By Carol S. Dweck (276 pages)
Published by Random House
Bookish rating: 3.75
This is another book that Carolyn Hax recommended, and she hasn't steered me wrong yet, so I read it. Of course I did. The research in Mindset is uber interesting, asking the question: What the heck motivates people? Especially children?
All 276 pages (honestly, it seemed a lot longer) come down to this: having a growth mindset vs. a fixed mindset.
Dweck's research got an entire chapter in NurtureShock (which I loved), and Hax also recommended it, so it didn't feel self-help-y to me. Rumor has it that this book is sometimes shelved in the self-help section instead of psychology, though, and I admit it. This concerned me.
I like well-designed studies to inform popular belief, and that's where Dweck shines. Your kiddo doesn't win a medal at her gymnastics competition? Essentially, you tell her tough, you didn't deserve it, try harder next time. I mean, you deliver your sage parental advice in a way that encourages learning and effort and improvement, but you get the gist.
Nobody LIKES failure, but there's definitely truth in here: Learn from it. It's a simple but kind of HOLY SHIT realization. As my beloved prof would say when something didn't turn out real great: "Well? Did you LEARN?"
Recommended.
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