[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":3,"doc-seo-591556-105":59,"doc-detail-591556-en":129},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",[7,13,18,23,28,33,38,43,48,51,55],{"id":8,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":10,"show_sort_weight":11,"slug":12},1,"Document","Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":14,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":15,"show_sort_weight":16,"slug":17},2,"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":19,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":20,"show_sort_weight":21,"slug":22},4,"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":24,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":25,"show_sort_weight":26,"slug":27},5,"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":29,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":30,"show_sort_weight":31,"slug":32},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":34,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":35,"show_sort_weight":36,"slug":37},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":39,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":40,"show_sort_weight":41,"slug":42},8,"Research & Report",30,"research-report",{"id":44,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":45,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":47},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":46,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":49,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":50},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":52,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":53,"show_sort_weight":52,"slug":54},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":56,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":57,"show_sort_weight":24,"slug":58},19,"General","general",{"code":4,"msg":60,"data":61},"ok",{"site_id":62,"language":63,"slug":64,"title":65,"keywords":66,"description":67,"schema_data":68,"social_meta":122,"head_meta":124,"extra_data":126,"updated_unix":128},105,"en","grit-is-trendy-but-can-it-be-taught-ask-the-cognitive-scientist","“Grit” Is Trendy, but Can It Be Taught? - Ask the Cognitive Scientist","","“Grit” is presented as a newly popular term for a character trait defined as passion and perseverance for long-term goals. The column examines why grit has attracted major public attention, outlines what research suggests about grit’s scientific status, and asks whether gritty students perform better in school. It differentiates grit from related traits like self-control and conscientiousness, describes the Grit Scale used to measure it, and discusses evidence linking grit to outcomes such as college performance and persistence in demanding programs.",{"@graph":69,"@context":121},[70,84,104],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":35,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/healthcare/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/grit-is-trendy-but-can-it-be-taught-ask-the-cognitive-scientist/591556/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":98,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":99,"interactionStatistic":100},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/grit-is-trendy-but-can-it-be-taught-ask-the-cognitive-scientist/591556.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"supergirl","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-15",true,{"@type":101,"interactionType":102,"userInteractionCount":4},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":103},"ViewAction",{"@type":105,"mainEntity":106},"FAQPage",[107,113,117],{"name":108,"@type":109,"acceptedAnswer":110},"How is grit defined in the article?","Question",{"text":111,"@type":112},"Grit is defined as passion and perseverance for long-term goals. It emphasizes sustained commitment over years.","Answer",{"name":114,"@type":109,"acceptedAnswer":115},"What is the Grit Scale mentioned in the article?",{"text":116,"@type":112},"The Grit Scale is a paper-and-pencil measure with eight questions. Four focus on perseverance and four assess consistency of interests over time.",{"name":118,"@type":109,"acceptedAnswer":119},"What outcomes are linked to grit in research cited here?",{"text":120,"@type":112},"Scores on the grit scale are related to college GPA and are associated with persistence in demanding programs, including dropping out of West Point and success in the National Spelling Bee.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":123,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":125,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":127,"site_id":62},591556,1792072719,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":130},{"doc_id":127,"user_id":131,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":132,"doc_module":4,"category_id":34,"category_name":35,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":133,"file_id":134,"file_url":135,"file_type":136,"file_size":137,"view_count":4,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":29,"language":138,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":139,"faqs":140,"seo_title":141,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":128,"read_time":142},962088121634,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_9964176cb1d06d4a9deccf72a44ae3dc","Ask the Cognitive Scientist  \n“Grit” Is Trendy, but Can It Be Taught?  \nHow does the mind work—and especially how does it learn? Teachers’ instructional decisions are based on a mix of theories learned in teacher education,  \ntrial and error, craft knowledge, and gut instinct. Such knowledge often serves us well, but is there anything  \nsturdier to rely on? Cognitive science is an interdisciplinary field of  \nresearchers from psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, philosophy, computer science, and anthropology who seek to understand the mind. In this regular American Educator column, we consider findings from this field that are strong and clear  \nenough to merit classroom application.  \nILLUSTRAT IONS BY SERGE BLOCH  \nBy Daniel T. Willingham  \nQuestion: What do you think about grit? It seems tobe in the news everywhere, but hasn’t everyone always thought that determination and persistence were good? Is all the excitement just because it has a new name? Or has someone figured out how to teach grit?  \nAnswer: Grit is something new. It’s a character trait defined as“passion and perseverance for long-term goals.”1 Long-term goals are those that typically take years to attain. Passion in this context means what we might call an overriding concern in your life, something that gives direction and purpose to much of what you do.  \nDaniel T. Willingham is a professor of cognitive psychology at the University of Virginia. He is the author of When Can You Trust the Experts? How to Tell Good Science from Bad in Education and Why Don’t Students Like School? His most recent book is Raising Kids Who Read: What Parents and Teachers Can Do. For his articles on education, go to www. [danielwillingham.com. Readers can post questions to](danielwillingham.com. Readers can post questions to) “Ask the Cognitive Scientist” by sending an email [to ae@aft.org. Future columns will](to ae@aft.org. Future columns will) try to address readers’ questions.  \nPsychologists have studied related personal characteristics in the past (seethe box on page 31 for details), such as self-control, for example, and conscientiousness. And now, researchers have found that the concept of grit adds something to our understanding of certain behaviors, especially those that require perseverance in the face of long-term, difficult work, like succeeding at West Point Military Academy, for instance. Whether you can teach someone to be gritty is quite another matter. It’s likely you can teach parts of grit, but researchers are just beginning to explore how to do so.  \nS  \nuddenly talk of grit—being passionate about long-term goals, and showing the stamina to pursue them—seems to be everywhere. In 2007, Angela Duckworth published an article, which has since been cited hundreds of times  \nin the scientific literature, on the role grit plays in success.2 The notion of grit (and its possible importance in education) was thrust into the public sphere a few years later in two ways: Paul Tough introduced grit to a broad audience in his 2013 book How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character, which went on to spend ayear on the New York Times best-  \n28 AMERICAN EDUCATOR | SUMMER 2016  \nseller list.3 And in the same year, Duckworth herself gave a TED talk, which has been viewed more than 8 million times online. Stories followed on the topic from National Public Radio, CNN, National Geographic, and many other news outlets. Some schools are seeking to teach grit, and (somewhat ominously) some districts propose to measure children’s grit, with the outcome contributing to judgments of school effectiveness.4  \nThis enthusiasm for grit invites the following questions: First, what is the scientific status of grit? Is it really true that gritty children do better in school? Second, didn’t scientists already know that motivation matters to what gets done? Does grit differ from motivation, and if so, how? Finally, what, if anything, should educators do about grit?  \nDoe","cbCaiuFef10hiaBq","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaiuFef10hiaBq","pdf",233986,"English","# “Grit” Is Trendy, but Can It Be Taught?\n## What is grit?\n## Does grit matter?\n## How is grit measured?","[{\"question\":\"How is grit defined in the article?\",\"answer\":\"Grit is defined as passion and perseverance for long-term goals. It emphasizes sustained commitment over years.\"},{\"question\":\"What is the Grit Scale mentioned in the article?\",\"answer\":\"The Grit Scale is a paper-and-pencil measure with eight questions. Four focus on perseverance and four assess consistency of interests over time.\"},{\"question\":\"What outcomes are linked to grit in research cited here?\",\"answer\":\"Scores on the grit scale are related to college GPA and are associated with persistence in demanding programs, including dropping out of West Point and success in the National Spelling Bee.\"}]","“Grit” Is Trendy, but Can It Be Taught? - Ask the Cognitive Scientist | PDF",15]