Browsing by Subject "Mindset"

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Academic math mindset interventions in first-year college calculus
(2017-07-21) Hunt, Joseph Franklin; Treisman, Uri; Davis, Kathy; Sadun, Lorenzo; Starbird, Michael; Schallert, Diane; Daniels, Mark
Freshman calculus is in the policy spotlight. This gateway course’s well-documented high failure rates impede students’ timely completion of baccalaureate degrees. The Mathematical Association of America launched a large-scale study of calculus instruction documenting the breath and intensity of efforts to increase student success. Concurrently, economic studies reveal high returns on investment for mathematics-dependent majors. This study examines whether brief, low-cost interventions targeting freshman calculus students’ beliefs about (1) the nature of intelligence, (2) the course content’s relevance to their goals, and (3) whether they belong to the community of successful mathematics students, can increase their academic performance. To this end, I developed and implemented 3 academic “math mindset” interventions. Each consisted of a video of former calculus students ostensibly reflecting on their experiences and their development and adoption of 1 of the 3 targeted math mindsets: growth (“math intelligence increases with effort”), purpose (“math is relevant to my future”), or belongingness (“I am a valued member of the mathematics community”). The videos lasted between 2 and 4 minutes and were embedded in online homework assignments in 18 first-semester calculus courses. The study included 663 participants. My measures include a validated test of conceptual understanding of differential calculus and self-report surveys of regulation of cognition, task value, control of learning, and self-efficacy. I observed no large significant effects of the interventions on the outcome measures. Unbeknown to me, a similar intervention was administered to all incoming freshmen during the same year; this could have contributed to the lack of positive results. A growing research base has demonstrated the effectiveness of academic mindset interventions in raising K-12 students’ academic achievement and persistence. This study explored the possible effectiveness of such interventions on college freshman. It provides an important reminder that mindset interventions are not guaranteed to deliver positive results, even when they address crucial student beliefs, and that contextual factors play a considerable role in their effectiveness. It adds to the developing suite of mindset interventions that may produce positive outcomes under other circumstances, and it provides educators with useful insight about the practical applications of academic mindsets in calculus classrooms.
An investigation of congruence in coaches' perception and awareness of motivational, goal climate, and mindset within a task-interdependent environment : a pilot study
(2023-04-21) Devins, Mikayla; Bartholomew, John B.
Objective: This study investigated the congruence of coach self-perceptions with objective observations of behavior by (1) comparing coaches' perceived motivational approach to objective observations of motivational climate. (2) investigation of a sport that requires a high level of synchrony and precision creating a unique coaching situation. Sample: 13 competitive cheerleading coaches from 7 different competitive cheerleading gyms in Central TX. 8 male coaches and 5 female coaches (avg. 33.3 yrs, range 23-46), had at least 5 years of competitive cheer coaching experience (avg. 13.7 yrs, range 5-27). Also had experience as a competitor, with an average of 8.6 years of competitive cheer experience ranging from 0-27 years. Method: A self-report questionnaire was utilized that aimed to collect data on the coaches' perceived mindset (growth vs fixed) in the competitive cheer environment based upon modified questions from the 3-item Growth Mindset Scale and their perceived coaching style (task vs ego) based upon modified questions from The Perceived Motivational Climate in Sport Questionnaire-2 (PMCSQ-2). Demographic information was collected verbally after each observation and recorded by a researcher. Coaches' behaviors were observed using the Coaching Behavior Assessment System (CBAS). Results: Self-report- 84.6% reported a very high mastery climate; 15.3% reported a high mastery climate; 30.8% reported very low-performance climates; 61.5% reported a low-performance climate; Ego orientation was correlated with task orientation, r=-.22. 77% reported a high - mostly fixed mindset; 23% reported a moderate - neutral mindset; 0% reported growth; Ego nor task orientation correlated with a growth mindset. Conclusion: 30.7% of coaches did not have congruent findings with the observations for perceived motivational climate. 38.5% of coaches did not have congruent findings with the observations for mindset. Cheer experience was related to TO, r=.33 & GM, r=.37; Coaching experience was related to EO, r=.24 & GM, r = .39, but negatively to observed behavior, r=-.27; Observed behaviors were related to GM, r=.27. Coaches within a task-interdependent environment, such as cheerleading, lacked self-awareness to a degree based on comparison from self-report measures and observations. This study calls for more qualitative research within competitive cheer environments and coaching interventions to improve self-awareness.
