and had higher quiz scores when compared to the control group. These results provide early evidence that even non-feedback related comments can influence students’ mindsets and performance. We discuss implications for teaching, teacher training and future research.
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Appendix
Appendix
1.1 Introductory script for growth and fixed conditions
Growth condition Welcome to our project. Today, we are going to discuss introductory statistics. We are going to take everything step by step; I’m not going to just throw everything at you and wish you good luck! I’ll be here every step of the way. Everyone can do well with statistics if they work at it. There are a lot of students who believe that they are not good with statistics or math, students with poor math grades in the past, even some with learning disabilities, and with the right effort they have been very successful. Please make mistakes while we are here and ask questions! [IF A QUESTION ARISES: Answer directly without making extra comment (e.g., “good question”).]
Fixed condition Welcome to our project. Today, we are going to discuss introductory statistics. I am going to go through all the information up here on the slides. It is up to you to follow along. Some people do better with math than others. Sometimes doing badly in math in the past, or having a learning disability can make doing statistics harder. Be careful not to make mistakes while you are here. We will not have time for questions, please focus on the information [IF A QUESTION ARISES: I’m sorry, we don’t have time for questions].
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Smith, T., Brumskill, R., Johnson, A. et al. The impact of teacher language on students’ mindsets and statistics performance. Soc Psychol Educ 21, 775–786 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11218-018-9444-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11218-018-9444-z