The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting up a Generation for Failure

by Jonathan Haidt

Give people the benefit of the doubt.

making an effort to interpret other people’s statements in their best or most reasonable form, not in the worst or most offensive way possible. Parents can model the principle of charity by using it in family discussions and arguments.

Practice the virtue of “intellectu...

Intellectual humility is the recognition that our reasoning is so flawed, so prone to bias, that we can rarel...

the TED Talk titled “On Be...

Look very carefully at how your school handles identity politics.

Homework in the early grades should be minimal.

Other than encouraging reading, minimize or eliminate all homework in kindergarten and first grade. In later elementary grades, homework should be simple and brief.

Give more recess with less supervision.

video titled “No Rules School,”27 about a New Zealand elementary school principal who gradually removed adult supervision from recess so kids could have “risky, unmanaged play.”

Discourage the use of the word “safe” or “safety” for anything other than physical safety.

If we mandate inclusion in everything and teach kids that exclusion puts them in danger—that being excluded should make them feel unsafe—then we are making future experiences of exclusion more painful and giving kids the expectation that an act of exclusion warrants calling in an authority figure to make the exclusion stop.

the American Academy of Pediatrics notes in a 2013 statement that “cognitive processing and academic performance depend on regular breaks from concentrated classroom work. This applies equally to adolescents and to younger children.”

The intellectual virtues are the qualities necessary to be a critical thinker and an effective learner. They include curiosity, open-mindedness, and intellectual humility.

intellectualvirtues.org

Teach debate and offer debate club.

great way for students to learn the skills of civil disagreement is by participating in structured, formal debates.

debate helps students distinguish between a critique of ideas and a personal attack.

We suggest that schools offer media literacy classes that teach students the difference between evidence and opinion, and how to evaluate the legitimacy of sources.

Heterodox Academy

OpenMind, a free interactive program that rapidly teaches basic social and moral psychology as a prelude to learning conversational skills for bridging divides.

TheCoddling.com.)

Place clear limits on device time. Two hours a day seems to be a reasonable maximum, as there does not appear to be evidence of negative mental health effects at this level.

We propose that Americans consider adopting a new national norm: taking a year off after high school—a “gap year”—as

High school graduates can spend a year working and learning away from their parents, exploring their interests, developing interpersonal skills, and generally maturing before arriving on campus.

Service Year Alliance,

We agree, and we believe that whether that year involves service or work, it would be good for America’s polarized democracy if that year were spent in a part of the country very different from the one in which the young adult grew up.50

51 If parents and teachers can raise children who are antifragile; if middle schools and high schools can cultivate the intellectual virtues; if all high school graduates spend a year doing service or paid work away from home, before beginning college at age nineteen or later, we think most students will be ready for anything.

What is the telos of a university?

there is widespread public agreement that the discovery and transmission of truth is a noble goal and a public good.

If the telos of a university is truth, then a university that fails to add to humanity’s growing body of knowledge, or that fails to transmit the best of that knowledge to its students, is not a good university.

If a university is united around a telos of change or social progress, scholars will be motivated to reach conclusions that are consistent with that vision, and the community will impose social costs on those who reach different conclusions—or who merely ask the wrong questions,

There will always be inconvenient facts for any political agenda, and you can judge a university, or an academic field, by how it handles its dissenters.

Prospective applicants should take colleges’ speech codes into account when deciding where to apply, and college students should be aware of their own school’s policies.

Protest that does not interfere with others’ freedom of expression is protected speech and is a legitimate form of productive disagreement. Boisterous protests that briefly interfere with the rights of other audience members may even be allowed. But if the sum total of protesters’ actions substantially interferes with the ability of audience members to listen, or the speaker to speak, then those who are responsible for the interference must face some punishment.

If universities stop admitting so many students whose childhoods were devoted to test prep and resume building and start admitting more students who can demonstrate a measure of autonomy, the culture on campus is likely to improve dramatically.

the professoriate and the student body have become more diverse by race, gender, and other characteristics but less diverse in terms of political perspectives. We suggest that universities add “viewpoint diversity” to their diversity statements and strategies.

Many students will experience their most cherished beliefs being challenged, and they must learn that this is not harassment or a personal attack; it is part of the process by which people do each other the favor of counteracting each other’s confirmation bias.

It is challenging to think well; we are easily led astray by feelings and by group loyalties. In the age of social media, cyber trolls, and fake news, it is a national and global crisis that people so readily follow their feelings to embrace outlandish stories about their enemies.

It has become increasingly clear that identitarian extremists on both sides rely on the most outrageous acts of the other side to unite their group around its common enemy.