Invisible Strings of Mindset: How Growth Mindset Connects to Student Outcomes

<p>Mental health concerns among youth are growing at an alarming rate, and the need to examine accessible, school-based tools is more urgent than ever. While a growth mindset has been linked to academic outcomes, its relationship to student mental health remains underexplored, particularly in large, diverse school populations. This study explores the role of a growth mindset in students’ well-being. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between students’ mindset of intelligence and their social-emotional well-being, with a focus on outcomes including covitality, social-emotional distress, depression, and suicidal ideation. Grounded in well-being theory, this quantitative study used logistic regression to analyze 40,000 responses from secondary student data from the 2022–2023 California Healthy Kids Survey. Results indicated that students with a growth mindset were significantly more likely to report higher social-emotional wellness and significantly less likely to report depressive symptoms, suicidal ideation, and social-emotional distress. Although the predictive strength of mindset was modest, the consistency of its association across all outcome variables reinforces its relevance to adolescent mental health. These findings underscore the value of a growth mindset as one potential component to contribute to student well-being, with implications for school psychologists and educators seeking scalable interventions. This study contributes to the growing literature on mindset and mental health, offering support for incorporating mindset-building strategies into school-wide practices.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Education

Year

2025

Author dc:creator

• Contreras, Brittany A

Contributors dc:contributor

• Kelly Kennedy
• Jeanne Anne Carriere
• Hong Yee

• growth mindset
• implicit theories of intelligence
• California Healthy Kids Survey
• logistic regression
• School Psychology

Repository record dc:identifier

https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/education_dissertations/100

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:digitalcommons.chapman.edu:education_dissertations-1099