Author Archives: Rebecca Gotlieb

Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning offers students, educators, and life-long learners suggestions to improve learning and retention. It explains why some common study practices are alluring, but ineffective. Authors Peter C. Brown, Henry L. Roediger III, and Mark A. McDaniel support their recommendations for effective learning techniques by drawing on their own cognitive psychology research at Washington University, the work of other prominent neuroscience and psychology scholars, and the revealing personal stories from students, teachers, and coaches.

Many students study by rereading lecture notes or assigned materials, and they often study in one massed chunk immediately preceding an assessment. These study strategies make the learner feel as though he is absorbing the necessary information quickly and with little resistance. In reality, rereading and cramming fill a student with an “illusion of knowing” but are ineffective for long-term retention or deep learning. Students should seek learning opportunities with “desirable difficulty” because when learning is challenging, it is more likely to lead to retention.

The idea that teaching to different learning styles increases students’ or other types of learners’ success is not empirically supported and the authors consider it an ineffective practice. While people have preferences about the way in which they receive information, matching teaching to a student’s preferred mode of receiving information does not improve performance.

Fortunately, Brown, Roediger, and McDaniel suggest several effective teaching and learning practice. Two effective strategies to promote learning are interleaving the study of multiple diverse concepts and reviewing concepts at multiple points in time. Make it Stick is written with these principles in mind; the same concepts are reintroduced and discussed in new context several times throughout the book. Studying multiple types of problems at once (interleaving) facilitates recognition of the unique qualities of a problem so that in a novel context the concept is still identifiable. This is more akin to how we use information in real life. Spacing learning is valuable because it provides some time during which forgetting can occur. The more often a student retrieves partially forgotten knowledge or skills the more easily and completely he will retrieve it in the future.

The authors advocate frequent quizzing, either by the student herself (e.g., with flashcards) or by an instructor giving multiple low stakes exercises. Reflecting about what one has learned helps a student see what concepts he needs to review and ultimately promotes long-term retention. The authors suggest that mnemonic devices help cue memory. In particular, “memory palaces” are a strategy based on the Greek method of loci, in which one remembers many ideas by associating them with a particular spatial location. Using the visual memory of a place, which is easier to recall, prompts the verbal or conceptual memory. Associative learning of this sort is accompanied by neurogenesis, the creation of new neurons, in the hippocampus, which is a memory center in the brain.

People can improve their own learning by focusing on understanding the rules governing a category of information, rather than by attending to the individual exemplars. Understanding the broad framework helps people retain more information because they distill the concept to its essential components. For example, high achieving people with dyslexia have reported that their ability to think creatively about big picture concepts, even when decoding individual words is a struggle, has led to their success.

Learners can increase their achievement by persevering through challenges. Citing Carol Dweck and Anders Ericsson’s work, Brown, Roediger, and McDaniel demonstrate that students who believe that their intelligence is fixed are less likely to attempt tasks at which they think they may not succeed. Those who believe effort and learning can increase intellectual abilities will take on challenging tasks. It is engagement with these sorts of challenging tasks and the grit to persevere in the task—even when one fails—that are critical for mastery.

Make it Stick concludes by reviewing how students can implement these tips in their studies. They suggest that teachers, professional trainers, and coaches should incorporate these techniques into their classrooms and coaching. Educators should explicate for students what techniques they are using and why those techniques matter for improving learning and memory. Implementing these strategies increases for the learner the information that will stick.

Brown, P.C., Roediger H.L. III., & McDaniel, M.A. (2014). Make it stick: The science of successful learning. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

A focus on oneself, on others, and on larger trends in one’s environment are the three key patterns of thinking that Daniel Goleman suggests are necessary for being successful in any endeavor. Goleman, a science writer, author of Emotional Intelligence, and an expert in the field of social and emotional learning, details inner, other, and outer focuses, how we can cultivate a focused mind, and why these three focuses are critical to success in his 2013 book, Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence.   With the smooth integration of psychosocial and neurobiological attention research and practical examples of ways to cultivate focus in everyone (from kindergarten children to doctors, monks and top executives) this book is ideal for anyone who is burdened by today’s persistent distractions in our technology-imbued world or who works with others in need of focus.

Inner focus is the ability to understand and capitalize on one’s own strengths and emotions. Accomplishment comes to those with the discipline to engage in deliberate practice by concentrating during training, correcting errors, and following the advice of an expert coach. Goleman sites Walter Mischel’s famous marshmallow test in which nursery school age children who were able to reallocate their attention from a sweet treat at hand so that they could receive a larger reward later were found to have more executive control. The related Dunedin study found that young kids who could resist temptation were healthier, wealthier, and more likely to be law-abiding citizens decades later than the kids who did not have this self-control. When Mischel’s original marshmallow test participants’ brains were scanned years later while they resisted temptation, those who delayed gratification had more activity in the right inferior frontal gyrus of the brain, a region associated with controlling thoughts and actions. Those who succumbed showed activity in the ventral striatum, which is a key part of the reward pathway.

