Theories of ability and the pursuit of challenge among adolescents with mild mental retardation.
Tell teens with mild ID that skills can grow and they will reach for tougher work.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team worked with 48 teens who had mild intellectual disability.
They told half the group that ability grows with practice.
The other half heard that ability is fixed.
Then they watched who picked hard puzzles and who chose easy ones.
What they found
Teens who heard the growth message chose harder puzzles.
They also said the task was more fun.
Scores matched those of typical kids who got the same talk.
A short sentence shifted motivation in under ten minutes.
How this fits with other research
Cryan et al. (1996) tracked the same age group and showed adaptive skills plateau after age eleven.
R’s study gives a way to push past that plateau by changing the story kids hear.
Lyall et al. (2012) found higher ability scores linked to more problem behavior in toddlers with ASD.
That looks like the opposite of R’s finding, but Kristen studied two-year-olds with autism while R worked with teens who had ID only.
Age and diagnosis explain the gap: little kids with ASD may act out when bored, while older kids with ID try harder when they believe they can grow.
Why it matters
You can lift challenge-seeking in one session.
Before a new task, simply say, “Skills grow when we work them.”
Then offer a harder option next to an easy one.
Watch which one your learner picks; you may see more persistence right away.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Dweck (1991) distinguishes two different ways children can view their abilities. Children who have an 'incremental theory' of their ability believe that it is a changeable, increasable and controllable quantity. Those who have an 'entity theory' believe their ability represents a fixed, unchangeable trait. Children with an 'incremental theory' tend to display adaptive achievement behaviours such as pursuing challenging activities, whereas children with an 'entity theory' tend to avoid challenges. The present study examined the usefulness of this distinction in understanding the behaviour and affect of children with mental retardation in an achievement situation. Results from an attributional questionnaire showed that children with mental retardation were significantly less likely to possess an incremental theory of their abilities than children without retardation. However, experimental results showed that when the context highlighted an incremental theory of ability, children with mental retardation showed the same positive motivational response as children without retardation (i.e. they chose high levels of challenge and reported greater interest-enjoyment). One unexpected finding emerged: children with mental retardation showed a tendency to choose lower challenge levels after receiving verbally administered success feedback relative to neutral feedback.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 1995 · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2788.1995.tb00914.x