As reported in A Growth Mindset Could Buffer Kids From Negative Academic Effects of Poverty:
a national study of tenth-graders in Chile found student mindsets are correlated to achievement on language and math tests. And students from low-income families were less likely to hold a growth mindset than their more affluent peers. However, if a low-income student did have a growth mindset, it worked as a buffer against the negative effects of poverty on achievement.
Do growth mindsets mitigate the harms of poverty, or do they signal other positive experiences that serve as a buffer? An ongoing concern I have with attempts to transmit growth mindsets (or resilience, or grit, etc.) is that such messages don’t truly function independently from real-world experience. We need to cultivate the experiences that make such beliefs plausible and fruitful.
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mindmannered 