“You’re so smart!” “You worked so hard!” Which of these do you think feels better? The former proves to be a popular choice. However, it may not actually be the best thing for you or your children.
Many believe that praising qualities like smartness or cleverness will motivate children to perform better, it actually might not. Children without natural academic ability can actually benefit from feedback from teachers and parents that don't promote innate traits. This type of feedback causes a growth mindset and benefits children by making them more hardworking and perseverance, teaching them to learn from criticism and their mistake, and overall having a higher level of achievement.
Practice makes perfect, but you don’t need practice if you’re born perfect.
And there are these children, who are born ‘perfect’. Born with natural academic ability so they don’t even have to try to succeed. Compliments of their smartness and natural talent follow them around but these are only going to hurt these ’gifted’ kids in the long run. In fact, praising children for their persistence or strategies (rather than for intelligence) emphasises hard work and the continuation of these behaviours in the future. If you praise children for their hard work and perseverance now it will motivate them to keep having these behavioural patterns in the future which is exactly what will benefit them the most. When faced with challenge they will be less likely to give up and will believe with more time and effort they can overcome these struggles.
Now, some may claim that anyone can be hard working, what difference does praising this in specific over other traits, like cleverness, make? However, attributes like intelligence, smartness and cleverness provide negative connotations and the, “implication that such traits are innate and fixed. [This] leaves people vulnerable to failure, fearful of challenges and unmotivated to learn.” (Carol S. Dweck, The Secret To Raising Smart Kids, 2015) What this evinces is that praising traits like smartness and intelligence, in naturally academically talented or when success occurs for non-academically talented kids, can actually demotivate students.
This can cause children praised on their smartness to be, “much quicker to doubt their ability, to lose confidence, and to become less effective performers as a result. (Heidi Grant Halvorson, The Trouble With Bright Kids, 2011) This all comes down to the fact that improvement and mastery instinctively comes down to, “intense commitment for extended lengths of time in the face of obstacles (Carol S. Dweck, Giftedness: A Motivational Perspective, 2008),” It’s about working hard and being resilient when things don’t go well for you and this simply doesn’t happen in schools to kids who naturally excel. Nevertheless, this doesn’t mean that academically gifted and naturally academically talented kids won’t succeed, it just means praising qualities that can be improved with time and effort and learning from criticism.
Learning from criticism is one major advantage of a growth mindset. Children without natural academic talent often feel like they have many disadvantages and weaknesses but these can all be solved with a growth mindset which promotes learning from mistakes and criticism.
Children with natural academic talent are usually the ones who worry about how much intelligence they possess and compare themselves to others. They are, “often afraid to make mistakes and reveal inadequacies (Carol S. Dweck, Giftedness: A Motivational Perspective, 2008),” and will, “[avoid] failure at all costs [to maintain] the sense of being smart or skilled (Maria Popova, Fixed vs. Growth: The Two Basic Mindsets That Shape Our Lives, .” These youngsters are so accustomed to being praised for their smartness and intelligence that they will actually look for easier tasks instead of a challenge because they want to keep up the impression of themselves being smart. This happens because they believe that, “you’re either naturally great or will never be great (Derek Sivers, Fixed Mindset vs Growth Mindset, 2014),” and that ability is innate and natural. This signifies that if youth with fixed mindsets don’t succeed at first, they assume they have failed and will never be able to succeed.
This boils down to the fact that children with a fixed-mindset want to prove that they have certain qualities and, “mistakes crack their self-confidence,”(Carol S. Dweck, The Secret To Raising Smart Kids, 2015) and take away their chance to prove and showcase their ‘natural gifts’. This contrasts to how youth with a growth mindset react to feedback and the judgement that, “flaws are just a TO-DO list of things to improve (Derek Sivers, Fixed Mindset vs Growth Mindset, 2014).” With students who are not naturally ‘smart’ or gifted, they have to work harder to do as well as the gifted kids so when they are praised for their hard work they understand that qualities like intelligence can be improved with effort and that, “attributing poor performance to a lack of ability depresses motivation (Carol S. Dweck, The Secret To Raising Smart Kids, 2015).” simply because they themselves have experienced a boost in their intelligence through hard work.
Praises oriented towards effort and hard work are more beneficial because these attributes are seen as things that can be changed. Intelligence and other qualities that are often seen as innate can be improved with effort which eventually leads to a higher level of success.
