Even Einstein Struggled: Effects of Learning About Great Scientists’
Struggles on High School Students’ Motivation to Learn Science
Xiaodong Lin-Siegler and Janet N. Ahn
Teachers College, Columbia University
Jondou Chen
University of Washington
Fu-Fen Anny Fang and Myra Luna-Lucero
Teachers College, Columbia University
Students’ beliefs that success in science depends on exceptional talent negatively impact their motivation
to learn. For example, such beliefs have been shown to be a major factor steering students away from
taking science and math courses in high school and college. In the present study, we tested a novel
story-based instruction that models how scientists achieve through failures and struggles. We designed
this instruction to challenge this belief, thereby improving science learning in classroom settings. A
demographically diverse group of 402 9th and 10th grade students read 1 of 3 types of stories about
eminent scientists that described how the scientists (a) struggled intellectually (e.g., made mistakes in
investigating scientific problems, and overcame the mistakes through effort), (b) struggled in thei
personal life (e.g., suffered family poverty and lack of parental support but overcame it), or (c) made great
discoveries (a control condition, similar to the instructional material that appears in many science
textbooks, that did not describe any struggles). Results showed that participation in either of the struggle
story conditions improved science learning postintervention, relative to that of students in the control
condition. Additionally, the effect of our intervention was more pronounced for low-performing students.
Moreover, far more students in either of the struggle story conditions felt connected to the stories and
scientists than did students in the control condition. The use of struggle stories provides a promising and
implementable instructional approach that can improve student motivation and academic performance in
science and perhaps other subjects as well.
Keywords: beliefs in exceptional scientific talents, scientists struggle story intervention, improving
motivation in science learning
We recently asked a set of 9th and 10th graders what kind of
people can be scientists. The interviews were conducted in schools
cu
ently implementing a program designed to teach students
about the value of effort and persistence for learning science.
Almost all of the students responded in ways that would garne
approval from teachers and researchers: “A scientist can be any
person who has a spark of curiosity in himself or herself,” “Any-
one who seems interested in the field of science,” and “People who
can work hard.” These egalitarian responses, however, did not
seem to translate into students’ views of themselves. For example,
when asked whether they could become scientists, many students
had trouble imagining their roles in that field, admitting, “Well, if
I’m being honest, science is a field I have not thought much about
ecause I am not good in it,” and “I won’t, because I don’t get the
est grades in science class right now. Even if I work hard, I will
not do well.” Our interviews suggest that even if students pa
ot
the belief that everyone has the potential to be successful in
science, these beliefs may not translate into beliefs about their own
abilities in science.
We view this disconnect between students’ general comments
about scientists and their comments about themselves as problem-
atic. A serious drawback of the belief in exceptional scientific
This article was published Online First Fe
uary 11, 2016.
Xiaodong Lin-Siegler and Janet N. Ahn, Department of Human Devel-
opment, Teachers College, Columbia University; Jondou Chen, Education,
Equity and Society, College of Education, University of Washington;
Fu-Fen Anny Fang, Department of Human Development, Teachers Col-
lege, Columbia University; Myra Luna-Lucero, Communication, Media, &
Learning Technologies Design, Teachers College, Columbia University.
This study was supported by National Science Foundation (NSF) Re-
search and Evaluation on Education in Science and Engineering (REESE)
Grant Award Number DRL XXXXXXXXXXto Xiaodong Lin-Siegler and Carol
Dweck. The opinions expressed in the article are those of the authors only
and do not reflect the opinions of NSF. We appreciate the statistical
analysis provided by Kristen Elmore, and special thanks to Eduardo Mata-
moros and Mabelene Mak for helping with data collection. We are also
grateful for the invaluable suggestions from our colleagues, John Black,
Allan Collins, Carol Dweck, Alan Lesgold, and Robert Siegler, and our la
esearch assistants, Marianna Lamnina, Danfei Hu, and John Park. Special
thanks for the generous support from New York City public schools and
their principals and teachers: Miriam Nightingale, Dan Novak, Owusu
Afriyie Osei, Jared Jax, Karalyne Sperling, and Mark Erienwein.
Co
espondence concerning this article should be addressed to Xiaodong
Lin-Siegler, Department of Human Development, 525 West 120th Street,
Box 118, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027.
E-mail: XXXXXXXXXX
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Journal of Educational Psychology © 2016 American Psychological Association
2016, Vol. 108, No. 3, 314– XXXXXXXXXX/16/$12.00 http:
dx.doi.org/10.1037/edu0000092
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mailto: XXXXXXXXXX
http:
dx.doi.org/10.1037/edu0000092
talents is students who believe that high-level scientific perfor-
mance requires exceptional inborn ability tend to give up before
they give themselves a chance to develop their own talents (Ban-
dura, 1977a, 1986; Dweck, 2000; H. Hong & Lin-Siegler, 2012;
Murphy & Dweck, 2010; Pintrich, XXXXXXXXXXThese beliefs are likely
to undermine effort when it is most needed; when students struggle
in science classes, they may misperceive their struggle as an
indication that they are not good at science and will never succeed
in it (Dweck, 2010, 2012; H. Hong & Lin-Siegler, XXXXXXXXXXThe
elief in the necessity of exceptional scientific talent for science
learning hinders efforts to increase the number of students pursu-
ing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM)
careers (National Academy of Science, 2005).
