Mindsets About Intelligence, Self-Regulation, and Failure and Their Effects on Parenting Behaviors and Children's Self-Regulation (Poster 37)

• In Event: AERA Poster Session Ten
  In Poster Session: Studying and Self-Regulated Learning SIG Poster Session

Abstract

This study examines the differential effects of mindsets of different domains (intelligence, failure, self-regulation) on parenting behaviors and child self-regulation. N=177 mothers participated with their preschooler. Mothers’ mindsets were experimentally manipulated using cover stories. First, mother-child dyads worked on several problem-solving tasks. Then, the children solved the same tasks without their mothers. Parenting behaviors were coded during joint problem-solving, and children’s self-regulatory strategies during child-alone problem-solving. Planned contrasts reveal that mothers in the intelligence-is-stable (vs. intelligence-is-malleable) mindset condition showed more autonomy support. Less autonomy support and more scaffolding means were observed in mothers in the failure-is-debilitating (vs. failure-is-enhancing) mindset condition. Mothers’ failure-is-debilitating mindset was indirectly linked to children’s lower motivational strategies in child-alone problem-solving – fully mediated by mothers’ scaffolding means.

Authors

• Maren Stern, Heidelberg University
  Presenting Author

• Kim Angeles Erdmann, Heidelberg University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Silke Hertel, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg
  Non-Presenting Author