Values writing raised Latino American students' grades, and the gain lasted a year

The study

1. 01

   Who took part

   335 students at two US middle schools with mixed ethnic groups. There were 136 Latino American students and 199 White students, and half were 12 or younger.

2. 02

   What they did

   Students in the values group picked two or three of their own important values and wrote about why they mattered. The other group picked values that were not important to them and wrote about why those would matter to someone else. Study 1 had four or five of these writing tasks across the school year, and Study 2 had two.

3. 03

   What happened

   In the first study, Latino students had higher grades in the values group that year, and the next year too. Two years later the gap was smaller and not clear, though the paper says it lasted three years. In the second study, Latino grades were higher too, and White students did not differ in either study.

What the study found

1. Helped

   Latino students who wrote about values that mattered to them had higher grades that year.

   • Action: Clarify what matters to youtested

   Randomised trial of 335 Latino American and White middle school students · vs students who wrote about values that did not matter · behaviour was recorded · ⚠ only counted people who finished; many people dropped out; summary claims more than the results show

2. Helped

   Next year, Latino students who wrote about values that mattered still had higher grades.

   • Action: Clarify what matters to youtested

   Randomised trial of 335 Latino American and White middle school students · vs students who wrote about values that did not matter · behaviour was recorded · ⚠ only counted people who finished; many people dropped out; summary claims more than the results show

3. Helped

   Latino seventh graders who wrote about values that mattered had higher grades.

   • Action: Clarify what matters to youtested

   Randomised trial of 335 Latino American and White middle school students · vs students who wrote about values that did not matter · behaviour was recorded · ⚠ only counted people who finished; many people dropped out; summary claims more than the results show

Source