We were all fourteen once. Hormones, attitudes, and lofty goals filled our days. As the Geometry teacher of fourteen-year-old humans, my mother has it all. Every cycle, a new crop of teenagers stumbles into her classroom. There are several types of students mom encounters regularly. Most students study, get good or decent grades, are attentive in class, and are regular students. Then there are the few, or maybe just a couple of kids, who buck the system and demonstrate social psychological theories through negative behaviors. My mother’s fourteen-year-old students regularly employ the concept of self-handicapping.
Have you ever encountered a fellow student who doesn’t seem to study for tests but always has an excuse for their poor performance? Self-handicapping involves actions that set the stage for poor performance and provide the perfect excuse for failures (Gruman, 2016). Mom has heard a myriad of justifications for bad exam grades that have ranged from blaming attending church the night before, having to cook dinner, mood-related issues, physical symptoms, or any number of other excuses (like staying up to play a video game). Self-handicapping for these kids involved doing anything but studying and then blaming the bad grade on their actions, which in their eyes, are external circumstances. This behavior is often driven by fear of failure and a low drive for achievement (Gruman, 2016). Self-esteem is damaged without the excuse for failure, so self-handicapping is an attractive idea. Studies have shown that self-handicapping can reduce failure anxiety by lowering expectations, thus maintaining self-esteem (Török, Szabó & Tóth, 2018).
Fear of failure can also affect students with self-handicapping behaviors and their education goals. There are two categories of goals: mastery and performance. Mastery goals relate to learning and competence, whereas performance goals relate to comparison. Two subcategories of each mastery and performance are approach and avoidance. Mastery-approach deals with learning and improvement (getting better at a skill), and Mastery-avoidance deals with trying to avoid the decline of skills or competence (maintenance). Performance-approach deals with trying to do better than the competition, while performance-avoidance deals with avoiding failure or losing face compared to others. A research study on self-handicapping and physical education found that the fear of failure was correlated to the adoption of goals that diminished their performance, so they did not look worse than their peers. Self-handicapping subjects used Master-avoidance and Performance-avoidance goals. The very possibility of failure is so stressful that these students set goals that set them up for failure (Chen et al., 2009). If fear of failure is driving self-handicapping, what are the ways that teachers and others involved in education can reduce or prevent its use?
Building a classroom environment that focuses on the individual and isn’t competitive can help. Research has shown that students in a learning environment that emphasizes individual mastery of subjects, effort, and overall learning versus the competition and ability-focused classroom fair better and have better learning outcomes (Gruman, 2016). Protection of self-esteem and self-concept is a driving force for self-handicapping, and by reducing the need to do so, students are more supported and are free to focus on learning. Self-affirmation techniques are also a positive tool that educators can use to foster self-esteem. Researchers suggest writing about positive personal traits might reduce self-handicapping tendencies. In addition, the healthy formation of goals in an implementation and intention format also helps students avoid self-handicapping behaviors (Török, Szabó & Tóth, 2018). Focusing on the individual student, reducing the focus on mistakes, and eliminating competition in classrooms can foster higher self-esteem and self-concept for students at risk of self-handicapping. These are techniques my mom uses with her students. They have a positive, affirming classroom that focuses not on competition or mistakes but the entire learning process.
As we have seen, the social-psychological concept of self-handicapping can be applied to many situations, including the classroom. Young adults are especially prone to using this technique due to the fear of failure, which damages their self-esteem. By using self-affirmation, positive goal setting, individual focus, and reducing time spent comparing students’ performance, educators can help prevent harmful self-handicapping behaviors.
Works Cited
Chen, L. H., Wu, C., Kee, Y. H., Lin, M., & Shui, S. (2009). Fear of failure, 2 × 2 achievement goal, and self-handicapping. An examination of the hierarchical model of achievement motivation in physical education. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 34(4), 298–305.
Gruman, J. A., Schneider, F. W., & Coutts, L. M. (Eds.). (2016). Applied social psychology : Understanding and addressing social and practical problems. SAGE Publications.
Török, L., Szabó, Z.P. & Tóth, L. A critical review of the literature on academic self-handicapping: theory, manifestations, prevention and measurement. Soc Psychol Educ 21, 1175–1202 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11218-018-9460-z