STANNIES www.stannies.com
NEWS 17 JUNE 2022
FROM THE HEAD OF COLLEGE
Dear Members of the St Stanislaus’ College Community, I am fascinated by the effects of Cognitive Dissonance. I am as prone to it as anyone else. Cognitive Dissonance is the awkward feeling that we all get when we are confronted by information that is inconsistent with our beliefs. We feel ill at ease when evidence challenges our existing beliefs, ideas and values. We all have an inner need to ensure that our beliefs and behaviours are consistent. For example, I believe myself to be a good person but I have just been rude and condescending to a colleague. So psychologically uncomfortable are the feelings of Cognitive Dissonance that we go to great lengths to reduce them. We will ignore key facts, distort our memories, blame others or even declare that we never really cared in the first place. In fact, we will do almost anything to avoid the realisation that what we believe has not matched the reality in a given circumstance. As US author Janet Malcolm noted: “We go through life mishearing and mis-seeing and misunderstanding so that the stories we tell ourselves will add up.” I sat with a senior student affected by Cognitive Dissonance this week - it’s not unusual at this time of year. This student believed themselves to be a more than capable student dedicated to their studies and to be fair, that would be my observation too. However, they got sidetracked by outside school activities, left an assessment till the last minute, rushed it through, handed it in late and received, to me at least, a predictably poor result. In their mind though, it wasn’t predictable or even rational. It didn’t make sense that a more than capable student, dedicated to his studies could get such a poor result. To make sense of the situation and reduce the dissonance, the excuses started: I got the
assignment after the others, the teacher wouldn’t help me, the teacher doesn’t like me, I didn’t have the resources at home, I had to work, and on it went. Any of these things may well have had an impact but nothing could take away from the fact that this student had made a choice to behave in a way (participating in co-curricular activities when an assignment is due) that was not consistent with their beliefs (I am capable and dedicated). Eventually, we needed to confront this reality and make a plan to move forward. To do this the student needed to amend their belief. It became “I am a more than capable student, dedicated to my studies and I was not as organised as I should have been.” As families and teachers, we don’t like to see our students struggle. Sometimes we inadvertently play the game of reducing dissonance by accepting excuses or apportioning blame. This is especially easy when we only receive one side of the story. The problem with this is though, that we don’t help the student to deal better with a similar situation in the future, in fact, we increase the likelihood they will end up in the same spot again. Learning and personal growth involves struggle and a continual consideration of our beliefs and values. As families and teachers, it is our role to guide and support young people through these processes rather than shield them from it. We need to allow students the space to grapple with their mistakes, their learning and their beliefs. Let us pray for all our students at this time of term as they feel the stress of assessment deadlines and competing priorities. Mr Lindsay Luck, Head of College Stannies News | 1