Art, immersive learning technologies, and mindset : a mixed methods study
(2022-12-02) Myers, Ryan (Ph. D. in curriculum and instruction); Liu, Min, Ed. D.; Urrieta, Luis; Hamilton, Xiaofen; Davis, Mark
This dissertation is a report of a mixed methods study designed to examine art education, immersive learning technologies, and mindset. The study is based on the development and application of a digital online museum resource used as a mindset intervention and grounded in qualitative data about transforming existing museum curriculum to a digital online museum resource. The goal of the study was to statistically measure subjects’ changes in empathy towards undocumented immigrants from Mexico, implicit theories of self, beliefs about social mobility, and views of malleability of intelligence after engaging with the digital online museum resource. The researcher used an exploratory sequential design. This method has three phases: qualitative, development, and quantitative. Each phase builds sequentially off the prior phase. In the first phase of this study an ethnography was conducted between 2016-2018 to collect qualitative data to use as a narrative in relationship to a pre-selected artwork and museum lesson plan (n = 1). In the second phase of this study a digital online museum resource was developed, based on qualitative data in phase 1, and was tested for content validity. In the third phase the digital online museum resource was used as an intervention that was administered to a sample of undergraduate college students (n = 237) as part of an experimental design to quantitatively measure change in four domains of mindset: implicit theories of self (change_self), beliefs about social mobility (change_society, views of malleability of intelligence (change_IQ), and empathy towards undocumented immigrants from Mexico (change_empathy). To increase the rigor of the study, two intervention conditions were included in this phase: a more immersive and a less immersive condition. A mindset survey with four subscales was used as a pre and post intervention test to measure changes in mindset across the four mindset domains mentioned above. A repeated measures MANOVA, collapsed across experimental conditions, found a significant multivariate effect, F (4, 214) = 24.20, p < .001, indicating an overall positive mindset change from pretest to posttest. A follow up MANOVA found a significant multivariate effect, F (4, 213) = 6.72, p < .001, indicating an overall effect of condition. Additional univariate analyses revealed significant mean differences between condition A (more immersive) and B (less immersive) for change_IQ, F (1, 216) = 20.71, p < .001, change_society, F (1, 216) = 12.55, p < .001, change_person, F (1, 216) = 16.49, p < .001, and change_empathy, F (1, 216) = 18.10, p < .001. Participants exposed to the more immersive condition displayed greater change in all four domains. A 2 (Condition) x 2 (Ethnicity) ANOVA found no statistically significant effects of ethnicity for all four domains of mindset, and there were no significant Condition x Ethnicity interaction effects on all four mindset domains. A second 2 (Condition) x 2 (Gender) ANOVA found no statistically significant effects of gender for three of the four domains of mindset: change_IQ, change_society, and change_person. There was a statistically significant effect of gender for change_empathy, F (1, 213) = 4.049, p = .019. Additionally, there were no significant Condition x Gender interaction effects on all four mindset domains. In conclusion, results show a significant difference in pre and post intervention survey scores for all four mindset domains. The results also show significant mean differences in all four mindset domains between the two experimental conditions, with participants experiencing greater change in the more immersive condition. The researcher concludes that just as learning with art in a museum can be “an experience” (Dewey, 1934), learning with art online in a digital format, incorporating immersive learning technologies and digital storytelling, can also be “an experience.”
Considering social cognitive processes in trajectories of adolescent self-esteem development : lay theories of self-diagnostic salience
(2019-12-09) O'Brien, Joseph Michael; Yeager, David S.; Brummelman, Eddie; Echols, Catharine H.; Woolley, Jacqueline D.
