If you have a child who isn’t doing well in a particular subject or activity, don’t lose hope. Your child may not be a top performer as a youth, but may end up being a late bloomer, outshining all those child prodigies, even the kid who graduated from high school before losing his baby teeth.
A new study published in the journal Science found that adults who reach the peak of their fields, perhaps winning a Nobel Prize or Olympic gold medal, often performed worse than their peers as youths. They were not child prodigies. Some of them couldn’t even spell the word “prodigy.”
What does this mean? Well, if you have a friend who is bragging that his 13-year-old daughter just published her first novel, you may want to say, “Oh no! That means she’ll never win the Pulitzer Prize!”
No, don’t say that, but don’t be envious either. Remind yourself that child prodigies rarely become top performers as adults. In fact, the researchers who conducted the study, including Brooke Macnamara of Purdue University, offered some interesting examples. Comparing world top-10 youth chess players and world top-10 adult chess players across time, they found that nearly 90 percent were different individuals. The same was true among athletes. (For the purpose of the study, chess players — even those sporting Nike gear — were not considered athletes.)
The researchers also found that top high school students and top university students across time were 90 percent different individuals. I’m a little skeptical about this finding, but perhaps those who excel in science and math in high school challenge themselves in other areas in university, such as beer and football. And what happens to those who don’t get good grades in university? They eventually become Nobel laureates!
Well, not exactly, but the researchers found that most top achievers, including Nobel laureates, world-class musicians, athletes, and chess players, don’t excel in their early years.
“When comparing performers across the highest levels of achievement,” the researchers write, “the evidence suggests that eventual peak performance is negatively associated with early performance."
What this means, of course, is that if your child brings home a report card with straight A’s, tell them that they need to spend more time on Minecraft.
If they look confused, explain to them the importance of diversity. “Look at Billy next door. He does not discriminate against B’s and C’s.”
Actually, it’s okay to be proud of your child’s achievements, even if your child is a true prodigy. After all, when the researchers say that 90 percent of high-achieving adults and children across time were different individuals, it means that 10 percent were the same people. So just say to your child, “Great job, honey! When you grow up, try to be the same person.”
Another important finding from the study is that child prodigies tend to focus on one discipline — and one discipline only. If they’re good at plumbing, that’s all they do: plumbing, plumbing and more plumbing. It helps them progress quickly, but this progress eventually slows, perhaps because they get completely drained.
In contrast, those who reach the pinnacle of their fields as adults spend a lot of their early years on multidisciplinary practice. They don’t focus on just one thing. It means that their progress in their eventual field of choice is much slower, but they’re able to think outside the box and maintain their drive until they reach the top.
I find this study very inspiring, partly because I consider myself a late bloomer (I’ve yet to bloom). My progress has been very slow. But eventually, like the fabled tortoise, I hope to cross the finish line ahead of a hare.
If not a hare, then another tortoise wearing a hare costume.
