Person versus process praise and criticism: Implications for contingent self-worth and coping.

“When children receive inflated praise, they might infer that they should meet very high standards to be valuable as a person (e.g., “If I don’t excel, I won’t be valued”; cf. Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“…Strengths (Peterson & Seligman, 2004) Active Constructive Responding and Praise Active Constructive Responding (Gable, Reis, Impett, & Asher, 2004; Kamins & Dweck, 1999) Hunt the Good Stuff Gratitude (Emmons & McCullough, 2003) Assertive Communication Assertive Communication (Wolpe & Lazurus,…”

“Dweck and colleagues (Hebert & Dweck, as cited Burhans & Dweck, 1995; Heyman, Dweck, & Cain, 1992; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998) have conducted much of the research on learned helplessness relevant to this discussion.”

“Another theory holds that person praise implies conditional regard, conveying to children that they are valued as a person only when they succeed (Assor, Roth, & 2004; Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“Criticism is defined as negative evaluative feedback received from other people in social interactions (Deutsch, 1961; Kamins and Dweck, 1999).”

“In this vein, Kamins and Dweck (1999) have found that helpless and mastery responses can result from certain types of criticism children receive from their parents.”

“Most prior researchers investigating the influence of language on children’s self-cognitions and motivation have focused on the wording of praise and criticism (e.g., Cimpian et al., 2007; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998; Schunk, 1983).”

“…emphasizes children’s intelligence or other global traits (e.g., “you’re smart”), rather than their effort (e.g., “you’ve worked hard”), to the emergence of entity theories (Cimpian, Arce, Markman, & Dweck, 2007; Heyman, 2008; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998; Zentall & Morris, 2010).”

“It is also one of few existing studies on longitudinal links between implicit theories and psychiatric symptoms in youths [9].”

“; Kamins and Dweck 1999; Muller and Dweck 1998).”

“Different lines of research have looked at offering praise based on person versus process (Gunderson et al., 2013; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Pomerantz & Kempner, 2013) or intelligence versus effort (Mueller & Dweck, 1998) and in delivering praise in generic versus nongeneric terms (Cimpian, Arce,…”

“Unlike the literature on praise, we did not examine the consequences of praising children for being “good scientists” or “smart scientists” (e.g., Cimpian, Arce, Markman, & Dweck, 2007; Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“…changes in children’s beliefs, motivation, and interests over time (e.g., Aunola, Viljaranta, Lehtinen, & Nurmi, 2013; Jacobs, Hyatt, Eccles, Osgood, & Wigfield, 1999; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Leaper, Farkas, & Brown, 2012; Marsh, K€oller, Trautwein, L€udtke, & Baumert, 2005; Wigfield et al., 2006).”

“…mindset literature is that mindsets are influenced by environmental factors, such as pedagogical practices and parents’ view of failure (e.g., Haimovitz & Dweck, 2016), and can be modified through environmental modifications (Blackwell et al., 2007; Haimovitz & Dweck, 2016; Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“mance without the accompanying pitfalls of self–praise unrelated to performance ( Kamins & Dweck, 1999 ).”

“Finally, although the current research follows on from a long tradition of research on the framing of feedback (e.g., Dweck, 1999; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998), because the student-teacher relationship is an interactive, dynamic dyad where both student and teacher expectations are…”

“Person versus process praise in college This is the first study to replicate in a college sample the finding from research with children that process praise is more motivating than person praise (Corpus & Lepper, 2007; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998).”

“both effort praise and strategy praise (2).”

“Persistence refers to interest in pursuing certain tasks to attain a desirable outcome (Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“It has been suggested that praise for effort may be more beneficial (Kamins and Dweck, 1999; Mueller and Dweck, 1998; Owens, 1997), but this may be difficult to instill in an education system where the emphasis is increasingly placed upon achievement.”

“…recently have implicated demands on the self (also described as nonacceptance of the self, contingent self-worth, or validation striving) in vulnerability to subclinical depressive reactions (Crocker, Sommers, & Luhtanen, 1999; Dykman, 1998; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Roberts, Gotlib, & Kassel, 1995).”

“…of overlooking contextual, social and societal explanations, due to the specious explanation offered by labelling (Batstra et al., 2012; Cimpian, Arce, Markman, & Dweck, 2007; Heyman & Dweck, 1992; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mehta & Farina, 1997; O’Rourke, Haimovitz, Ballweber, Dweck, & Popović, 2014).”

