David B. Miele

The present study examined the extent to which college students’ academic mindsets predicted their persistence when solving challenging math problems. The study included an experimental manipulation, in which participants initially received either an easy or a difficult arithmetic task. Following the manipulation, all participants solved two target math problems: one that was solvable but very hard and another that was unsolvable.

Time spent attempting to solve each problem served as a measure of persistence. Results showed the predicted pattern for the solvable target problem, but not for the unsolvable problem. That is, for the solvable problem, the more of a fixed mindset participants had, the less persistent they were after completing a relatively difficult arithmetic task than after completing an easy task. The results suggest that, for certain types of math problems, students’ persistence may vary as a function of academic mindset and previous experiences of math success or failure.