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Scientists Look To West Point To Better Understand What It Takes To Succeed

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What does it take to succeed at West Point? An elite combination of brains, brawn, and guts, perhaps? Not exactly, according to one high-achieving cadet, who once observed:

“For one to succeed here, all that is required is an ordinary mind and application; the latter is by far the most important and desirable of the two. For men of rather obtuse intellect, by indomitable perseverance, have been known to graduate with honor; while some of the greatest geniuses of the country have been found deficient, for want of application.”

New research forthcoming in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences put this observation to the test. Specifically, a team of researchers led by Angela Duckworth of the University of Pennsylvania examined data from over 11,000 West Point cadets to uncover the cognitive and non-cognitive attributes that were most predictive of cadets’ success.

Their results, though nuanced, suggest that non-cognitive aspects of the human composition – for example, physical ability and mental toughness – cannot be undervalued.

“The question of what predicts success is among the most basic in social science,” state Duckworth and her team. “The past century of empirical research on human accomplishment has disproportionately focused on cognitive ability. [...] This investigation underscores the independent roles of cognitive and non-cognitive determinants of achievement.”

To arrive at this conclusion, the researchers examined data from 11,258 cadets who entered training at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point within the past decade. To assess their performance, the researchers tracked cadets’ military, academic, and physical GPAs, as well as whether or not they graduated. They also tracked cadets’ performance in the “Beast Barracks” – a six-week initiation regimen touted as the most demanding part of the entire West Point experience.

The researchers calculated cadets’ cognitive aptitude from their SAT or ACT scores. They assessed cadets’ physical aptitude from the Candidate Fitness Assessment, a battery of six fitness tests typically administered by a high school gym teacher as part of a cadet’s application. And, they assessed cadets’ mental toughness using the 12-item GRIT scale. This scale asks people to rate themselves on statements such as “Setbacks don’t discourage me” and “I have achieved a goal that took years of work.”

The researchers then tested which aptitudes were most predictive of success at West Point.

Here’s what they found. First, they report that the three aptitudes measured were, in fact, differentiable within the student body. In other words, not everyone gifted in one aptitude (say, cognitive ability) was also above average on the other aptitudes.

Examining which aptitudes best predicted performance on the Beast Barracks, the researchers found that only mental toughness was associated with an increased likelihood of completing the exercise. They write, “Cadets one standard deviation higher than their peers in [mental toughness] had 54% greater odds of completing Beast Barracks training.”

Furthermore, they found (not surprisingly) that cognitive ability was most predictive of cadets’ academic GPA and physical ability was most predictive of cadets’ physical GPA. None of the three aptitudes measured were any better than the others in predicting cadets’ military GPA.

Finally, Duckworth and her team examined West Point’s graduation rates. According to their analysis, 81% of incoming cadets go on to receive their diploma. Interestingly, Duckworth and her team found that mental toughness and physical ability were better predictors of a cadets’ likelihood to graduate than cognitive ability.

The authors conclude, “The unique affordances of this longitudinal investigation suggest that both cognitive and non-cognitive attributes matter in different ways and at different times. [...] We conclude that non-cognitive aspects of human capital deserve greater attention from both scientists and practitioners interested in predicting real-world success.”