Development of boys and girls

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kiryan
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Development of boys and girls

Postby kiryan » Tue Mar 01, 2011 7:40 pm

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/heidi-gra ... 28418.html

Interesting research / theory. Basically boys are told to try harder, girls are told they are smart. When a woman encounters something at the limits of her ability she gives up because of this conditioning, men take on the challenge because they've been conditioned to try harder.

I found this quote particularly interesting because it was so counter intuitive.

...Girls, when given something to learn that was particularly foreign or complex, were quick to give up; the higher the girls' IQ, the more likely they were to throw in the towel. In fact, the straight-A girls showed the most helpless responses.
Ragorn
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Re: Development of boys and girls

Postby Ragorn » Tue Mar 01, 2011 7:52 pm

I took two developmental psychology courses, and one of the things they teach you is that "Wow, you really tried hard!" is actually infinitely more beneficial praise than "Wow, you're really smart!" The former is praising the child for making the choice to exert effort, the latter highlights an inherent trait. It's the difference between telling someone "I really like what you did with your hair" versus "Your hair is a really nice color." Choice vs. trait.

Parents often condition their kids to believe that they're "smart," so when they run up against a problem they can't solve, their default reaction is to assume the task is outside their scope of knowledge and they give up. I hadn't seen research correlating it to gender... but I guess it makes sense.
- Ragorn
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kiryan
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Location: Los Angeles, CA and Flagstaff, AZ
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Re: Development of boys and girls

Postby kiryan » Tue Mar 01, 2011 8:00 pm

I think I can see that at work in my boys.

One I often mention is really smart. The other I say is smart, but needs to try harder. While both get to points where they have no idea how to do something, the smart one sits on his thumb (for hours and hours and hours) and the try harder keeps trying.

I'm definitely going to have to adjust my praise style to see if it has an impact. I should probably stop calling them stupid too.

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