The GOAT and Growth

Yes, I am a Bostonian, and with it comes a zealous devotion to an annoyingly successful plethora of sports teams. So on Sunday, while eating the nachos and chili my mom so lovingly made and watching the highly anticipated matchup of the Patriots and Cowboys game, Tom Brady reminded me of a social psychological phenomenon. Brady repeatedly evolves and picks himself up after difficult times. In 2008, Brady stepped up to throw a pass to wide receiver Randy Moss in the week one matchup against the Chiefs, but was unfortunately sacked and tore his ACL. Many athletes have suffered this injury and failed to come back better and stronger. However, Brady did just that. In 2009, Brady won the NFL Comeback Player of the Year Award. Since the injury, he has led the Patriots to win 2 AFC Championships, 1 Super Bowl, attended the Pro Bowl 6 times and was named Super Bowl MVP.

     This is a perfect example of the growth mindset. Which is the idea that our abilities are malleable qualities that we can cultivate and grow. This mindset is crucial to an individual’s success. Those with the opposite, a fixed mindset, are more likely to give up after a setback and less likely to motivate themselves to achieve more. Those with a growth mindset are allowed to alter their goals and find new constructive ways to achieve them. 

     An example, of this can be related to a study conducted by Lee, Heeter, Magerko, and Medler in 2012. They tested undergraduate students and had them play a game called Do I have a Right?, which is a serious game play for teaching United States Constitutional Amendments. They developed two mindsets and then had the participants answer questions for each category. They measured the participants' learning ability and how well they performed the game over a course of four days. This study used survey and gameplay server data to examine the different mindsets in the context of learning a game. The findings show that growth mindset players performed better than fixed mindset players, their mistakes did not affect their attention to the game, and they read more learning feedback than fixed mindset players. In addition, growth mindset players were more likely to actively seek difficult challenges, which is often essential to self-directed learning.
    

     From the study and example it is clear that growth mindset can help with knowledge and learning as well as athletic goals. It is apparent that a growth mindset allows for people to achieve more in challenging circumstances. It would be wiser to maintain this outlook, because it makes an individual more persistent in their endeavors. I apologize, but I will use Brady as an example again. Coming back from the drawn out scrutiny of Deflate-Gate, many expected the great quarter-back to face a season of distraction and failure. However, once again, he utilizes growth mindset and even in adversity, remains successful. The key to a growth mindset is to always challenge yourself and reinvent ways in which you can handle problems. 

[Submitted by: Katie Hayes]

Reference

Lee, Y., Heeter, C., Magerko, B., & Medler, B. (2012). Gaming Mindsets: Implicit Theories in           Serious Game Learning. Cyberpsychology, Behavior & Social Networking, 15(4), 190-194.       doi:10.1089/cyber.2011.0328