Seriously. How many people think they've missed their opportunity to be a musician, or an expert golfer, or even a chess grand master because they didn't start when they were young? Or because they simply lacked natural talent? Those people are (mostly) wrong. According to some brain scientists, almost anyone can develop world-class (or at least top expertise) abilities in things for which they aren't physically impaired. Apparently God-given talent, natural "gifts", and genetic predispositions just aren't all they're cracked up to be. Or at least not in the way most of us always imagined. It turns out that rather than being naturally gifted at music or math or chess or whatever, a superior performer most likely has a gift for concentration, dedication, and a simple desire to keep getting better. In theory, again, anyone willing to do what's required to keep getting better WILL get better.
Maybe the "naaturally talented artist" was simply the one who practiced a hell of a lot more. Or rather, a hell of a lot more deliberately. Dr. K. Anders Ericsson, professor of psychology at Florida State University, has spent most of his 20+ year career on the study of genuises, prodigies, and superior performers. In the book The New Brain (it was on my coffee table) Richard Restak quotes Ericsson as concluding:
"For the superior performer the goal isn't just repeating the same thing again and again but achieving higher levels of control over every aspect of their performance. That's why they don't find practice boring. Each practice session they are working on doing something better than they did the last time."
So it's not just how long they practice, it's how they practice. Basically, it comes down to something like this:
Most of us want to practice the things we're already good at, and avoid the things we suck at. We stay average or intermediate amateurs forever.
Yet the research says that if we were willing to put in more hours, and to use those hours to practice the things that aren't so fun, we could become good. Great. Potentially brilliant. We need, as Restak refers to it, "a rage to master." That dedication to mastery drives the potential expert to focus on the most subtle aspects of performance, and to never be satisfied. There is always more to improve on, and they're willing to work on the less fun stuff. Restak quotes Sam Snead, considered one of the top five golfers of the twentieth century, as saying:
"I know it's a lot more fun to stand on the practice tee and rip your driver than it is to chip and ptch, or practice sand shots with sand flying back in your face, but it all comes back to the question of how much you're willing to pay for success."
There's much more to the brain science around this topic, of course--I'm just doing the highlights. And a lot of the research is new, made possible today by how easy it is for researchers to get time with an fMRI or PET scan. And I stretched just a little... there is some thought that to be, literally, THE best in the world at chess, or the violin, or math, or programming, or golf, etc. you might indeed need that genetic special something. But... that's to be THE best. The research does suggest that whatever that special sauce is, it accounts for only that last little 1% that pushes someone into the world champion status. The rest of us--even without the special sauce--could still become world (or at least national) class experts, if we do the time, and do it the right way.
Where this ties into passionate users is with the suck threshold and kick-ass (aka "passion") threshold. Your users will typically fall into one of the three categories in the graphic: expert, amateur, or drop-out. The drop-outs decide that during that "I suck at this" phase, it isn't worth continuing. They give up. Is that something you can work on? Do you know what your attrition rate is?
But the most troubling--and where we have the most leverage--is with the amateur who is satisfied with where they are. These are the folks who you overhear saying, "Yes, I know there's a better way to do this thing, but I already know how to do it this [less efficient, less powerful] way and it's easy for me to just keep doing it like that." In other words, they made it past the suck threshold, but now they don't want to push for new skills and capabilities. They don't want to suck again. But that means they'll never get past the kick-ass threshold where there's a much greater chance they'll become passionate about it. The further up that capability curve they are, the higher-res the user experience is!
Can we help make it easier for them to continue on the path to becoming expert? Remember, being better is better. Whatever you're better at becomes more fun, more satisfying, a richer experience, and it leads to more flow. This is what we're trying to do for our users.
Oh yes, about that never too late thing... most of us can kiss that Olympic ice skating medal good-bye. And at 5' 4", my basketball career is probably hopeless. But think about this... actress Geena Davis nearly qualified for the US Olympic archery team in a sport she took up at the age of 40, less than three years before the Olympic tryouts.
And if the neuroscientists are right, you can create new brain cells--by learning (and not being stuck in a dull cubicle)--at virtually any age. Think about it... if you're 30 today, if you take up the guitar tomorrow, you'll have been playing for TWENTY years by the time you're 50. You'll be kicking some serious guitar butt. And if you're 50 today, there's no reason you can't be kicking guitar butt at 70. What are you waiting for?
