CULTURES OF BRILLIANCE, ACADEMIC GENDER GAPS, AND GROWTH MINDSET

Several recent reports provide strong research-based evidence that both 

• societal stereotypes, and 
• the perceptions held by practitioners within the academic disciplines 

are at the culprit of gender gaps across various academic fields.  The perceived traits such as “intellectual brilliance,” being a “genius,” and having “natural talent” are often associated with men and not women. For example, a recent analysis of Google search queries by American parents indicates that queries weighted towards boys involve intelligence while queries weighted towards girls involve appearance. The author of the study, Seth Stephens-Davidowitz writes:

In fact, of all Google searches starting “Is my 2-year-old,” the most common next word is “gifted.” But this question is not asked equally about young boys and young girls. Parents are two and a half times more likely to ask “Is my son gifted?” than “Is my daughter gifted?”

In a recent study Gender stereotypes about intellectual ability emerge early and influence children’s interests, Bian et al. found that at age 5, boys and girls considered themselves “really smart” equally often. However, by age 6, girls tend to avoid games/activities perceived as intended for “really smart” kids. You can also read about this study in this New York Times article, and watch the short description here:

In another study published in Science in 2015, Leslie et al. demonstrate that the way brilliance is viewed in different academic fields correlates with the percentage of women practitioners in that field. You can read the commentary on the paper and watch the description of the research by Dr. Leslie:

Finally, in a recent PLOS ONE article, Storage et al. looked at the frequency of the words “brilliant” and “genius” in over 14 million teaching evaluations on RateMyProfessors.com. The authors write:

Fields in which the words “brilliant” and “genius” were used more frequently on RateMyProfessors.com also had fewer female and African American Ph.D.s. Looking at an earlier stage in students’ educational careers, we found that brilliance-focused fields also had fewer women and African Americans obtaining bachelor’s degrees. These relationships held even when accounting for field-specific averages on standardized mathematics assessments, as well as several competing hypotheses concerning group differences in representation.

Believing some people are “intellectually brilliant,” “geniuses,”or have “natural talent” is contrary to having a growth mindset. In fact, thinking about intelligence as changeable and malleable, rather than stable and fixed reduces stereotype threat. 

Students who adopt growth mindset as their own learning philosophy are less prone to the risk of conforming to societal or disciplinary stereotypes that associate their aptitude or intellectual capacity with gender, race, nationality, previous educational experience, etc. 

Carol Dweck summarized these findings and their association with the growth mindset principles in a short clip available here:

GROWTH MINDSET AND STEREOTYPE THREAT

The Teaching Center website provides wealth of information on the phenomenon of stereotype threat (please see this video with a short explanation of stereotype threat).  The term stereotype threat was originally coined by Claude Steele and Joshua Aronson in the early 1990s, and defined as a

“situational predicament in which people are or feel themselves to be at risk of conforming to stereotypes about their social group.”

Research suggests that stereotype threat reduces the individual’s working memory capacity thus impeding performance (see also an article by Schmader, Johns, and Forbes, An Integrated Process Model of Stereotype Threat Effects on Performance).

Teaching growth mindset reduces stereotype threat (see this powerpoint overview by Beth Fisher, Washington University in St. Louis). For example, Aronson, Fried and Good have demonstrated that teaching African American students that intelligence is malleable improves performance (see Aronson, Fried, and Good full study). In another study Cohen and others demonstrated that brief writing assignment designated to “reaffirm students sense of personal adequacy or self-integrity” improved grades of African American students and reduced the achievement gap.

Dr. Greg Walton, Department of Psychology at Stanford University, has an excellent website with resources on growth mindset, belonging interventions, and stereotype threat.

There are many additional examples of how growth mindset can help reducing stereotype threat:

• An excellent “Belonging for Educators” lesson on mindsetkit 
• A 2-page handout by American Bar Association on how growth mindset reduces implicit bias and stereotype threat
• An article on problems with believing in innate talent (see link here)
• An article in Science Magazine on women in stem (see link here)
• A lecture in stereotype threat by Joshua Aronson

• A lecture on stereotype threat in STEM by Claude Steele

• A panel conversation (Drs. Claude Steele, Carol Dweck, Geoff Cohen, and Deborah Stipek) on “Identity, Motivation, and Stereotype Threat: How do they matter for learning?”

GROWTH MINDSET IN MATHEMATICS (I)

Growth mindset has a special place in mathematics education.  Fostering growth mindset reduces stereotype threat and can help narrow both racial and gender achievement gaps.  For example, recent PLOS ONE article suggests that gender-dependent decisions to drop out of STEM (following a calculus I class) might be dictated by beliefs rather than abilities.  See also this introduction to stereotype threat on dePaul University's Learning in Progress.

In the November issue of Scientific American, Dr. Jo Boaler, Professor of Mathematics Education at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, argues that

An emphasis on memorization, rote procedures, and speed impairs learning and achievement in mathematics.  

Dr. Boaler is a cofounder of Youcubed, a company providing large array of growth mindset resources for K-12 teachers - some of them certainly applicable to college-level mathematics.

• Youcubed provides an excellent cycle of mindset-boosting videos in the context of mathematics classroom (we have used some of these videos in our early-alert campaign in calculus).  
• The Teaching Channel provides short descriptions of Youcubed resources including on-line courses. 
• Follow these links to additional resources from Edutopia and Growth Mindset Maths.

The video below is an excerpt of an interview with Carol Dweck and Greg Walton in which they discuss some strategies for and effects of encouraging a growth mindset in learners.

Drs. Carol Dweck and Greg Walton talk about Growth Mindset from Character Lab on Vimeo.