Learning, emotion, and the Goldilocks Zone
Super learners (a.k.a. learnaholics) feel great when they don’t understand. The rest of us are more likely to feel bad. This has big implications for learning in the Goldilocks Zone.
If you’re a regular reader, you’ve already heard about the Goldilocks Zone. It’s the range in which a learning goal is just challenging enough to support optimal learning by stimulating interest and triggering the dopamine-opioid cycle—the brain’s natural motivational cycle. This cycle functions best when we are building skills—putting knowledge to work—as opposed to memorizing.
If you have no idea what I’m talking about, see the short video about our learning model — VCoL+7.
People are born pre-wired to learn in the Goldilocks Zone. In infancy and early childhood, the dopamine opioid cycle drives a desire to build skill during almost every waking moment. Unfortunately, most formal education disrupts the dopamine-opioid cycle by emphasizing “learning about” over “learning how.” As a consequence, many (perhaps most) older children, adolescents, and adults must rediscover the Goldilocks Zone if they want to learn optimally from everyday experience.
My mentor, Dr. Kurt W. Fischer of Harvard’s Graduate School of Education, claimed that mainstream educational systems work only for about 20% of students—those endowed with slightly above-average intelligence and a high tolerance for sitting still. The majority of students are either repeatedly punished for learning (for example, with low grades) or experience learning itself as a kind of punishment (endless information cramming or chronic boredom). The psychological harm caused by sustained exposure to demotivating experiences like these can result in learning trauma, which like other forms of psychological trauma, can lead to persistent maladaptive behaviors.
Rediscovering the Goldilocks Zone can be difficult—sometimes downright onerous. My colleagues and I have been gathering evidence that some of this difficulty stems from the traumatic impact of sustained exposure to negative learning experiences. We believe that this kind of trauma both disrupts the dopamine-opioid cycle and contributes to learning avoidance.
To illustrate, I’ve created a couple of word clouds. The first word cloud represents the emotions reported by learnaholics (people who absolutely love learning) who have been asked what they feel like when they don’t understand.
You’ll notice that the larger words in this cloud primarily represent emotions most of us would label “positive.” When learnaholics don’t understand something, they feel curious, excited, motivated, engaged, and energized.
The picture looks quite different for many other learners. They are far more likely to experience not understanding as a negative experience, one characterized by feelings like frustration, stress, embarrassment, self-consciousness, and overwhelm.
My colleagues and I think this second pattern of emotions suggests that many adult learners are likely to lack an innate (or intrinsic) motivation to learn. In other words, they are likely to find it difficult to recruit the dopamine-opioid cycle in the service of learning. There are two reasons for this conclusion:
- First, individuals who primarily experience negative emotions when they lack understanding are unlikely to view not understanding as a positive opportunity.
- Second, these individuals would find it more difficult to identify the Goldilocks Zone, because doing so depends on the ability to experience interest or curiosity about something that is not understood.
Unlike knowledge of calculus, which for most adults isn’t much more than a fuzzy memory involving baffling equations, emotions around not understanding have been wired deeply into our brains. Overcoming them means rewiring neural pathways laid down over many years. The long-term solution involves educating our children in a way that preserves their natural love of learning. For adults who primarily associate not understanding with negative feelings like shame, stress, or anger, the first step toward the Goldilocks Zone is awareness.
Here’s an example of a VCoL (Virtuous Cycle of Learning) designed to build emotional awareness around not understanding.
- SET: Learn to notice how you feel when you don’t understand.
- SEEK: During the next week, dedicate a corner of your mind to noticing when you don’t understand something you are hearing or reading.
- APPLY: Each time you notice that you don’t understand something, tune in to how you’re feeling in that moment. Quickly jot down any feelings you experience.
- REFLECT NOW: As you jot down each feeling, ask yourself, “Does this feeling make me want to learn?”
- REFLECT LATER: At the end of the week, review your notes. Think about how the feelings you experience when you don’t understand might affect your interest in learning. Would they impede or support your desire to learn? What could you do to overcome emotions that might interfere with your desire to learn?
We are continuing our research in this area, in the hope of identifying ways of supporting learners who have lost touch with their natural motivation to learn. If you have a story to share, please do so! And if you’d like to contribute to the body of knowledge we’re collecting about learning emotions, please take our Learning Emotions Survey.
