Few days ago I was flipping the January 2013 issue of Smithsonian magazine. There I got this exciting article- Are babies born good? New research offers surprising answers to the age-old question of where morality comes from. Yes, babies are born with basic morality and ability to differentiate between 'right' and 'wrong'.
It reminded me of a discussion on whether to be strict to our kids to make them more quality conscious or follow the current tradition of encouraging our kids for whatever they do. Now majority parents in countries like the US encourage their kids even for a very sloppy job and say awesome. Does that “awesome culture” increase the chance of future success by boosting confidence or encourage kids to continue sloppy work that need to be criticized to encourage him/her to do better or help him/her to try something else? Of course, I do not buy the extreme of “tiger mother” concept prescribed by Prof Amy Chua in her controversial book “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother”. In fact, Prof Chua’s portrayal of typical Chinese mother is not so common among Chinese mothers, at least in cities like Beijing. More compelling evidence of why Prof Chua may not be right comes from the fact that countries like India and China where such 'tiger mom' culture is perceived to be more prevalent, do not do well to minimize high level of corruption in public lives, to promote leadership quality, original thinking and ranks at the very bottom so far creativity and innovation are concerned. The more intriguing question for me is- what should be the right proportion of criticism and encouragement.
Like everyone else, I do acknowledge the power of praise and encouragement to make our kids more confident. But we often forget that our praise need to be sincere and with reason. We just cannot keep on saying 'awesome', 'great' in a casual fashion without showing much interest or have time to evaluate what the kid has done. If a kid is intelligent enough to understand 'right' and 'wrong' from a very early age, s/he probably understands what a genuine praise is and what is just a habit. Nonetheless they are confused to evaluate their work and take the easy way of congratulating themselves for even a sloppy job.
Like everyone else, I do acknowledge the power of praise and encouragement to make our kids more confident. But we often forget that our praise need to be sincere and with reason. We just cannot keep on saying 'awesome', 'great' in a casual fashion without showing much interest or have time to evaluate what the kid has done. If a kid is intelligent enough to understand 'right' and 'wrong' from a very early age, s/he probably understands what a genuine praise is and what is just a habit. Nonetheless they are confused to evaluate their work and take the easy way of congratulating themselves for even a sloppy job.
Now coming to a trickier issue. Does confidence really breeds success? Mere high confidence does not breed success. But our effort to make our kids more confident resulted in "narcissism epidemic", at least among students in USA. Few recent studies concluded that narcissistic attitude among US students are increasing since 1979. Many factors are blamed for that trend, including "parenting styles, celebrity culture, social media and access to easy credit, which allows people to appear more successful than they are". It has been concluded that "there is very little evidence that raising self-esteem leads to tangible, positive outcomes." It has been suggested that over confidence is a symptom of "narcissism epidemic".
We probably are ignoring one major factor here i.e. increasing dominance of mediocrity in almost every field of life. Published data show that rate of innovation and invention is slowing even in developed countries like USA. Both wealth and power are consolidating in fewer hands. Nobel Prize winning US economist Joseph Stiglitz recently said, "The US has one of the worst opportunity rates of any of the advanced economies. A child's life chances are more dependent on the income of his or her parents than most other industrial economies".
Now success depends more on networking, ability to agree with majority than raw talent, ability to solve problems, wisdom in engaging in constructive discussions and informative debate. One can gauge this trend more clearly in social networking sites like Facebook. Number of ‘like’ depend more on who is posting it, rather than its relevance or quality. It can also be argued that many people who have less knowledge and/or critical thinking tend to give 'expert' opinions. Such opinions are readily available to others by virtue of media and internet. Higher acceptance or 'agreeability' can give rise to a sense of confidence and seemingly more influence among peers. In the long run it might have bigger consequences in democratic societies.