“Our society worships talent and many people assume that possessing superior intelligence or ability - [...] is a recipe for success (Carol S. Dweck, The Secret To Raising Smart Kids, 2015).” This is a myth. Children without natural academic talent are actually more likely to have a higher level of success and fulfilment in the future.
In fact, children with so-called superior intelligence usually stay away from challenge and stick to what they already know thus lessening their overall skill and reducing their chance of a high level of success. This is primarily caused because naturally academically talented kids can often feel even more pressure to perform and live up to their ‘smart’ impression. These leads to them tending to, “avoid challenges because [they] make mistakes more likely and looking smart less so (Carol S. Dweck, The Secret To Raising Smart Kids, 2015).” This happens solely because they, “see their abilities as innate and unchangeable (Heidi Grant Halvorson, The Trouble With Bright Kids, 2011).”
A growth mindset provides the perspective that your abilities can be improved if you try hard enough. The problem with the fixed mindset is that these kids grow up to be, “far too hard on themselves and [...] give up too soon. (Heidi Grant Halvorson, The Trouble With Bright Kids, 2011)” They start believing that if they fail at something once, they will never be able to do it. Leading to them inescapably trying out fewer things and taking on minimum opportunities causing them to have less success and decreased amount of fulfilment.
Praising children and especially non-naturally gifted children on things that they did rather than something they are supposedly born with will inevitably give them a higher level of success in the future.
Carol S. Dweck and Claudia M. Mueller ran an experiment where they gave children 3 tests. The first with easy problems, the second with difficult and the third with easy problems again. After the first set, they praised half the kids on their smartness and half the kids on their hard work. The students then did a set of challenging problems where most of the kids couldn’t even solve one of the problems. Then the students completed another round of easier problems similar to the first set. From their experiments, Dweck and Mueller concluded that, “children who were praised for their smartness did 25% worse compared to the group who was praised for their hard work.” This proves that even one simple comment and challenging problems could alter these children’s beliefs in their own skill and make them question their ability.
If there are all these downsides to this type of feedback, why are parents and teachers still doing it? Simply because they don’t know. For generations of students and teachers, praising smartness, cleverness and teaching kids to aspire to be geniuses has been assumed to be the best way to ‘motivate’ students. But recent research has proved that the supposed best type of feedback might actually be the worst. Instead, parents and teachers should compliment skills that correlate with a growth mindset.
Many believe that praising qualities like smartness or cleverness will motivate children to perform better, but it actually doesn’t. Children without natural academic ability can actually benefit from feedback from teachers and parents that don't promote innate traits. This type of feedback causes a growth mindset. A growth mindset has many benefits and ensures success in the future. So, the next time you have to give praise or feedback to a student don’t opt for the easier, shallow comment, “You’re so smart” or “You’re so clever”. These remarks are trivial and serve only one purpose. To hurt these children’s abilities. The preferable and superior method would be to praise qualities that can be acquired through time and effort. Qualities that can be improved. These are the things that will lead to a growth mindset and cause students to become more hardworking and perseverant, to learn from criticism and overall having a higher level of achievement and success.
Bibliography:
Popova, Maria. "Fixed vs. Growth: The Two Basic Mindsets That Shape Our Lives." Brain Pickings. N.p., 29 Jan. 2014. Web. 12 June 2016. <https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/29/carol-dweck-mindset/>.
Dweck, Carol S. "Duke TIP." Giftedness: A Motivational Perspective. N.p., 21 Apr. 2008. Web. 12 June 2016. <https://tip.duke.edu/node/888>.
Halvorson, Heidi Grant. "The Trouble With Bright Kids." Harvard Business Review. N.p., 21 Nov. 2011. Web. 12 June 2016. <https://hbr.org/2011/11/the-trouble-with-bright-kids>.
Dweck, Carol S. "The Secret to Raising Smart Kids." Scientific American. N.p., 1 Jan. 2015. Web. 12 June 2016.