Goleman describes aids to help children cultivate inner focus. For example, some students are given a “biodot” to wear during tests. This device changes color as blood flow underneath the skin changes to alert kids when they have become anxious and thus may need to take a calming break to think more clearly.

Cognitive empathy (reading others’ thoughts) and emotional empathy (understanding people’s feelings) help us build rapport with others and feel compassion. This other focus is a critical skill across professions—executives who listen to their coworkers are less likely to be resented; surgeons with more caring and less domineering voices are less likely to be sued. Goleman sites Tania Singer’s work showing that when we empathize we feel the other person’s pain on a physiological level; the same brain region that is activated for feeling our own pain—the anterior insula—responds to feeling the pain of others.

Successful people hone what Goleman refers to as outer focus. They are forward-thinking, and they make decisions to increase efficiencies across whole, interconnected systems—even when the components of those systems are distant from one another in space or time. This kind of system thinking generally does not come naturally. Some of the most intractable problems we face today, such as global warming, are ones that require system thinking. Because outer focus is so critical, Goleman argues for teaching children systems thinking in schools. For example, an integrated lesson about pollution and environmental issues could be taught across science and social science disciplines.

Goleman emphasizes the importance of attention that is deliberate and effortful (top-down) because in a focused state people are generally happier, and they produce better work. However, he does acknowledge the value of fast-paced automatic attention (bottom-up). Mind wandering, our default mode of thinking, can offer flashes of insight that solve complex problems we are passively pondering. It has been associated with creativity.

Every person is or can be a leader, whether of a giant corporation or of one’s family. Goleman argues that to lead effectively we must integrate inner, other, and outer focus. We must be able to listen to our own instincts and to be able to push ourselves to engage in high-quality practice. We must be able to read others’ thoughts and emotions to ensure that those we lead feel satisfied and fulfilled. Finally, exceptional leaders vigilantly monitor emerging trends. They understand how their organization affects and is affected by those trends. They see the critical goals, direct others’ attention to those goals, and possess the courage to look past the immediate in order to make the decisions that are best in the long run.   A brilliant leader utilizes his focused mind to lead with passion.

 

Goleman, D. (2013). Focus: The hidden driver of excellence. Bloomsbury Publishing.

The Big Disconnect: Protecting Childhood and Family Relationships in the Digital Age, by Catherine Steiner-Adair and Teresa Barker, provides insights about managing family life and rearing healthy children from infancy through teenage years amidst the omnipresence of technology.  Steiner-Adair recognizes that technology can be a constructive learning and socializing tool—it allows us to see and speak to faraway family and enables us to learn at any time and from anywhere.  However, she urges parents to be measured about their own use of technology and about the influence they let technology assert in their children’s lives. Steiner-Adair draws on her experience as a clinical psychologist, school consultant, and clinical instructor at the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School to sprinkle The Big Disconnect with illuminative personal stories from her clients.

Steiner-Adair labels technology and media as addictive, ubiquitous, laden with damaging content, fast-paced, permanent, and invasive. We are all hyperconnected all the time, and yet we are also less present in the moment and less comfortable with face-to-face interactions. Intimacy gives way to superficial social connections, which (among other problems) facilitates more vicious bullying.  Children may perceive parents who are distracted by technology as emotionally unavailable.  Children who get less practice with in-person interactions get less training in interpreting conversational nuances, and those with an iPad always in-hand get less practice in learning to play creatively on their own.  Further, technology makes cynical, stereotype-ridden, violent, and sexual adult content intrusively present to even the most innocent children. Finally, technology assumes quick decision-making.  These decisions, however, can have serious and permanent consequences (e.g., kids making expensive purchases online without their parents’ knowledge or posting cruel content about a peer that can go viral and damage that person’s reputation).  The incessant blinking and buzzing in modern technology may contribute to the increased prevalence of ADHD as technology cultivates children who are more distracted.