The same media, internet and social networking sites also make common people aware that some of our leaders, famous public figures, top executives are no genius. Many people having less sense of honesty and logic can become ‘scientists’ yet believe in scientology, astrology and so many other superstitions (in the name of religion or tradition or otherwise). A president with some of the 'most coveted' degrees from prestigious universities can make calculated blunder and severely damage the future of a prosperous country.
Sycophancy, nepotism, stealing ideas, telling lies are not taboos anymore but a ‘desired’ character for increasing number of people to become successful. People who succeeded via that route are less likely to accept constructive criticism or even failure. That puts extra pressure among colleagues, junior staff and students. The trend is expanding due to increasing reach of our news-hungry media and internet. More we know about our ‘leaders’ more we tend to think that s/he is just one of us, nothing special. If others consider that person a genius, then I’m no less a genius! Recently I watched a news report on one of the affairs of famous american president, John F Kennedy (JFK) with a former white house intern Mimi Alford. Few people, interviewed in that TV report, started 'severely disliking' JFK after they came to know JFK more intimately. Such reversal of fortune, erosion of public faith will continue to rise as internet and other media coverage increases its reach and investigative ability.
It’s yet to be proved if increasing reach of internet and other media adds or counter-balance its existing power to promote mediocrity in the name of talent in this era of reality shows. But we can be reasonably sure that increased scrutiny will help reversal of fortune, erosion of public faith, at both individual and institutional level to rise as internet and other media coverage increases its reach and investigative ability. Evidences now indicate that social media is making us more honest. It’s seems that many well groomed people, ambitious enough to succeed and occupy influential positions would try avoiding such media scrutiny and taking extra precaution to leave less digital footprint.
Sycophancy, nepotism, stealing ideas, telling lies are not taboos anymore but a ‘desired’ character for increasing number of people to become successful. People who succeeded via that route are less likely to accept constructive criticism or even failure. That puts extra pressure among colleagues, junior staff and students. The trend is expanding due to increasing reach of our news-hungry media and internet. More we know about our ‘leaders’ more we tend to think that s/he is just one of us, nothing special. If others consider that person a genius, then I’m no less a genius! Recently I watched a news report on one of the affairs of famous american president, John F Kennedy (JFK) with a former white house intern Mimi Alford. Few people, interviewed in that TV report, started 'severely disliking' JFK after they came to know JFK more intimately. Such reversal of fortune, erosion of public faith will continue to rise as internet and other media coverage increases its reach and investigative ability.
It’s yet to be proved if increasing reach of internet and other media adds or counter-balance its existing power to promote mediocrity in the name of talent in this era of reality shows. But we can be reasonably sure that increased scrutiny will help reversal of fortune, erosion of public faith, at both individual and institutional level to rise as internet and other media coverage increases its reach and investigative ability. Evidences now indicate that social media is making us more honest. It’s seems that many well groomed people, ambitious enough to succeed and occupy influential positions would try avoiding such media scrutiny and taking extra precaution to leave less digital footprint.
Some of our great leaders like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln did not have formal education. Since last few decades majority of US presidents are coming from privileged background with Ivy League university degrees while past US presidents are from all over the country and from different colleges and universities. Of course, I’m not talking about Obama. Personally consider him as a rare exception in this regard. The trend deteriorated further after Ronald Reagan, who practically transformed US education mainly higher education, to another for-profit industry. Is it a mere coincidence that all the US presidents are from Yale or Harvard since 1980s? One can observe the same trend for many influential positions in US, including supreme court judges. All nine current supreme court judges in US are from either Harvard or Yale, except one (justice Alito).
Education, which is considered the silver bullet for social mobility and fulfilling the so-called ‘American dream’, is also consolidating among fewer individuals. Education is becoming more of manufacturing workers and consumers than to groom a complete human being with the ability to understand the difference between ‘right’ & ‘wrong’ and, more importantly, act accordingly. Now money and influence plays a more important role in deciding college admission (1, 2). Students from affluent, privileged background have more advantage than they had before. Such students enjoy even more competitive edge in admission in very selective and costly Ivy League universities where many of our current leaders in both corporate and government sector now comes from. The famous book, "The Price of Admission" by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Daniel Golden shows, "how America’s ruling class buys its way into elite colleges and universities – and who gets left outside the gates".