Showing posts with label Prerna. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Prerna. Show all posts
Sunday, June 12, 2016
Sunday, March 20, 2016
Everything I Never Told The Help
Parents, friends, peers, society. Everyone, everywhere is constantly processing thoughts, ideas and emotions. We are constantly picking up on social cues and consequences of not adapting to accommodate for them. Choosing to indulge other’s desires rather than what is best for yourself is often easier than going through the pain, social disgrace and disappointment of letting down your parents, family and community. “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett and “Everything I Never Told You” by Celeste Ng both deal with this issue. “The Help” is a story based in a highly segregated and restricting community where everyone has the same rigid principles and ideologies implanted into their brain. Newcomer Celia Foote finds adjusting to life difficult and struggles with being good enough. “Everything I Never Told You” is a story set in the 1970’s in Ohio centered around a mixed race family with mountains of social stigma. Marilyn appeased her mother’s expectations of becoming a housewife even though she always had dreams of becoming a doctor. After her failure, she pushes her dream onto her favourite child, Lydia. In both The Help and Everything I Never Told You the lesson that it can be hard to make your own decisions and have your own opinion when society and your parents are constantly telling you what to do, think and believe is revealed using Ng's and Stockett's use of 3rd person narrator and the symbol of eggs and Skeeter’s book respectively.
Living up to your parents and society’s expectations is a natural instinct. As teenagers especially, we thirst for a feeling of belonging and will usually do whatever is needed to be considered this way. From the start, Stockett portrays Celia to feel like she isn’t good enough for Jackson because she came from sugar ditch and, “even the white people look like they haven’t eaten in days.” She doesn’t come from much and it constantly bothers her now because of all the riches she is living in. If that wasn’t enough, Celia can’t have any kids, she has several unfortunate miscarriages because she wants to live up to the definition of a successful woman. To overcompensate for this, she hires a maid so that her husband will think that she “can do it on [her] own. [She] [wants] him to think [she’s]...worth it,” because if she can supposedly cook and clean it makes up for her child bearing shortcomings. On one side, Celia wants to be good enough for her community, whereas on the other side, Lydia is doing everything out of obligation to her mother. She doesn’t want to be a doctor at all but because she is so scared of her mom leaving the family again, she doesn’t have a choice. Infact even her mother, Marilyn realizes that she is vicariously living through her child and forcing her childhood dreams on her child. She figures this out precisely when she looks back on old times,“Five years old, standing on tiptoe to watch vinegar and baking soda foam in the sink,” Lydia kept on doing what her mother wanted because her mother simply didn’t know that when Lydia had, “[said], “Show me again, show me another”,” It had been purely for her mother’s satisfaction. Truth is, Marilyn had not known Lydia was unhappy and Lydia had believed that Marilyn wouldn’t care if she didn’t want to be a doctor. Lydia has simply done whatever her mother told her to, regardless if she wanted to or not or liked it or not. It didn’t matter to her mother if she, “didn't feel like smiling? Then what? Force [herself] to smile. Act as if [she] [was] already happy.” It never mattered to Lydia either, she calmly satisfied their wants and needs as if she was truly happy. She just had to become okay with the fact that, “You never got what you wanted; you just learned to get by without it.” And much like Marilyn who only realized the harsh effects of her actions, Celia realized that trying to please her husband and society wasn’t worth it. Celia was trying so hard with no reward. Both the characters want to prove something. Lydia wants to prove to herself that she doesn’t need to be a doctor for her mother’s love and Celia wants to prove to herself that a baby and becoming ‘adequate’ in society is all she needs to be happy. It’s unfortunate actually that they and so many teenagers base their worth and importance on how they satisfy desires from their parents or society. And because of this, many teenagers can’t make the decisions they want to because they feel that they are letting down or disappointing their parents and society. Disappointing parents or society seems like a much harsher punishment than simply being unhappy. Teenagers and adults alike are so caught up in fulfilling others expectations they can’t even think about what they actually want and if they are genuinely happy.
Pleasing other people and meeting their expectations can spin out of control quickly and understanding that happiness matters more than satisfying other’s superficial desires is very important. Ng used the symbol of eggs, both literally and figuratively to show how Marilyn is satisfying her mother’s expectations even if she doesn’t want it and then how she pushes it onto her daughter who doesn’t want it and Stockett used Skeeter writing her book as an act of rebellion and to show that she didn’t care what was expected from her, she was doing what she wanted. Marilyn was never comfortable with the idea of being a housewife and her whole world revolving around a man. This is revealed from her mother’s Betty Crocker Cookbook and how it tells her that,“The man you marry will know the way he likes his eggs.” This affected Marilyn greatly because it meant to her that all her use was to please and satisfy her husband’s wants and needs, but Marilyn didn’t want or believe this. She wanted to be more than a wife, more than children, more than her mother. But somewhere along the line, Marilyn got caught up in her mother’s mess and became exactly what was wanted and expected out of her, she became the expectation. And then pushed her literal egg, her daughter to complete her dream for her because she couldn’t even if, “It had not been science that Lydia had loved,” even if, “everything that [Marilyn] had wanted for Lydia. Lydia had never wanted but had embraced anyway,” even if Marilyn could never quite got over her failures. Much the opposite of Skeeter living in Jackson, Mississippi. Her passion also being for something that wasn’t expected or wanted from her community or her parents. And unlike Marilyn, Skeeter actually got her dream. Skeeter realizes that she’s been told her entire life what to think about everything and when she finally understood that, [she] actually had a choice what [she] could believe,” it became simpler, easier for her to do what she believed was right for herself even if it created social disgrace and shame. Writing a book with the help of coloured maids who were telling stories about white people was unheard of and unthought of because of it’s sheer perception as a sin. The difference is Skeeter had a choice to do what she wanted, Marilyn didn’t. After she became pregnant it became more difficult for her to follow through with her plans. Juggling fulfilling expectations and what you want can be extremely challenging at times because it is almost always impossible. And because of this fact trying to be ‘perfect’ or accomplishing everyone’s expectations is absolutely useless and a waste of time if you aren’t happy because in the end happiness matters the most.