“In contrast, striving to demonstrate competence to an authority figure who links competence to acceptance (Elliot and Thrash, 2004) or makes global ability attributions (Kamins and Dweck, 1999) may be fueled by feelings of fear or confusion and produce a number of negative outcomes.”

“…2001; Spinath & Spinath, 2005), the present study found a significant pattern of lower scores in higher grade levels for effort goal orientation, which is one of the strongest motivational constructs researchers have emphasised (e.g. Dweck, 2006; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Yeung & McInerney, 2005).”

“…situation (Dweck & Bempechat, 1983; Jagacinski & Nicholls, 1984; Thill & Brunel, 1995; Xiang, Lee, & Williamson, 2001); feedback (Dweck, 2002; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998; Solmon, Li, Lee, & Purvis, 2002); gender (Dweck, 1999, 2002; Li, Harris, & Solmon, in press); race…”

“The amount and type of this criticism and praise can impact kindergartners’ sense of self-worth, their affect, and their task persistence, a characteristic strongly related to literacy achievement (Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Ready, Burkam, Lee, & LoGerfo, 2005).”

“Our findings build on mindset development research and suggest that it is not only how parents react to children’s success in the form of praise (Pomerantz and Kempner 2013; Mueller and Dweck 1998; Kamins and Dweck 1999), but also how parents react to their children’s”

“However, praising children for being smart carries unintended consequences: It can undermine their achievement motivation in a way that praising their effort or performance does not (Cimpian, Arce, Markman, & Dweck, 2007; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998; see Dweck, 2007).”

“For example, children who were given process praise (“you must have tried really hard to do this”) instead of outcome praise (“that’s the right way to do it”) showed both more persistence and more adaptive beliefs about learning [27].”

“…reputation manipulation with 3- year- olds is surprising given that negative consequences of ability- related praise have only been documented in children older than this age (e.g., Cimpian et al., 2007; Elliot & Dweck, 2013; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998; Zentall & Morris, 2010).”

“, intelligence or talent) and characteristics as fixed traits (Kamins and Dweck, 1999).”

“…praise that implies evaluation (Ryan, 1982) or implicates the person’s worth (Dweck, 1999), can have negative consequences, including behaviors that are less flexible, less intrinsically motivated, and less conducive to high quality performance (Benware & Deci, 1984; Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“…day, Ms. Reese did make a comment praising Grace’s advanced abilities four weeks earlier that could have elicited this statement; this type of ability-focused feedback has been shown to cause students to have difficulty recovering from mistakes, as seen on this exit slip (Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“Mindsets are shaped, in part, by messages presented about ability (Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998).”

“A multitude of studies have also revealed that brief interventions can effectively alter self-theory (Aronson, Fried, & Good, 2002; Levy, Stroessner, & Dweck, 1998; Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“When adults praise children for their effort (“process praise”), children consistently persist longer than when they are praised for their ability (“person praise”; Cimpian, Arce, Markman, & Dweck, 2007; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998).”

“This may be due the fact that teachers’ ability perceptions may increase children’s feelings of self-worth (see also Covington, 1984; Kamins & Dweck, 1999), and suggest that in some cases, teachers’ perceptions of children’s reading abilities may measure children’s reading ability self-concepts…”

“Indeed, 5- and 6-year olds who had been given ‘‘person’’ feedback (praise or criticism) were subsequently more likely to blame themselves in a failure situation than those who had been given ‘‘process’’ feedback focusing on their strategies or effort ( Kamins and Dweck, 1999 ).”

“Criticism can be person centred, whereby a person’s traits or abilities are evaluated, or it can be process centred, in which the processes or strategies used by a person to succeed are evaluated [6].”

“A growth mindset is also linked with a mastery-orientated attitude towards failures, which means that an individual focuses on the learning process and on understanding the significant components of learning (Dweck & Leggett, 1988; Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“Records of children’s reading behaviors, because they are process focused, are more likely to lead to strategy-focused instruction that will turn attention away from trait-oriented interpretations of performance and build resilience (Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“…in te nd ed so le ly fo r t he p er so na l u se o f t he in di vi du al u se r a nd is n ot to b e di ss em in at ed b ro ad ly . oriented praise (Kamins & Dweck, 1999) or parents’ sensitive responsiveness (e.g., Ainsworth et al., 1978; Berlin, 2005)—the interventions by Mikulincer and Dweck…”

“Emphasizing effort and individual mastery enhances children’s perceived control over their achievement and fosters the belief that they can improve their abilities (Elliot and Dweck, 1988; Kamins and Dweck, 1999; Mueller and Dweck, 1998; Skinner et al., 1990; Wentzel and Wigfi eld, 1998).”

