We all knew them growing up. They were incredibly smart and talented youngsters who excelled in school or demonstrated great talent in an area, and seemed destined for success. They were the ones who were voted the “most likely to succeed” and were the ones our parents wanted us to be friends with, hoping their genius would wear off on us. However, when we check in with these people later in life, very often, they have not achieved the success we expected they would. In contrast, there were those people we knew growing up who may not have been the brightest or the most talented, and yet they later achieved great success.

This seeming anomaly could be chalked up to “fate” or a “fluke.” However, new research is convincingly showing that the reason some succeed and others don’t is the result of what psychologists call grit. Those with grit succeed and those without grit, no matter how smart or talented they are, don’t achieve success.

Grit is a non-cognitive trait that is defined as “perseverance and passion for long-term goals.” It is the “stick-to-it-ness,” “drive” or consistency of effort and passion we see in people whereby they continue to pursue their goals, even in the face of challenges. Grit is what propels people to continue with their goals and work, while their less grittier peers give up or change focus.

A simple self-report grit test developed by Angela Duckworth can predict which West Point cadets will make it through the first year of training, which sales trainees will earn the most money, and which National Spelling Bee finalists will win the title. Duckworth found that grit, not IQ or talent, was the most predictive factor in determining success within these varied samples. Grit is positively correlated with success in non-self-selected groups as well, such as predicting grades for underprivileged children in New York City public schools.

The concept of grit as integral to success runs contrary to our long-held cultural belief that successful people are very smart and extremely talented. This cultural view has developed a “sprint” mentality in which as soon as a child is born the clock starts ticking as parents race to teach their child as much information and as many skills as soon as possible. The proliferation of baby learning videos and toddler math programs underscore this desire.

This race to push children to excel is not limited to cognitive areas, but can be seen in athletic and artistic domains. We enroll children in an alternating sequence of every conceivable sport throughout the year in an effort to help them find their “talent” and do the same for musical instruments. All these efforts are done in good faith and founded on the idea that encouraging cognitive skills and talents are the important focus of parenting and lead to success.

The new grit research may make us rethink this traditional idea of racing to increase children’s cognitive skills and talents. Perhaps encouraging perseverance, goal setting, focus and concentration are more important. It may be helpful to think of child rearing and life in general as not a sprint but rather a marathon.

Having a child stick with one sport or one musical instrument for a period of time instead of surveying many in an effort to find the right one may really benefit the child more in the long run. In the end, it may be that we don’t want to raise just smart and talented children but children who are gritty; children who will pursue their goals and dreams day in and day out.

Once you appreciate the value of grit, you may wonder how to support the development of grit. Research suggests that grit can be inherited and can be learned. We know that grit will increase when we are passionate about a goal, have some control in choosing the goal and believe we can succeed in achieving the goal. Also, grit increases when we can view the rival options to our goal as not nearly as good as our goal and have had a history of succeeding in tasks we persist at. Moreover, grit will increase when we adopt a growth mindset where we see learning and the brain as changing based on challenges.

Carol Dweck and her colleagues at Stanford University found that children who were instructed about a growth mindset were more likely to persist, even after a failure, in a given task. As parents we can look for, encourage, model and reinforce grit.

While a paradigm shift that entails moving from the old conceptualization of intelligence and talent as the keys to success, to viewing grit as an essential component of success may seem radical, it is supported by research. Changing your thinking about success can help you seek out, value and reinforce gritty behavior. It may be that Thomas Edison, an incredibly smart, talented and arguably a man with significant grit, had it right when he famously said, “Genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.”

In short, grit is the necessary element for success. Go find your grit!

— Winifred Lender Ph.D. is a licensed psychologist in private practice in Santa Barbara and can be contacted at drwinifredlender@gmail.com. She provides cognitive-behavioral therapy for sleep regulation issues, anxiety and depression, and completed her undergraduate work at Cornell University and received her master’s and doctorate degrees at the University of Pennsylvania. She completed a fellowship at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia/The University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and is a past president of the Santa Barbara County Psychological Association. Click here to read previous columns. The opinions expressed are her own.