Trials, Errors, and Tiny Wins: What We Learned from Developing a Peer Mindset Intervention

• In Event: From Idea to Impact: Candid Reflections on Building Interventions

Abstract

Purpose
Many students leave STEM not due to lack of ability but because they interpret struggle as a sign they don’t belong (Seymour & Hunter, 2019), especially in environments that appear to prize innate brilliance, which can be particularly discouraging for minoritized students (Muradoglu et al., 2023). These interpretations are shaped by peers, whose everyday comments signal what kind of ability is valued. While mindset interventions often target instructors or individual beliefs (e.g., Hecht et al, 2023; Wallace et al., 2025), this project addresses a gap by developing an intervention aimed to shift students’ perceptions of peer mindset culture in introductory STEM classrooms.

Theoretical Background
This intervention is grounded in mindset theory, which posits that beliefs about the nature of ability—whether fixed or malleable—shape how students respond to academic difficulty (Dweck, 2006). While early interventions focused on changing individual beliefs, recent scholarship has emphasized the importance of social context, including instructor beliefs and classroom norms (Walton & Yeager, 2020). However, peers, who are proximal, frequent interaction partners and key identity referents (Harris, 1995), remain an understudied source of mindset signaling (King, 2020; Muenks & Yan, 2024; Seo et al., 2025). Peer behaviors are often ambiguous, and their meaning depends on students’ interpretations (Graham, 2020). For example, a classmate’s silence or a boastful comment may be perceived as signaling fixed beliefs unless students are equipped to consider alternative, non-threatening explanations. This highlights the need to address how students make sense of peer behaviors.

Methods
We conducted two pilot studies. In Pilot Study 1, students in a chemistry course were randomly assigned to peer discussion groups, and group-level fixed mindset was calculated. In Pilot Study 2, we tested a light-touch, perception-based intervention designed to shift how students interpret peer behaviors, using authentic student quotes and daily diary methods to track peer interactions and belonging.

Data Sources
Table 1 summarizes the study designs and data sources.

Results
1. Peer mindset norms causally influenced belonging, but not achievement, suggesting outcome-specific effects.
2. The intervention targeted peer mindset perceptions, yet students also perceived instructors as more growth-minded, suggesting unintentional spillover.
3. Students disengaged when tone felt lecture-like; authentic peer voices helped. Dense or emotionally demanding prompts led to disengagement.
4. Course context shaped effectiveness: A perception-based intervention may be especially effective in settings with limited peer interaction, while behavior-focused strategies may be more impactful in highly collaborative classrooms.
5. Next step: test a combined behavior- and perception- intervention in lecture-based classrooms.

Scholarly Significance
This project advances motivation and intervention science by introducing a novel, peer-focused approach to shaping mindset culture in STEM classrooms, an area traditionally centered on individuals or instructors. By demonstrating that peer mindset norms can be causally linked to student belonging and influenced through scalable, psychologically attuned activities, the work extends mindset theory into a more socially embedded context. It also models an iterative, reflective development process, highlighting how early missteps, unexpected outcomes, and contextual mismatches can yield valuable insights.

Authors

• Eunjin Seo, Texas State University

• So Yeon Lee, The University of Alabama at Birmingham