Skill Acquisition 2 Flashcards
what determines the limits of expertise
- talent or innate differences
- motivation
- types of practice
- innate difference: hereditary
Galton (1869) studied family background of
geniuses.
– Found evidence that genius ran in families.
– But this confused nature and nurture.
– Environment and family background definitely seem to play a role
Terman study found no evidence that group of 1000 children with IQ > 140 became geniuses (Kreuter, 1962).
Genetic influence on “g” is greatest in
adulthood, as high as 60% (Plomin, et al., 1997).
– But this is a general skill, what determines limit?
perfect pitch
Some people (1/1000) can immediately identify a note without any reference
– Appears to be present from a young age so it was assumed that it was innate, and many famous musicians had it.
– However it seem only people with early musical training have perfect pitch.
– More common among people who speak tonal language.
– E.g., Mandarin, but only if you grew up speaking Mandarin.
Sakakibara (2014) recruited 24 children (2-6
years old) and gave them a months long training program
– All developed perfect pitch
Lack of innate predictors
Howe et al (1998) argued that there are no
reliable measurable, innate predictors of talent.
– Eg, early performance by children on music exams is not a good predictor of who ends up the best musicians.
– Family background plays a role though
Twin studies don’t predict genius.
May be need for some minimum level of general traits relevant to specific tasks, but variance in trait lacks predictiveness beyond that level.
Personality traits such as need for achievement (Murray et al , 1938) might help most
– Conscientiousness linked to success (Barrick & Mount (1991)
- motivation: birthdays of canadian ice hockey players
Barnsley et al (1985) found that birthdays of
Canadian ice hockey players were most likely in January and declined linearly to December
Players near the cutoff often bigger/better than opponents, then motivated to get better
Belgian soccer players: In 1997 Cut-off date changed from Aug 1st to Jan 1st, change of trend
- motivation: Steve Faloon
After Faloon they tried another person, who got not further than 20 digits
Steve Faloon worked out a way to do the task partly because he was very motivated (Ericsson & Pool, 2016).
– Getting paid, but seemed to be minor factor
– Enjoy improving
– He liked to challenge himself, partly because he was a runner used to dedicated training over a long period.
– Ericsson tends to recruit athletes and musicians, people used extensive training.
So talent may not be critical, but personal
characteristics such as motivation might be.
The 10-year rule
ten years of preparation are required to attain high levels of skill seems to apply to many domains, not just chess (Hayes, 1989).
– Sports such as swimming, tennis
– Piano playing
– Music (including Mozart), Poetry (Wishbow, 1988)
Also written composition in general (Bereiter & Scardamalia (1987)
– By 12-14 have 10 years of mastering mechanics of writing and spelling, advance from concrete to abstract thinking
– Qualitative advance from knowledge-telling to knowledge- transforming
– Need longer for the knowledge-crafting of a professional
May be 10,000 hours rather than 10 years
criticism of 10-year rule
Need appropriate type of practice (Simonton, 2004)
Not just exposure, but deliberate practice
(Ericsson, 2003).
For creativity there can be too much practice (Simonton, 2000)
– Simonton (1991) assessed 120 eminent composers
– Negative correlation between difference between age of first hit and first lesson (i.e., preparation), and productivity and fame.
Ericsson, Teach-Römer & Krampe (1993) violin students study
-Identified 10 considered to have potential as soloists.
(“Best”)
-10 very good but not considered superstars (“Better”)
-10 heading for being music teaching (“Good”)
-10 from Berlin Philharmonic (“Professional”)
All had practice for over a decade
-As kids might spend an hour a week with teacher, but up
to 15 hours a week on solo practice
Interviewed them and they kept diaries
All thought solo practice was most important, but not fun
Best violinist spent significantly more time on practice. – Good mean 3,420 hours by 18 – Better mean 5,301hours by 18 – Best mean 7,410 hours by 18 – (Professionals similar)
No short-cuts, no prodigies, even for the good the number of hours of practice was associated with how far they got
Ericsson’s theory of practice
Rejects Galton’s claim that performance is constrained by fixed innate capacities.
Mediating biological mechanisms and observable performance can still be
improved substantially even when individuals are highly experienced.
Expert performance is mediated by complex modifiable representations that allow experts to exhibit faster speed, superior selection, and more precise motor execution.
To do this use deliberate practice
modifiability (Ericssson)
Ericsson (2003) claims that virtually all aspects of the human mind and body are modifiable, except height and body size.
– Otherwise there is no evidence of innate characteristics required for elite performance that cannot be modified.
Dramatic changes in elite performance over time
indicate that training has pushed performance
beyond what had previously been considered innate limits.
Ericsson, Chase & Faloon (1980) increased digit
span from 7 to 79.
How many push-ups can a person do?
– 10,507 push-ups by Minora Yoshida is the current world record (with no breaks)
– Record for 24 hours is 46,001 by Charles Servizio
Change occurs by extending beyond previous limit
– Increase digit sequence length by one when right
– Do one more push-up today than yesterday
When body is strained it reacts to try to maintain
homoestatis
– When a kidney is donated, the remaining
kidney is insufficient
– In reaction to this the kidney grows by 70% in
a few weeks.
Animal brains change due to different types of physical activities.
- Maguire et al (2000) found London cab drivers
hippocampi change
how to change
struggle against automaticity
Most people can get a skill from the cognitive to
the automaticity stages, at which point further
experience improves performance more slowly
– Takes perhaps 50 hours for many skills, such as
typing, tennis, driving car
Experts struggle against automaticity
– Try to stay at the cognitive or associative stages
– Want access to cognitive mechanisms that mediate
continued learning
Do this through deliberate practice which attempts to push beyond current levels.
deliberate practice principles
- Deliberate practice develops skills that other people have already figured out how to do.
– Need coach - Takes you outside of your comfort zone
– Demands near maximal effort, so not fun - Well-defines, specific goals
– Develop plan for improvement, not just “get better” - Involves feedback and modification of efforts in
response to feedback
– Can come from coach but eventually learn to monitor self - Produces and depends on effective mental
representation - Nearly always involves building or modifying
previously acquired skills
– Aim for specific improvements, fundamentals have to be good.
implications of deliberate practice
In deliberate practice attempt to push beyond current levels.
Mistakes lead to refinement of task representations
– Deakin (2001) reports that elite skaters make more mistakes, than sub-elite: they try more complex things
Requires good feedback
– Surgeons improves with age but mammographers don’t (Barlow et al, 2004): mammographers often lack feedback.
– Requires good coaching, but solitary practice also critical
– Amount of study alone is best predictor of level of chess skill (Charness, Krampe & Mayr, 1996).
– Speed and actions provide good feedback in sports.
Full concentration is required.
Not just purposeful practice, needs a roadmap.
Ericsson’s conclusion
No disconfirmation of claim that any healthy individual with appropriate body size who engages in appropriate amount of deliberate practice can attain an expert levels of
performance.
– Concedes that genetics may have some role, in
particular at setting novice levels of performance.
– May set an upper-limit, but he doubts it.
His argument pushes the practice approach to the
extreme, but difficult to confirm or refute.
