Developing a “growth mindset” has been at the heart of many education initiatives in the past decade. The growth mindset message, however, could lead pupils to develop mental health problems unless it is carefully presented.
In my years of teaching and counselling pupils I have come across a problem linked to growth mindset: pupils who try very hard indeed, but still do not achieve. Often these pupils have embraced the growth mindset message that intelligence, talent and ability can be grown through effort and determination.
This had given them hope: those who had previously thought they lacked ability were told that if they put in more effort they would improve. The message may have been valid, but a message is only as good as how it is interpreted. And the message of a growth mindset is often misunderstood, as its pioneer Professor Carol Dweck herself has said (Anderson, 2016; Gross-Loh, 2016).
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