Often times though, this unfulfillment of expectations can happen because of unhappiness. This unhappiness is not expressed which results in a lot of secrets and lack of communication. Stockett and Ng both use 3rd person omniscient narrator to reveal secrets about characters. Ng reveals how pressure and expectations from parents can lead to bad decisions and negative whereas Stockett uses 3rd person narrator in chapter 25, to reveal the struggles, misconceptions and eventual acceptance of failure complying with society’s expectations. The narrator in “Everything I Never Told You”, often reveals the theme through opinions from other characters. The way Marilyn still thought of her mom as something she, “will never end up like,” and the way Nath is, “amazed at the way [lydia] can lie without even a raised eyebrow to give her away,” Nath is surprised about how good Lydia is at lying to her parents, this shows the lack of communication in the family and also foreshadows that Lydia can lie about other things and might be hiding bigger, more important things from her family, such as the fact that she doesn’t actually want to be a doctor. This is fully revealed later in the story, when we are in the actual scene of Lydia’s supposed suicide. She is so overwhelmed and stressed about pleasing her parents that it was just all too much for her. Lydia was truly fearful for how her mom would react and instead lied and hid from the truth, “She will tell her mother: enough. If she fails physics, if she never becomes a doctor, it will be all right.” Lydia finally believes that if she can magically learn how to swim, she will tell her mother that. “From now on, she will do what she wants.” She will change everything. But, it’s not only if she can swim. She wants to be as brave the neglected child, Nath. “Lydia thinks that, If he can be brave, so sure of who he is and what he wants, perhaps she can, too.” What Lydia doesn’t realize though, is that her parents don’t expect anything in specific from Nath. Lydia is expected to be the doctor her mother never go to be just because she expects it. It never mattered what Lydia wanted. On the other hand, in the Help, the sheer severity and strictness of the expectations from the Jackson community leaves Celia helpless to be her own person. She tries so hard to fit into the community even, “[ordering] a book in the mail to learn [Bridge],” But learning alone wasn’t enough for her, She wanted to connect with the most prestigious members of her community, Hilly Holbrook and Elizabeth Leefolt and constantly “calling again to see about a bridge game.” It never mattered to Celia whether she actually enjoyed Bridge much in the same way it didn’t matter to Lydia if she wanted to be a doctor because both of them were satisfying expectations put on them. And these expectations can come from anywhere, like your parents to your general community and these all lead down to one root cause. If nothing more, humans inherently want to feel adequate, feel like we belong and like we are good enough. Often doing minor and important things are a main consequence from this need.
Even the smallest of actions can mislead people. Mislead people into believing you are happy and believing that you actually want whatever they are forcing you to do like career choice or Stockett and Ng both want us to learn that it can be hard to make your own decisions and have your own opinions when your parents and society are constantly telling you what to do, think and believe. As teenagers this idea is extremely relevant to us to understand that it’s going to be hard to make your own decisions and have your own opinion but it is vital to have them. We are all just trying to figure out who we are and what we want in life and it’s important to know that making other people happy isn’t always the same as being happy. Because in the end, if you aren’t happy, what’s the point? What’s the point of being praised for something you don’t care about? This simple idea of trying to do what you want, rather than what everyone else expects you to want is eloquently portrayed in Kathryn Stockett’s, “The Help” and Celeste Ng’s, “Everything I Never Told You”.