Adolescents experience varying trajectories of self-esteem development. While self-esteem grows rapidly and stabilizes for most adolescents, around 1 in 5 show continued self-esteem lability and decline—a pattern that predicts enduring problems with mental health and life-course success. Unfortunately, theories to explain or predict these diverging self-esteem trajectories are lacking. This dissertation proposes and tests a novel theoretical framework of self-esteem development. Differing trajectories may be in part explained by variation in adolescents’ lay theories of self-diagnostic salience, defined as a belief that experiencing more salient thoughts and feelings—those that are more intense, frequent, spontaneous, or persistent—serve as evidence that experiences contain self-diagnostic information about “who they really are.” Normative biological changes from puberty provide highly salient experiences in abundance, and negative experiences tend overall to be more salient than positive ones. Thus, adolescents who more strongly endorse a self-diagnostic theory of salience may tend to attribute greater personal importance to negative experiences, leading to increased self-esteem contingency on those experiences. Over time, this pattern of response may tend to undermine healthy self-esteem development compared to those adolescents holding more non-diagnostic theories. To test this proposed account, Chapter 2 describes the construction and initial validation of a novel measure of the lay theory of self-diagnostic salience, also demonstrating wide variation in endorsement among adolescents. Chapter 3 demonstrates that, when faced with particularly intense and therefore salient negative daily events, adolescents with strongly self-diagnostic theories also appraise those events as having increased levels of personal importance and likely stability. Chapter 4 uses a moderated random-intercept cross-lag design to show that theory endorsement predicts both lasting harm to state self-esteem and greater emotional inertia on days following more intense experiences of sadness. Finally, Chapter 5 incorporates 9-month follow-up data to show that theory endorsement at the start of 9th grade predicts more negative self-esteem change at 9th grade’s end, as well as increases in depression symptoms indirectly through self-esteem decline. Chapter 6 reviews the findings in support of this novel account of self-esteem development, describes potential future work, and considers broader implications.
Emphasizing eustress to change students’ stress mindsets : a randomized controlled trial
(2019-02-06) Sanders, Molly Ryan; Suizzo, Marie-Anne
Stress is often portrayed as an overwhelmingly negative phenomenon in cultural discourse (Helman, 2006) even though research on stress demonstrates that it can have both beneficial and harmful effects on health, well-being, and performance (Crum, Salovey, & Achor, 2013a; Dhabhar, 2018; McGonigal, 2015). Further, there is evidence that a person’s beliefs about the nature of stress – known as a stress mindset – can influence those individual outcomes (Crum et al., 2013a). In a partial replication of Crum et al.’s (2013a) study, I conducted a randomized controlled trial using a stress mindset intervention with college undergraduate students to test whether “stress-is-enhancing” video content influenced participants’ stress mindsets in a positive direction. Undergraduate students (N=236) at The University of Texas at Austin were recruited via subject pool and randomly assigned (1:1) to treatment and control groups. The primary intervention outcome variable, stress mindset, was measured in both groups pre- and post-intervention. With independent samples t-test, I found that stress mindset scores of the treatment group increased positively compared to the control group. Linear regression modeling showed that participant sex, pre-intervention stress mindset score, and treatment group assignment were statistically significant predictors of post-intervention stress mindset. These results suggest that video-based content can influence students’ overall beliefs about stress toward a view that stress can be enhancing.
Whistle while you work : the role of mindset and mood on goal motivation
(2016-05) Han, Eunjoo; Gershoff, Andrew David, 1966-; Broniarczyk, Susan; Irwin, Julie; Raghunathan, Raj; Henderson, Marlone
My dissertation investigates the interactive effects of mindset and mood on motivation in consumers’ goal striving. In seven studies, I find that for those in a process mindset, positive (vs. neutral) mood decreases motivation. Conversely, being in a positive (vs. neutral) mood leads to increased motivation for those in an outcome mindset. The reason for this is rooted in the mood-creativity link, which leads individuals to generate more activities, or means, by which a goal may be achieved when in a positive mood. For those in a process mindset, a large set of goal attainment activities decreases motivation because detailed implemental steps and processes alert people to the challenge in resource allocation. However, I find that outcome-oriented individuals view their goal attainment activities as opportunities or resources that will aid in goal achievement. As outcome-oriented individuals are less concerned about resource constraint, motivation increases in an outcome mindset even when a large number of activities are considered as means to attaining a goal.