Schools in USA and many other countries are now trying to impose equality among kids. They tend to give the impression that every kid is the same. It sometimes fail to identify and/or encourage specific talents a particular individual has. Einstein once said, “everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid”. It’s not that hard to understand the consequences of encouraging a fish to think that it is equally talented to climb a tree. The situation gets worse if climbing tree is far more financially rewarding than swimming. In that situation, many parents will try to coerce their fish-kids to climb. The culture of imposed equality may not be that great to infuse a sense of quality and mentor talent. Deliberate or not, it seems to help kids from privileged background who are destined to be 'successful' irrespective of their ability and talent at the cost of the society and the nation in the long run.
We seem to destroy the in-born morality that I talked earlier. More people feel less ashamed, not even shy, to accept awards/scholarships/credit that they don't deserve. The tendency probably continues when such kids grow up and occupy influential positions, be it in academic-research institutions, corporate management or public policy. It probably makes a decent worker out of them who follow orders to ‘succeed’ than to be a natural leader who is able to earn respect and lead effectively.
Now we live in an increasingly smaller global village with more aggressive news media, increasing reach of internet and social networking sites. People feel comfortable with mediocrity. Many people don't like to take the pain to find out what they are good at, what they love to do (particularly if that is not financially rewarding) but prefer to impose themselves on a subject that they are not so good at. Best prepared candidates are not always the best or most talented ones to succeed. Gradually talent is replaced by mediocrity. More kids are groomed with that objective. They are less encouraged to excel what they are good at if that does not fit the objective. We see its consequence more clearly during selection of top bureaucrats in India through, arguably, the most competitive selection processes in the world with less than 0.3% success rate. Yet ‘Indian bureaucracy the worst in Asia’.
We can see its influence not only in schools, universities and screening for a specific career but also in many other forums and cultural programs. Many, if not majority, cultural organizations promote children and adults who have proper connections or influence. Such parents feel elated simply by seeing themselves, their spouses and children on the stage. Many times we witness reduction of performance time even for expensive artists from abroad to accommodate such whims of influential members. They seem to be totally ignorant on the larger implications of such act of nepotism. Many organizers of such programs proudly assert that cultivating equality, mass participation is the goal; not promoting talent or leadership. The sense of justice, professional ethics are severely damaged for the kids too. Talented kids are not only demoralized but also start accepting corruption and nepotism as part of life, as the main (sometimes, only) criteria to be recognized and enjoy what they are good at. They too will try to take advantage of the same in areas where they are not so good at.
In a sense, imposition of equality helps maintaining the status-quo. It encourages people who believe in dynasties, give effort to establish their children towards same success and power. We need to keep in mind that kids from privileged families sometimes are under more pressure to succeed. Regular evaluation, defeat in the hands of more talented student help such kids to accept defeat, remain humble and empathetic. It help promoting talent, grooming worthy leaders towards a better society and more civilized world.
No, I am not suggesting that kids from privileged families cannot be good or genius. Yes, they have equal probability to excel. We need to encourage students who are good- irrespective of his/her background. I believe that every child has talent. We must acknowledge specific talent and not lower the bar to make almost everyone feel like a genius. Coming from a developing country, l personally feel little worried when witness the same trend in a developed country like the USA.
Students who cannot see the bigger picture start believing that if many mediocre people become so successful then why not they. In the long run, the rot will become clearer in form of deterioration of governance, decreasing ability to innovate and invent, erosion of product quality (both goods and creative art) and resulting deterioration of industrial competitiveness, and over all quality of life. It's impact will be on whole society, including our children.
Shorter URL: http://goo.gl/uEF6M
** Modified version of the blog is published in one of the most influential science and technology policy forums in USA, Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes (CSPO) at Arizona State University and Washington DC.