Living up to your parents and society’s expectations is a natural instinct. As teenagers especially, we thirst for a feeling of belonging and will usually do whatever is needed to be considered this way. From the start, Stockett portrays Celia to feel like she isn’t good enough for Jackson because she came from sugar ditch and, “even the white people look like they haven’t eaten in days.” She doesn’t come from much and it constantly bothers her now because of all the riches she is living in. If that wasn’t enough, Celia can’t have any kids, she has several unfortunate miscarriages because she wants to live up to the definition of a successful woman. To overcompensate for this, she hires a maid so that her husband will think that she “can do it on [her] own. [She] [wants] him to think [she’s]...worth it,” because if she can supposedly cook and clean it makes up for her child bearing shortcomings. On one side, Celia wants to be good enough for her community, whereas on the other side, Lydia is doing everything out of obligation to her mother. She doesn’t want to be a doctor at all but because she is so scared of her mom leaving the family again, she doesn’t have a choice. Infact even her mother, Marilyn realizes that she is vicariously living through her child and forcing her childhood dreams on her child. She figures this out precisely when she looks back on old times,“Five years old, standing on tiptoe to watch vinegar and baking soda foam in the sink,” Lydia kept on doing what her mother wanted because her mother simply didn’t know that when Lydia had, “[said], “Show me again, show me another”,” It had been purely for her mother’s satisfaction. Truth is, Marilyn had not known Lydia was unhappy and Lydia had believed that Marilyn wouldn’t care if she didn’t want to be a doctor. Lydia has simply done whatever her mother told her to, regardless if she wanted to or not or liked it or not. It didn’t matter to her mother if she, “didn't feel like smiling? Then what? Force [herself] to smile. Act as if [she] [was] already happy.” It never mattered to Lydia either, she calmly satisfied their wants and needs as if she was truly happy. She just had to become okay with the fact that, “You never got what you wanted; you just learned to get by without it.” And much like Marilyn who only realized the harsh effects of her actions, Celia realized that trying to please her husband and society wasn’t worth it. Celia was trying so hard with no reward. Both the characters want to prove something. Lydia wants to prove to herself that she doesn’t need to be a doctor for her mother’s love and Celia wants to prove to herself that a baby and becoming ‘adequate’ in society is all she needs to be happy. It’s unfortunate actually that they and so many teenagers base their worth and importance on how they satisfy desires from their parents or society. And because of this, many teenagers can’t make the decisions they want to because they feel that they are letting down or disappointing their parents and society. Disappointing parents or society seems like a much harsher punishment than simply being unhappy. Teenagers and adults alike are so caught up in fulfilling others expectations they can’t even think about what they actually want and if they are genuinely happy.
Pleasing other people and meeting their expectations can spin out of control quickly and understanding that happiness matters more than satisfying other’s superficial desires is very important. Ng used the symbol of eggs, both literally and figuratively to show how Marilyn is satisfying her mother’s expectations even if she doesn’t want it and then how she pushes it onto her daughter who doesn’t want it and Stockett used Skeeter writing her book as an act of rebellion and to show that she didn’t care what was expected from her, she was doing what she wanted. Marilyn was never comfortable with the idea of being a housewife and her whole world revolving around a man. This is revealed from her mother’s Betty Crocker Cookbook and how it tells her that,“The man you marry will know the way he likes his eggs.” This affected Marilyn greatly because it meant to her that all her use was to please and satisfy her husband’s wants and needs, but Marilyn didn’t want or believe this. She wanted to be more than a wife, more than children, more than her mother. But somewhere along the line, Marilyn got caught up in her mother’s mess and became exactly what was wanted and expected out of her, she became the expectation. And then pushed her literal egg, her daughter to complete her dream for her because she couldn’t even if, “It had not been science that Lydia had loved,” even if, “everything that [Marilyn] had wanted for Lydia. Lydia had never wanted but had embraced anyway,” even if Marilyn could never quite got over her failures. Much the opposite of Skeeter living in Jackson, Mississippi. Her passion also being for something that wasn’t expected or wanted from her community or her parents. And unlike Marilyn, Skeeter actually got her dream. Skeeter realizes that she’s been told her entire life what to think about everything and when she finally understood that, [she] actually had a choice what [she] could believe,” it became simpler, easier for her to do what she believed was right for herself even if it created social disgrace and shame. Writing a book with the help of coloured maids who were telling stories about white people was unheard of and unthought of because of it’s sheer perception as a sin. The difference is Skeeter had a choice to do what she wanted, Marilyn didn’t. After she became pregnant it became more difficult for her to follow through with her plans. Juggling fulfilling expectations and what you want can be extremely challenging at times because it is almost always impossible. And because of this fact trying to be ‘perfect’ or accomplishing everyone’s expectations is absolutely useless and a waste of time if you aren’t happy because in the end happiness matters the most.