Steiner Adair outlines the risks and challenges associated with technology usage for five age groups of childhood. She believes that there is absolutely no productive role technology can play in the life of a baby under two years old, and she goes so far as to suggest that electronics should come with warning labels stating that they may be hazardous to a baby’s development.  For preschoolers, Steiner-Adair says that some technology can contribute positively to development (e.g., Sesame Street), but most shows, even those targeted to this age group, contain harmful messages.  Technology use among children five and under can make them less persistent learners, less creative in their free play, less facile and empathic communicators. It can have an addictive quality to it.  Steiner-Adair says that media consumption among non-white and female children ages six to ten negatively impacts their self-esteem and introduces gender-stereotypical, homophobic, and violent messages.  For children under ten a vital message a parent can impart is that her child should always tell her what she has seen online, even if the child feels embarrassed.

Tweens and teens are consumed by their social media personas during a time when their real-life identity is developing. The Internet has emerged as the primary, albeit deficient, source of sex education for tweens. The average American child sees pornography by age 11. The media teach tweens and teens about a problematic “friends with benefits” model of romantic relationships that separates physical intimacy and interpersonal social interactions. Teens send sexually explicit texts (“sext”) as a way of courting one another. In response, Steiner-Adair offers a script that parents can use with male and female tweens and teens to discuss how to form healthy romantic and sexual connections and how to avoid being “friends with benefits.” Given the pervasiveness of technology in tweens and teens’ lives, Steiner-Adair argues that more important than limiting adolescents’ use of technology, is teaching them about appropriate use. The same questions that parents might ask a teen before he is allowed to use the car (who, what, where, and when) should be asked of a teen about his technology usage.

Steiner-Adair offers recommendations about how to be an approachable parent  (i.e., how not to be a parent a child would describe as “scary, crazy, or clueless”).  She recommends creating an “amnesty policy”: parents will not get mad if the child admits to having gotten in trouble online. Parents should model for their children the tech rules that their children should follow. Steiner-Adair ends by saying strong families are those that are deeply connected.  These families play together across generations, have conversations about feelings and values, learn how to disagree constructively, appreciate each family member for his or her unique qualities, and spend time with one another with and without technology.

The Big Disconnect is an insightful guide for parents that offers advice about using technology to our advantage and knowing when to unplug.

 

Steiner-Adair, C., & Barker, T. H. (2013). The big disconnect: Protecting childhood and family relationships in the digital age. Harper Business.

Artists and neuroscientists alike will be drawn to The Age of Insight: The Quest to Understand The Unconscious In Art, Mind, and Brain From Vienna 1900 to The Present.  Author Dr. Eric Kandel, a Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University and Nobel Laureate in Medicine, argues that the time is ripe to pursue questions in a new, interdisciplinary field of neuroaesthetics.  This field would address neuroscientific questions about how the brain processes perceptual information, especially when that information carries emotional salience. Also, neuroaesthetics would help artists understand more deeply the critical aspects of emotion and the perceptual information that captivate the mind and brain.  The field could ultimately lead to new and creative art forms.

Kandel uses turn-of-the-20^th century Vienna as an exemplar of the productivity of a cultural and intellectual milieu that facilitates cross-pollination among painters, writers, psychologists, doctors, and other intellectuals.  Using the tools of their respective disciplines, Vienna’s elites began exploring unconscious human mental states.  They turned inward to grapple with their own internal emotional and thought processes. Social gatherings at salons, like those hosted by Berta Zuckerkandl, were fertile ground for the exchange of ideas. Among the Viennese intellectuals Kandel examines are:  Carl Von Rokitansky, a doctor who espoused the view that medicine should be rooted in sciences (rather than philosophy) and pioneered the practice of literally looking inside a person to understand disease;  Arthur Schnitzler, a Viennese writer whose works focused on themes of eroticism and relied on stream-of-conscience and inner monologues; and Sigmund Freud, who is well-known for delving into deeply rooted human motivations and desires.

Kandel focuses in particular on three Viennese modernist painters:  Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoscka, and Egon Schiele. Through their portraits they showed what an emotion feels like and how it is experienced.  They depicted faces, often with emotionally ambiguous expressions. The brain’s processing of faces is well researched. Nancy Kanwisher’s research from about a decade ago suggested that there is a particular region in the inferior temporal cortex of the brain, known as the fusiform face area, that responds strongly and specifically to viewing faces. Kandel draws on the fact that both art and neuroscience have a deep understanding of the importance of faces in order to help illustrate the ways in which art and psychological and brain sciences can learn from one another. Portraiture may serve an evolutionary purpose by offering practice in reading faces, a skill that psychologists suggest is important for using clues about avoiding threats and finding rewards.

