The role of parents’ ability mindsets in parent–child interactions during math and reading activities

Abstract

Parents can be instrumental in promoting young children’s early mathematics and literacy skills. However, differences in parents’ beliefs can influence their behavior during parent–child interactions. We examined how parental beliefs about the fixedness of children’s math and reading abilities shape their interactions with their 4- and 5-year-old children during an educational activity. Parental beliefs about children’s abilities were manipulated using “articles” indicating that academic ability is fixed in one domain (e.g., math) but malleable in another (e.g., reading). We then investigated differences in parental unconstructive (performance-oriented and controlling) and constructive (mastery-oriented and autonomy-supportive) involvement across conditions. We also examined whether parent behavior differed depending on the type of educational material parents were told the activity tapped into. The results showed that parents who were induced to have a fixed mindset about reading took full control of the reading activity more often than those who were induced to have a growth mindset about reading, but not math. Parents did not differ in constructive involvement between mindset induction conditions in either domain. We also found that parent autonomy behavior in math differed depending on parents’ general theory of intelligence beliefs. Overall, we found some evidence that parents’ beliefs about the malleability of their children’s ability in a specific domain affected their behaviors in that domain.