At the lessons of physics, chemistry or biology, high school students are usually told about the achievements and discoveries of outstanding scientists. American psychologists suggested that it might be useful for students to learn more not only about successes and breakthroughs, but also about the difficulties that famous scientists faced in their careers and in life.
Scientists conducted a study in which 402 students of 9th and 10th grades of schools (60% boys and 40% girls, the average age of the participant is 16) took part in the poor neighborhoods of New York in the Bronx and Harlem. Schoolchildren (75% of them were from low-income families, almost 20% were born outside the United States) were divided into three groups.
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The first group was given a plain textbook text describing the scientific achievements of three eminent scientists—Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, and Michael Faraday. The second group of schoolchildren read a text about the life difficulties that these scientists had to endure. Finally, a third group of students were given a text describing the scientific failures and difficulties of the three scientists. The texts also described what exactly Einstein, Curie and Faraday did to overcome these obstacles.
At the very beginning of the study, schoolchildren also underwent psychological testing, during which psychologists ascertained their ideas about the relative importance of innate talents and intelligence and their own efforts.
A few weeks later, the researchers retested the students and also assessed how their academic performance had changed over the past period.
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It turned out that high school students who read texts that described the personal or professional difficulties of scientists significantly improved their grades in natural science subjects (the performance of the most backward students increased the most). They were also more likely to believe that the achievements of outstanding people were primarily due to their hard work, and not just to their innate ability.
“If children believe that Einstein is a genius who has nothing in common with ordinary people, then of course they do not believe that they themselves can achieve something in science. Many of them do not understand that success is a long and difficult path, on which many failures await. In addition, for them, science and scientists have nothing to do with everyday life. The school curriculum in science subjects seems to them just a list of facts to remember, ”says Xiaodong Lin-Siegler, lead author of the study, professor at the Teachers College of Columbia University (USA).
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It is noteworthy that the students reacted in the same way to texts that described the personal or professional difficulties of scientists. The authors of the study believe that any such information helps schoolchildren see famous scientists as ordinary people with their own shortcomings, and not some ideal “celestials”, as traditional textbooks often unwittingly represent them. This, in turn, shows teenagers that they, too, can potentially achieve something in science.
Подробнее см. Х. Lin-Siegler et al. «Even Einstein Struggled: Effects of Learning About Great Scientists’ Struggles on High School Students’ Motivation to Learn Science», Journal of Educational Psychology, February 2016.