Causal effects of teachers’ mindsets on student motivation and emotion

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Anke Heyder
• Subject Area: Developmental and Educational Psychology
• Term: since 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 449022799

Numerous studies have shown that students benefit from having a growth mindset, that is, believing that their abilities are malleable. Comparatively few studies investigated the importance of teachers’ mindsets on student ability. These studies suggest that teachers’ mindsets are related to their behavior, which in turn is associated with their students' motivation and emotion. However, these studies are based solely on correlative self-reports or qualitative data and therefore do not permit any conclusions about the causal effects of teachers’ mindsets. The two studies of this research project combine the experimental research paradigm with the richness of quantitative student and teacher ratings as well as qualitative data to address this research gap. In the first step of both studies, preservice teachers’ mindsets are manipulated with the help of a proved brief intervention. Subsequently, the teachers predict the further school development of a fictitious low-performing student and give either written feedback (study 1), or written school career counseling (study 2). In the next step, students rate the feedback and the written counseling with regard to their motivating and emotional impact and trained coders code it with regard to its growth or fixed mindset orientation. Both students and coders are blind to the experimental condition of the teacher. The experimental manipulation and analysis of various data sources provide detailed and reliable insights regarding the questions (a) whether and how teachers’ mindsets influence teachers’ behavior operationalized as written teacher feedback and school career counseling, and (b) what causal effect this behavior has on students’ motivation and emotion. The results of the project not only serve to better understand the importance of teachers’ mindsets, but also have practical relevance for university teacher training and the design of existing growth mindset interventions for students.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: USA
• Co-Investigator: Professorin Dr. Ricarda Steinmayr
• Cooperation Partner: Professor Andrei Cimpian