The purpose of the cu
ent study was to confront students’
eliefs that scientific achievement reflects ability rather than effort
y exposing students to stories of how accomplished scientists
(Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, and Michael Faraday) struggled and
overcame the challenges in their scientific endeavors. These stories
were designed to show students that even the most accomplished
scientists are relatable people who often fail and struggle through
difficulty prior to their triumphs. To test the impact of hearing such
stories, we conducted a randomized field experiment in which
students read biographical stories about eminent scientists’ strug-
gles to achieve, struggles to overcome personal difficulties, o
control stories recounting the scientists’ achievement. The goal
was to test whether hearing such stories would improve students’
motivation and academic performance in science classes.
Theoretical Framework
Motivation has been a topic of interest for educational psychol-
ogists since the early 1930s. Researchers have defined motivation
in many different ways but generally agree that the core of moti-
vation describes why a person selects one action over another with
great energization or frequency (Bargh, Gollwitzer, & Oettingen,
2010; Gollwitzer & Oettingen, 2012; McClelland, 1978; Touré-
Tillery & Fishbach, XXXXXXXXXXFor instance, a motivated student often
persists in the face of challenging problems, intensely focuses on
the task at hand, and often concerns oneself about ways to make
things better without becoming distracted by other activities.
Motivation is essential for successful learning and performance,
ut crucially related to motivation is how one attributes successes
and failures. For simplicity, the discussions of the theoretical
ationale behind our study will focus primarily on two areas: (a)
attribution theories, or beliefs about the causes of one’s own and
other people’s outcomes and behaviors; and (b) instructional meth-
ods to effectively convey the message to students in schools that
success comes by effort.
Self-Attributions and Their Effect on Motivation
The way an individual selects one action over another is directly
elated to one’s confidence in being able to attain a successful
outcome. If people believe that they will be unsuccessful in ob-
taining a certain outcome, they are less likely to engage in actions
in pursuit of that outcome, and if they do, it is unlikely that the
person will persist and invest 100% effort (Dweck & Leggett,
1988; Oyserman, Bybee, & Te
y, XXXXXXXXXXThe basic premise of
attribution theory is that people’s judgments of the causes of thei
own and other people’s success or failure have important motiva-
tional effects (Bandura, 1986, 2005; Renninger, Bachrach, &
Posey, 2008; Weiner, 1986, 1992, XXXXXXXXXXThat is, people who
credit their failures to insufficient effort will be more likely to
undertake difficult tasks and persist in the face of failure. This is
ecause they see that outcomes can be influenced by how much
effort they invest. In contrast, those who ascribe their failures o
deficiencies in learning and performance to uncontrollable factors
such as innate intelligence (e.g., “Einstein was lucky because he
was born smart”) will display low achievement strivings and give
up readily when they encounter obstacles (Dweck, 2006; H. Hong
& Lin-Siegler, XXXXXXXXXXClearly, people decrease their motivation to
learn when they feel that, regardless of what they do, very little
change can happen.
Multiple sources influence people’s attribution about thei
own and others’ success and failure. The source we are partic-
ularly interested in for the present study is people’s implicit
eliefs about ability and effort, which Dweck and colleagues
(Blackwell, Trzesniewski, & Dweck, 2007) refer to as “mind-
set.” There are usually two types of mind-sets that have been
shown to have a striking impact on people’s motivation and
achievement, namely, fixed and growth mind-sets (Dweck,
2006). When setbacks occur, people with fixed mind-sets per-
ceive themselves as unalterably incompetent at the task; as a
esult, they avoid challenging tasks and are reluctant to invest
effort (Dweck & Leggett, XXXXXXXXXXThese people also tend to
adopt performance goals, in which people are more interested in
positive judgment of their competence and avoid challenging
problems that might lead to failure (Dweck & Leggett, XXXXXXXXXXIn
contrast, people with growth mind-sets perceive ability and
learning outcomes as attributes that can be changed through
increased effort (Dweck, 2009, 2010, 2012, which positively
influences their motivation to learn (Bandura, 1977b, 1986;
Dweck & Leggett, 1988; Greeno, 2006; Grube, Mayton, &
Ball-Rokeach, 1994; Hammer, 2007; Mischel, 2004; Walton,
Paunesku, & Dweck, XXXXXXXXXXThese people tend to adopt mastery
goals, in which they try to understand what they are doing and
master difficult tasks to increase their competence