No Effort Required

 

    Though most parents think that the best parenting is achieved by constantly praising their children for being smart, studies have proven that is not always the case. When you tell a child that they’re smart, it often promotes complacency, especially at school. This is because kids who are told that they’re smart, are put in a mindset that they don’t need to put effort into anything in order to succeed. This complacency also affects these kids in school when they’re presented with anything that challenges their intelligence. When facing adversity in school, it’s been seen that students who are constantly praised for being smart, will give up a lot quicker than those praised for their hard work and determination. The complete opposite behavior is seen in children who are instead told that they’re hard workers. This type of praise seems to motivate these kids to put maximum effort into everything they do. The same happens when children are taught that intelligence is not innate but rather something that can be improved by challenging the brain. It’s important to note that in both cases, the behavior of students tends to continue all the way to college. Students who were praised for their “smarts” growing up, typically cheat on schoolwork and tests more often because they’ve always tried to maintain their image as a “smart student”, and so are not used to coping with failure. As Po Bronson says in the video The Myth of Praise, parents want to be an angel on their child’s shoulder, riding along with them to give them confidence. This is fine, but parents need to realize that the praise they give their child should be specific and helpful for their development, not something insincere and vague that gets thrown out constantly like “You’re so smart”, which ultimately can be detrimental to their precious child’s success.