Often times though, this unfulfillment of expectations can happen because of unhappiness. This unhappiness is not expressed which results in a lot of secrets and lack of communication. Stockett and Ng both use 3rd person omniscient narrator to reveal secrets about characters. Ng reveals how pressure and expectations from parents can lead to bad decisions and negative whereas Stockett uses 3rd person narrator in chapter 25, to reveal the struggles, misconceptions and eventual acceptance of failure complying with society’s expectations. The narrator in “Everything I Never Told You”, often reveals the theme through opinions from other characters. The way Marilyn still thought of her mom as something she, “will never end up like,” and the way Nath is, “amazed at the way [lydia] can lie without even a raised eyebrow to give her away,” Nath is surprised about how good Lydia is at lying to her parents, this shows the lack of communication in the family and also foreshadows that Lydia can lie about other things and might be hiding bigger, more important things from her family, such as the fact that she doesn’t actually want to be a doctor. This is fully revealed later in the story, when we are in the actual scene of Lydia’s supposed suicide. She is so overwhelmed and stressed about pleasing her parents that it was just all too much for her. Lydia was truly fearful for how her mom would react and instead lied and hid from the truth, “She will tell her mother: enough. If she fails physics, if she never becomes a doctor, it will be all right.” Lydia finally believes that if she can magically learn how to swim, she will tell her mother that. “From now on, she will do what she wants.” She will change everything. But, it’s not only if she can swim. She wants to be as brave the neglected child, Nath. “Lydia thinks that, If he can be brave, so sure of who he is and what he wants, perhaps she can, too.” What Lydia doesn’t realize though, is that her parents don’t expect anything in specific from Nath. Lydia is expected to be the doctor her mother never go to be just because she expects it. It never mattered what Lydia wanted. On the other hand, in the Help, the sheer severity and strictness of the expectations from the Jackson community leaves Celia helpless to be her own person. She tries so hard to fit into the community even, “[ordering] a book in the mail to learn [Bridge],” But learning alone wasn’t enough for her, She wanted to connect with the most prestigious members of her community, Hilly Holbrook and Elizabeth Leefolt and constantly “calling again to see about a bridge game.” It never mattered to Celia whether she actually enjoyed Bridge much in the same way it didn’t matter to Lydia if she wanted to be a doctor because both of them were satisfying expectations put on them. And these expectations can come from anywhere, like your parents to your general community and these all lead down to one root cause. If nothing more, humans inherently want to feel adequate, feel like we belong and like we are good enough. Often doing minor and important things are a main consequence from this need.
Even the smallest of actions can mislead people. Mislead people into believing you are happy and believing that you actually want whatever they are forcing you to do like career choice or Stockett and Ng both want us to learn that it can be hard to make your own decisions and have your own opinions when your parents and society are constantly telling you what to do, think and believe. As teenagers this idea is extremely relevant to us to understand that it’s going to be hard to make your own decisions and have your own opinion but it is vital to have them. We are all just trying to figure out who we are and what we want in life and it’s important to know that making other people happy isn’t always the same as being happy. Because in the end, if you aren’t happy, what’s the point? What’s the point of being praised for something you don’t care about? This simple idea of trying to do what you want, rather than what everyone else expects you to want is eloquently portrayed in Kathryn Stockett’s, “The Help” and Celeste Ng’s, “Everything I Never Told You”.
Wednesday, December 9, 2015
The Stereotype Station Shouldn’t Be This Popular
The half-Chinese student goes to summer camp in Canada, people ask her where she learnt to use a knife and fork. Her peers tell her to get some chopsticks. They ask her how she can speak english so well, how she has an american accent.
If only these were genuine events of curiosity. Instead, they represent the way in which stereotypes still exist. Assuming everyone who fits into a certain ethnic group all have the same strengths and weaknesses, act the same, are the same. But nevertheless they are deceptions. “Stereotypes are fast and easy because they are lies, and the truth takes it’s time.” claims author Deb Caletti.
