Non-cognitive Skills Significantly Shape Educational Outcomes
What are the biggest factors in determining your child’s academic success? A new study published in the August 26, 2024, edition of the journal Nature Human Behavior reveals that in addition to strong cognitive skills, non-cognitive skills are increasingly influential on educational success.
The non-cognitive skills, which including motivation, self-regulation, grit, academic interest, and the value attributed to learning, are not only significant predictors of success, but also influences that grow stronger over the course of a student’s academic pursuits.
The Research on Non-Cognitive Skills
The study was a joint effort from team at Queen Mary University of London and University College London. Together, the researchers followed more than 10,000 children in England and Wales from age 7 to 16. It included twin studies as well as DNA-based analyses to examine how academic performance is impacted by genes, environment, and non-cognitive skills.
After analyzing DNA, the teams created a “polygenic score” for each child’s predisposition toward non-cognitive skills.
“We discovered that genetic effects associated with non-cognitive skills become increasingly predictive of academic achievement over the school years, in fact their effect nearly doubles between the ages of 7 and 16,” says University College London Research Fellow Dr. Andrea Allegrini. “By the end of compulsory education, genetic dispositions towards non-cognitive skills were equally as important as those related to cognitive abilities in predicting academic success.”
These findings seem to indicate that a student’s emotional and behavioral makeup—which are influenced by genetics and environment—weigh heavily in their educational journey.
Because the researchers had access to data from siblings, they were able to look at the impact of a shared family environment separate from genetics.
“We found that while family-wide processes play a significant role, the increasing influence of non-cognitive genetics on academic achievement remained evident even within families,” explained Dr. Allegrini. “This suggests that children may actively shape their own learning experiences based on their personality, dispositions, and abilities, creating a feedback loop that reinforces their strengths.”
Implications of the findings
These non-cognitive skills can be organized into three overlapping domains: motivational factors, self-regulatory strategies, and personality traits.
As the researchers summarize in their study, “Children who are emotionally stable, motivated, and capable of regulating their attention and impulses do better in school, independent of their level of cognitive ability.”
Understanding that non-cognitive skills are as critical as cognitive skills may eventually help educators develop interventions that support not only academic learning, but also social and emotional development.
MBJ
Wendy Burt-Thomas writes about the brain, mental health and parenting.
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