原文作者：Kathy Sierra
翻 译：孙小小
审 校：Danny Yu
你作为业余者和你成为专家的唯一区别是：投入。
这些谈论的是神童们么？只要花时间且专注，我们每个人都可以成为（或者接近）神童。至少那是有头脑的家伙们说的。还好，任何时候这都不算晚。
严肃说来，有多少人认为他们错过了成为音乐家、高尔夫球手，甚至是国际象棋大师 的机会？因为他们没有在很年轻的时候着手去做？或是因为他们缺乏天赋？那些人（基本上）错了。根据一些脑科学家的研究，几乎每个人都能在他们身体上没有缺 陷的事情上发展到世界级（或至少顶级专家）的能力。很显然，上帝给予的天分、自然的禀赋、遗传特质并不象它们被夸赞的那样，或至少不似我们大部分人的想 象。实际上，比起在音乐、数学、象棋或其他领域上的天赋，表现卓越者很可能是在专注、投入和追求卓越的欲望上有一种特别的天赋。再次强调，从理论上说，任 何人只要愿意去做那些被要求持续改善的事儿，就会做得更好。
或许“天生的艺术家”只是因为他们比别人尝试得多得多。或者，他们刻意进行了这样的尝试。Dr.K.Anders Ericsson，佛罗里达州立大学心理学教授，花了他20多年职业生涯的时间来研究天才、神童和表现卓越者。在《全新的大脑》（The New Brain）一书中（它正在我的咖啡桌上），Richard Restak引用了Ericsson的话：
“对于表现卓越者来说，目标不是简单的重复同样的事情，而是更上一个台阶，更好掌控他们的表现。这就是为什么他们不会觉得练习很无聊。每一次的练习，他们都会在某些地方比上一次做得更好。”
所以，不仅仅是练习了多久，还在于他们如何进行练习。基本上就象这样：
我们中的大多数人想练习我们已经擅长的，但却避免我们需要努力才能掌握的。我们永远停留在中等或业余水准上。
然而研究表明：如果我们愿意花更多的时间去练习那些看起来不太有趣的事情，我们能变得更好。优秀，潜在的杰出。我们需要，就像Restak说的， “一种追求精通的激情。” 那种对征服的奉献驱使潜在的专家专注在表现的细微方面，永远不满足。总是有更多需要改进的地方，他们愿意在无趣的事情上花时间。Restak引用了Sam Snead的话，他被认为是20世纪5个最好的高尔夫球手之一：
“我知道站在球座旁挥杆比打滚地球和劈球（或在沙地里面练习，弄得满脸都是沙子）更有趣。但是这些都回到了问题所在－－你到底愿意为成功付出多少代价。”
关于这个主题的脑科学还有很多内容，当然，我只是挑些重点。许多研究是新的，研 究者们在fMRI（机能性磁共振成像）和PET扫描（正电子发射计算机断层扫描）的帮助下得以轻松实现。我只展开一点……有些想法认为，不夸张的说，要成 为世界上玩象棋、小提琴、数学、编程，或高尔夫最好的人，你或许的确需要某些遗传因素。但是，那是指世界上最好的。研究表明，无论那个特殊调料是什么，它 也就只在推动某人达到世界冠军程度中起到1%的作用。剩余的我们，尽管没有特殊调料，仍然可以成为世界级（或至少国家级）的专家，如果我们花时间，并且按 照正确的方法。
这里和热情洋溢者密切关联的是“努力吸收门槛”和“活力门槛”（又叫作“激情”）。普通人很典型地掉入了上图中三个类别之一：专家，业余，或者放弃。放弃者决定，在“我在此努力了”阶段，不值得再继续，他们放弃了。对此你能起到什么作用？你知道你的退出率是多少么？
但是最烦人的，也是我们最能起作用的，是业余爱好者正满意于他们的现状。你经常会听到：“是的，我知道做这个事情有更好的办法，但是我已经知道如何做了[更无效，更无力]，让我只做这个很容易”。换句话说，他们通过了努力吸收的门槛，但是现在他们不想再争取新的技术和能力了。他们不想再次去吸收，但是那意味着他们永远不能再体验极度活力的阶段，在那里有大得多的机会使他们变得激情四射。他们越是靠近能力曲线的上端，所获得的激情体验就越棒！
我们能帮助他们更容易地行进在成为专家之路上么？记住，变得更好就是更好。无论 你在什么方面变得更好，只要它更有乐趣，更令人满意，有更丰富的体验。它就能有更多的涌流（译注：美国心理学家米哈伊尔.奇凯岑特米哈伊命名的一种心理状 态，在其中人们获得了卓越的心理体验，可在此详细了解）。这正是我们努力帮助我们的读者的。
哦，对了，关于那个永远都不晚的说法……我们中的大多数人都无法染指奥林匹克滑 冰奖牌，身高5尺4寸（160cm），我的篮球生涯很可能毫无希望。但是，想一想这个例子，演员吉莲.戴维斯差一点就被选进美国奥林匹克箭术队，她从40 岁开始参加这项运动，到奥林匹克预选赛之前，还不到三年时间.
如果神经科学家是对的，实际上你在任何年龄都可以创造出新的脑细胞，不过需要通过学习，而不是闷在一间昏暗的小屋子里。想想看……如果今天你30 岁，明天你开始学吉他，到你50岁的时候你已经弹了20年的吉他。你将能够弹奏一些高难度的吉他曲。如果你今天50岁，没有任何理由你不能在70岁时成为高手。你还在等什么？
139
被折叠的 条评论
为什么被折叠?
到【灌水乐园】发言