“In general, the predominant focus of the literature on feedback and motivation has been on the influence of praise (Henderlong and Lepper 2002; Kamins and Dweck 1999).”

“Interventions that teach students about the malleability of intelligence have been successful in changing student learning approach and academic performance, with young children (e.g. Kamins and Dweck, 1999), adolescents (e.g. Good et al., 2003), and college students (e.g. Aronson et al., 2002).”

“…indicating that the extent to which children conceive of ability as a static versus a malleable quality is subject to social influence (Aronson, Fried, & Good, 2002; Blackwell et al., 2007; Good, Aronson, & Inzlicht, 2003; Heyman & Compton, 2006; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998).”

“These objections are less relevant in the case of positive verbal feedback, which can be extremely effective in enhancing learning when the feedback focuses on the learning process [23].”

“In fact, previous studies have shown that individuals displaying an acquirable skill view continue to seek challenges and present high performance and persistence on the task, while individuals displaying an inherent trait view present a helpless behavior – including an avoidance of challenges and a low persistence on…”

“…of the difficulty of the task, much as language linking people’s abilities with their identity (“you are a good drawer”; e.g., Cimpian et al., 2007; Kamins & Dweck, 1999) and generic language focused on the success or failure of children by gender (Cimpian, 2010; Rhodes & Brickman, 2008)…”

“…as explicit teaching because children often make inferences that go beyond what they hear rather than passively assimilating adult input in its exact form (Callanan, 2006; Gelman, 2009; Harris & Koenig, 2006; Keil, 1998; see also Cimpian, Arce, Markman, & Dweck, 2007; Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“Coping strategies are used to alleviate negative emotions arising from, for example, failing an assessment, not completing school tasks, and social isolation (Folkman & Lazarus, 1988; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Lazarus, 1993).”

“…Dweck and her colleagues demonstrates that the type of praise that children hear has an impact on the motivation framework that they adopt, and in turn can predict behavior outcomes including how children reorient themselves after failure (Dweck, 2006; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck 1998).”

“Students praised for their intelligence have shown a lower desire to persist after failure and higher task enjoyment (Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mueller & Dweck, 1998).”

“Five-year-olds were the target age group because children this age appear to be sensitive to some forms of evaluation (e.g., Kamins & Dweck, 1999), and they are able to work cooperatively and learn from each other (e.g., Azmitia, 1988; Garton & Pratt, 2001).”

“…growth involves challenges and effort • Blackwell et al., 2007; Burnette et al., 2013; Dweck, 2012; Dweck & Leggett, 1988; Hong et al., 1999; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Mangels et al., 2006 Activating processing dynamics • Develop goals to avoid failure and be viewed favorably • Assesses…”

“, 2013); and second, that personfocused praise is related to negative academic motivation whereas process-focused praise is related to positive academic motivation (Hypothesis 2, see Mueller and Dweck, 1998; Kamins and Dweck, 1999).”

“We adapted a measure used with kindergarten students in Kamins and Dweck (1999).”

“…on individual children’s innate abilities, effort, potential performance and motivation, and give their students the feelings of both competency and diligence (see also Craven, Marsh, & Debus, 1991), as well as a mastery orientation and incremental views of abilities (Kamins & Dweck, 1999).”

“Studies have found that when teachers believe their students can be successful, students indeed meet expectations (Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Ostroff, 2016).”

“Praising the learner’s process, abilities, and achievements has been shown to influence their motivation, performance, and self-esteem, among others [23,28,29,45].”

“In our research, we did not differentiate and compare aspects of praising described in the literature such as person vs. process praise (Kamins & Dweck, 1999), generic vs. non-generic praise (Zentall &Morris, 2010), empty vs. grounded in reality praise (Brummelman, Brummelman, Thomaes, Orobio de…”

“Indeed, studies have provided evidence for the negative effects of including attributions to individual character in critical feedback (e.g., Anderson & Jennings, 1980; Clifford, 1986; Kamins & Dweck, 1999; Meyer & Engler, 1986; Weiner, 1985).”