The Big Cop-Out

Legend has it that preteen Albert Einstein, for all his future
genius, was a ho-hum student. Whatever hope that might provide to parents
whose seemingly bright children are performing below expectations, recent
research suggests a different course.

Academic underachievers--students whose grade-point averages don't
measure up to the potential suggested by aptitude tests--rarely catch up
to their similarly talented classmates. "An underachieving diamond in the
rough," says University of Pittsburgh psychologist Robert B. McCall,
Ph.D., "tends to stay in the rough."

McCall and his colleagues have tracked the progress--or lack
thereof--of more than 6,700 underachievers. Their grim findings: 13 years
after high school, only about 15 percent of the underachievers had
attained career success consistent with their abilities. They earned less
money and dropped out of school more often than less-talented peers with
comparable academic records. Even their personal lives suffered: their
marriages were 50 percent more likely to end in divorce.

Why do underachievers fail? "They lack persistence in the face of
challenge," says McCall. "They check out." While an average student might
vow to train harder after losing a 100-meter dash, an underachiever quits
the team, declaring, "No one ever lost a race he never ran."

In addition to lacking "stick-to-itiveness," underachievers also
tend to be overly self-critical. They have poor self-esteem, set
unrealistic goals, and fear failure and success. Many are loners. Their
ranks include about twice as many boys as girls, but there seems to be
little correlation between under-achievement and socioeconomic
class.

Where economic status matters is prognosis, reports McCall in
Current Directions in Psychological Science (Vol. 3, No. 1). Despite the
discouraging data, counselors are not lying when they tell concerned
parents that their underachieving child may eventually get his act
together. The parents most likely to seek the help of counselors and
psychologists are successful and educated--exactly the type of parents
whose child most often does eventually catch up to his potential.

Although it is frustrating, there is little most parents can do for
an underachieving child. Since many parents unintentionally foster
dependence by being too helpful, McCall recommends that parents "try
harder not to try so hard to help their children."

Instead, he advises that parents seek professional help, gently
teach their children the art of persistence, and love them for what they
are rather than what they might seem capable of accomplishing.