Alois Riegl, an art historian in Vienna, introduced an idea now known as the “beholder’s share”.  Riegl believed that there is a collaboration between an artist and the viewer of his art; without both parties, the artwork is incomplete.  This idea is compatible also with the German Gestalt psychology movement, which created abstruse images in which it is possible to see two different objects (e.g., the Rubin Vase that depicts either a vase or the profile of two men facing one another). In this way, the viewer’s mind fashions the image that he sees as much as the image’s creator chooses the subject of the image.  Kandel states that what we perceive about the outside world is as much inferred as it is observed.

Kandel details the brain and neuronal bases for our perceptual abilities.  Vision begins in the eye and the optic nerve and involves several brain areas (including the lateral geniculate nucleus of the thalamus and the primary visual cortex in the occipital lobe). He describes the function of photoreceptor cells called rods and cones; rods detect light and the three different types of cones facilitate color discrimination. Kandel describes the cues we instinctively use to understand depth, like comparing the relative size of objects or comparing the size of an unfamiliar object to a familiar one. Artists draw on these visual habits and use lines and contours to help viewers perceive three-dimensional shapes on a two-dimensional surface.

Just as the modernist artists explored how people experience emotions, so too have biologists, psychologists, and neuroscientists examined how the brain and body process emotions. Klimt, Kokoschka, and Shiele were able to reveal their subjects’ internal feelings.  Neuoroscience suggests that mirror neurons help us imitate another person’s behavior, which is a first step in developing a theory of mind—the ability to understand another’s internal thoughts and goals.

Kandel argues that through various means artists and scientists try to reduce the world to its component parts in order to make it more comprehensible. This newly proposed field of neuroaesthetics might shed light on the nature of conscious and unconscious thought, the nature of creativity, and the relation between consciousness and creativity. Kandel calls for the recreation of environments like the Zuckerkandl salon with the fluid exchange of ideas across disciplines.  Neuroscientists, artists, and beholders of art alike will benefit from attempting to bridge the chasm between science and art.

In Smart Thinking: Three Essential Keys to Solve Problems, Innovate, and Get Things Done, Art Markman draws on psychological and cognitive scientific principles to provide a general audience with techniques for changing mental habits, improving memory formation, and refining decision-making skills. Smart thinking, he argues, is based upon the wise use of the information one possesses to pursue a goal. Smart thinking is not raw intelligence or test taking ability.

Effective habits are key to smart thinking. Repetition, environmental cues, and distinctive actions facilitate habit formation. Eliminating bad habits by relying on willpower is extremely taxing; rather, one should replace bad habits with good behaviors through changes in the environment. A “habit diary” can help a person track her progress toward habit change.

A person cannot process—let alone remember—all the information to which he is exposed, but he can use a few techniques to be strategic about what he will remember. For example, whether preparing oneself to remember written or oral information or preparing others to remember the information one will present, we can aid memory by providing a preview, sticking to three main points, and reviewing key information. Also, being mentally present and resisting the cultural habit of multi-tasking are important for remembering. Markman asserts that we are more likely to remember information if it is meaningful and related to already known concepts. It can be recalled most easily when we are in a state similar to the state we were in when we learned it originally. If upon initially learning new information we experience some “desirable difficulty,” we are more likely to retain that information since we had to work to understand it.

We can bolster our ability to learn, remember, and innovate by asking the question “why” and answering this question when teaching others. It is important to ask oneself “why” questions given that people overestimate the extent to which they understand a concept. In the spirit of learning and with a friendly and non-accusatory disposition, people should ask others “why” when that speaker explains a new concept or uses new, unique terminology.

Effective decision-making is the third key component of smart thinking. Markman suggests his readers familiarize themselves with their decision-making style or their “need for closure” in deciding among options. Swift decision makers may need to take time to fully consider potential creative solutions and cool-off before committing to a course of action; painstakingly deliberate decision makers should learn to commit to a solution and recognize the futility of generating endless options. Decision makers should ensure that they clearly understand the situation about which they need to make a decision, which may require recasting the problem in different terms. People should elicit help from others in identifying issues they may have overlooked. Analogies are a powerful way to structure people’s beliefs and projections about situations. Proverbs (and stories and jokes) are a pithy and effective way of drawing an analogy. Markman even suggests his readers study lists of proverbs to improve their understanding of the key relations in a situation. Diagrams and gestures can be a more effective way of expressing a problem or the steps to a solution than words alone.

Finally, in the interdependent culture in which most people will find themselves (including in the corporate world), an organization’s “smart thinking” is critical. People tend to adopt the goals and actions exhibited by those around them. Accordingly, organizations should help their members reflect on how they think, stretch them to learn, be encouraging of new ideas and questions, probe for deep explanations, discourage multitasking, and encourage an attitude of “we” not “I.”