Stereotypes are the way that we try organize everything in our brain because one similarity isn’t enough, they are just attempts at over generalisation in a world where there is nothing but diversity. Novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie “The problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story” This offers evidence to support the idea that stereotypes aren’t always false, they just fail to account for natural differences in humans
The truth is stereotypes create pressure. They create standards even when they are posed as jokes, the comedy doesn’t outweigh the seriousness. According to one UWCE kid who chose to remain anonymous, “My friends have been extremely rude and critical when I got a grade that was not very high. They told me that it was really rare just because I was Indian.” This indicates that this stereotype has created pressure for her and shaped her. It made her actually feel bad about herself because of some stereotype that applies to some people but not all. But, it’s not only the mental capabilities, it also in the physical appearance. When the japanese child smiles, and his friends say that he has small eyes, that doesn’t help him. Now, whenever he smiles, he’s insecure, he’s scared that they are going to comment about his eyes, again.
These kind of comments might seem uncommon but that isn’t reality. 100% of people surveyed in a private survey admitted that people had commented about them based on stereotypes and 80% of people said that these comments were posed as jokes, from that only 40% of people said that they were offended compared to 100% when they were serious. What this exemplifies is that even when the commentor believes they are making a harmless joke, people still get hurt just the same.
The issue is that not only do stereotypes bring people down, they can actually weaken normal performance. “The idea is that when a person’s identity has a negative stereotype attached to it and that person engages in important activities that are relevant to that stereotype, he or she will become distracted and anxious and then underperform in a manner consistent with the stereotype”, remarked Claude Steele, psychologist and current Executive Vice Chancellor at University of California, Berkeley. And so it becomes clear that the pressure created by stereotypes even when they are fiction can subconsciously transition into our actions and we unknowingly, unwillingly make ourselves stereotypes.
An experiment performed by Steele and his colleagues proved this theory. The experiment consisted of 4 groups, 2 of equal mathematical intelligence of men and 2 of women. They all completed an exam in which because of the stereotype that women are naturally worse at math than men, women placed a whole standard deviation lower than men. Then, when the women were told before the test that “you may have heard that women are not as good at math, … but that’s not true for this test, this is a test where women always do as well as men …,” the women got the same results as the men. The difference has disappeared simply because of the fact they were told that usually they do the same as men, the creation of a non-negative stereotype improved their performance, it made them feel like they could do it and they therefore were a lot less anxious and stressed.
Stereotyping people can have a huge impact on people, not only their ability to mimic them because of mental stress, but they can also cause decreased self esteem, aggression, inability to focus, lack of self control and the incapability to make rational decisions. And Michael Inzlicht, professor of psychology also claims that these impacts stay with the people forever, they carry around this baggage for the rest of their lives.
But, there is a solution, there is a way to break the stereotype. “Stereotypes lose their power when the world is found to be more complex than the stereotype would suggest. When we learn that individuals do not fit the group stereotype, then it begins to fall apart” said lawyer and politician Ed Koch. We simply need to embrace diversity, embrace uniqueness and understand that everybody is different, everyone has different strengths and weaknesses, everyone has different hobbies and everyone is different. One common similarity like race doesn’t make everyone the same and understanding that, is the key to solving this issue.
Try thinking about yourself and the stereotyped comments people have said to you, did they make you a better person or insecure? How about the stereotyped comments you have told other people, 60% of people admitted they had made comments and the other 40% responded that they don’t think they had, but might have. These comments even when posed as jokes are harmful for your health and future. Of the surveyed bunch, 54% believe that there is never a time where it is okay to make stereotyped jokes but all admitted to having made them before. Keeping a double standard for such a serious topic like this, isn’t the way to go.
So before judging, before making a stereotyped comment, think it through. Annie Murphy Paul stated that “We all use stereotypes, all the time, without knowing it. We have met the enemy of equality, and the enemy is us.”
If only these were genuine events of curiosity. Instead, they represent the way in which stereotypes still exist. Assuming everyone who fits into a certain ethnic group all have the same strengths and weaknesses, act the same, are the same. But nevertheless they are deceptions. “Stereotypes are fast and easy because they are lies, and the truth takes it’s time.” claims author Deb Caletti.
