Keith Stanovich

And in, in cognitive science and in psychology, cognitive psychology, there is a whole field that studies, um, the question of whether or not human beings are on balance rational.

Keith Stanovich is one name that comes to mind who's, uh, sort of prominent in that field.

And, uh, and, um, and Tversky and, um, Kahneman wrote that famous book, uh, Thinking, Fast and Slow, to document- The, uh, the vast numbers of cognitive biases that humans walk around with on a daily basis-

Mm-hmm

Number six: the rich get richer, and motivation is part of the engine.

Finally, in 1986, Stanovich described what he called Matthew effects in reading.

Children who read well read more, and reading more makes them read better, while children who struggle read less and fall farther behind.

A 2020 meta-analysis by Toast and her colleagues covering students from kindergarten to 12th grade found a consistent, positive relationship between reading motivation and reading achievement, with evidence that each feeds the other.

Books at the right level, a teacher who reads aloud and models, and time to talk about what was read.

Why this works? Every page a child reads with understanding gives her more words, more automatic recognition, and more confidence.

So that is a Stanovich virtuous circle.

And autonomy matters.