In addition to improving habits, memory, and decision making, Markman scatters throughout the book “instantly smarter” tips that one can implement immediately to improve thinking. Among his suggestions are: get a good night’s sleep; listen to your emotional reactions when making decisions; if you do not know something important, then identify the people who would possess that information; and if you struggle to remember something, stop thinking about it and the solution may come to you.

With a clear structure and relatable examples, Markman provides easily digestible tips to improve our habits of mind and to execute Smart Thinking.

Scott Barry Kaufman, the author of Ungifted: Intelligence Redefined, is a cognitive psychologist and was a student in special education classes. As a student enormously impacted by intelligence testing and labels, he presents the enduring emotional impact that a learning disability diagnosis and IQ testing had on him; as an Intelligence researcher, Kaufman traces the history of defining and testing intelligence, delineates other personal qualities key to success, and ultimately proposes a new definition of intelligence that aims to help each individual thrive.

Kaufman presents the continuing disagreement about what constitutes intelligence. Some intelligence scholars, such as Charles Spearman, conceived of intelligence as a single entity, a general intelligence. Others, like Howard Gardner, believe that there are in fact multiple (seven or more) independent “intelligences” that a person might posses.

Since Alfred Binet’s first modern IQ test there have been numerous iterations of IQ tests, but all are imperfect measures of intelligence. There is substantial variability in an individual’s IQ score both between two administrations of the same IQ test and among various different IQ tests. Kaufman challenges the practice of summarizing a person’s intelligence based on a test that lasts only a few hours, that asks decontextualized questions that may be dissimilar to an individual’s everyday experiences, and that offers little opportunity for practice. In addition, a test-taker’s score can be affected by her anxiety or by stereotype threat (the phenomenon in which a person’s fear of confirming a culturally relevant stereotype can make him perform in a stereotype consistent manner).

There is variation in conceptualizations and determinations of giftedness. While our federal definition includes 6 distinct abilities (intellect, academic aptitude, creativity, leadership, artistic skill, and psychomotor ability) states vary considerably in how they operationalize giftedness. Most states rely on IQ tests to determine giftedness, and no state includes measures of motivation in giftedness determinations. This perpetuates a view that intelligence is fixed and that giftedness is a trait one does or does not possess rather than that a student can act gifted. The Matthew Effect sets in; those labelled as gifted become genuinely more gifted. Conversely, students with a learning disability may become less interested in school and perform less well than they would otherwise.

Kaufman’s examples of people with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), dyslexia, ADHD, Bipolar disorder, Schizophrenia/schizotypal traits, prodigies, and savants speak to the problem of relying on IQ measurements to determine a person’s strengths or potential. For example, a boy known as NP, was an extraordinary musical savant, and yet he had an IQ in the 60s. The deficits in social skills that people with ASD typically display can virtually disappear if the person discusses a topic of special interest. People on the schizophrenia spectrum are more creative than people without these diagnoses. All students, Kaufman argues, should be given resources and opportunities to demonstrate their strengths, even if they are atypical gifts.

Study after study finds that various personal characteristics and beliefs are better predictors of success than intelligence alone. Kaufman embraces Adele Diamond’s argument that a student will reach his highest academic potential when schools invest in his full development as a social, emotional, and physical being. A person’s motivation to succeed and persistence in working towards a goal even in the face of set-backs (grit) best distinguishes and predicts the highest achievers. Those with a growth mindset, a belief that their skills and intelligence can be improved, are indeed more likely than those that believe intelligence is fixed to seek out challenging tasks and to process deeply feedback from these tasks. Kaufman sites research suggesting that more so than IQ, hope was related to academic success. Self-regulation skills are critical for success as early as preschool and are predictive of important later life outcomes like substance abuse, financial prudence, and criminal convictions.

Kaufman believes that intelligence must be redefined. He offers the Theory of Personal Intelligence, that is, “Intelligence is the dynamic interplay of engagement and abilities in pursuit of personal goals.”

Intelligence, he argues, should be measured relative to one’s self and one’s aims, not relative to other people. We can recognize each student’s gifts without diminishing the greatness of any other student’s talents. Any behavior that helps a person achieve her goals is an intelligent behavior; as such, personal characteristics like grit are included in Kaufman’s Theory of Personal Intelligence. All students should be encouraged to set lofty goals. Fostering the skills (i.e., perseverance, communication, emotional intuition, self-regulation, creative thinking) required to achieve these ambitious goals will benefit all learners more than enforcing strict test score thresholds. When all students are provided with the academic and social skills necessary for success, when students are no longer deemed gifted or not, and when our educational structure is “ungifted,” we will help the most students reach their fullest potential.