Stereotypes are the way that we try organize everything in our brain because one similarity isn’t enough, they are just attempts at over generalisation in a world where there is nothing but diversity. Novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie “The problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story” This offers evidence to support the idea that stereotypes aren’t always false, they just fail to account for natural differences in humans
The truth is stereotypes create pressure. They create standards even when they are posed as jokes, the comedy doesn’t outweigh the seriousness. According to one UWCE kid who chose to remain anonymous, “My friends have been extremely rude and critical when I got a grade that was not very high. They told me that it was really rare just because I was Indian.” This indicates that this stereotype has created pressure for her and shaped her. It made her actually feel bad about herself because of some stereotype that applies to some people but not all. But, it’s not only the mental capabilities, it also in the physical appearance. When the japanese child smiles, and his friends say that he has small eyes, that doesn’t help him. Now, whenever he smiles, he’s insecure, he’s scared that they are going to comment about his eyes, again.
These kind of comments might seem uncommon but that isn’t reality. 100% of people surveyed in a private survey admitted that people had commented about them based on stereotypes and 80% of people said that these comments were posed as jokes, from that only 40% of people said that they were offended compared to 100% when they were serious. What this exemplifies is that even when the commentor believes they are making a harmless joke, people still get hurt just the same.
The issue is that not only do stereotypes bring people down, they can actually weaken normal performance. “The idea is that when a person’s identity has a negative stereotype attached to it and that person engages in important activities that are relevant to that stereotype, he or she will become distracted and anxious and then underperform in a manner consistent with the stereotype”, remarked Claude Steele, psychologist and current Executive Vice Chancellor at University of California, Berkeley. And so it becomes clear that the pressure created by stereotypes even when they are fiction can subconsciously transition into our actions and we unknowingly, unwillingly make ourselves stereotypes.
An experiment performed by Steele and his colleagues proved this theory. The experiment consisted of 4 groups, 2 of equal mathematical intelligence of men and 2 of women. They all completed an exam in which because of the stereotype that women are naturally worse at math than men, women placed a whole standard deviation lower than men. Then, when the women were told before the test that “you may have heard that women are not as good at math, … but that’s not true for this test, this is a test where women always do as well as men …,” the women got the same results as the men. The difference has disappeared simply because of the fact they were told that usually they do the same as men, the creation of a non-negative stereotype improved their performance, it made them feel like they could do it and they therefore were a lot less anxious and stressed.
Stereotyping people can have a huge impact on people, not only their ability to mimic them because of mental stress, but they can also cause decreased self esteem, aggression, inability to focus, lack of self control and the incapability to make rational decisions. And Michael Inzlicht, professor of psychology also claims that these impacts stay with the people forever, they carry around this baggage for the rest of their lives.
But, there is a solution, there is a way to break the stereotype. “Stereotypes lose their power when the world is found to be more complex than the stereotype would suggest. When we learn that individuals do not fit the group stereotype, then it begins to fall apart” said lawyer and politician Ed Koch. We simply need to embrace diversity, embrace uniqueness and understand that everybody is different, everyone has different strengths and weaknesses, everyone has different hobbies and everyone is different. One common similarity like race doesn’t make everyone the same and understanding that, is the key to solving this issue.
Try thinking about yourself and the stereotyped comments people have said to you, did they make you a better person or insecure? How about the stereotyped comments you have told other people, 60% of people admitted they had made comments and the other 40% responded that they don’t think they had, but might have. These comments even when posed as jokes are harmful for your health and future. Of the surveyed bunch, 54% believe that there is never a time where it is okay to make stereotyped jokes but all admitted to having made them before. Keeping a double standard for such a serious topic like this, isn’t the way to go.
So before judging, before making a stereotyped comment, think it through. Annie Murphy Paul stated that “We all use stereotypes, all the time, without knowing it. We have met the enemy of equality, and the enemy is us.”
Tourist Ethnicity Is A Problem Now?
You would think that by now in 2015, racism and the stereotyping of people might have diminished but this isn’t true at all. Tourists are still getting targeted in other countries because of simple differences like skin tone and language. It might not seem possible, however this is exactly what happened in mid-july at Ocean Park, Hong Kong.
A ‘mainland’ chinese tourist group was passing through the theme park when a man stopped a random indian teenage girl and asked to take a picture with her. The girl was a student from UWCSEA and was visiting Hong Kong with her friends. The situation was quite awkward and seemed to be based on the conjecture from the chinese tourist. This teen having come from an international school thought little of the event and agreed to take the picture to the surprise of many. Witnesses at the event also saw this teens friends attempt to talk to the man and his partner but were unable to make out the man’s intentions.
This may seem like an isolated incident but it’s not. A local Hong Kong resident claims that “this incident was racially motivated and this sort of thing happened all the time.” She also added that “ it was just a simple case of ignorance.”
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