The Huffington Post – Joel Peterson
“As parents, we love to praise our children. When a daughter or son has succeeded in something at school, at home or in an activity, we love telling them, “You’re so smart!” “You’re so talented!” “You’re the best!” After all, reinforcing a child’s success with praise is good for them, right? Well, maybe. But, it may depend on the praise that’s given, and certain kinds of praise can actually do harm…A former Columbia University researcher, who is now currently at Stanford, psychologist Carol Dweck, conducted a series of landmark studies with her colleague, Claudia Mueller, in the late 1990s about praise and education outcomes…The findings repeatedly showed that praising intelligence or talent made children actually less persistent, less confident and less resilient. Because intelligence and talent are things they can’t control, every challenging situation they faced became a confrontation that could discredit their being labeled intelligent or talented. But praising improvement and the process children engage in — like their effort, hard work, strategy or focus — led to greater persistence, greater resiliency and greater success.”(more)