ABSTRACT
Psychologist Anders Ericsson sees quality feedback vital to the success of one’s practice. Without good feedback, even when students have plenty of motivation, “efficient learning is impossible and improvement only minimal.”
But feedback and self-criticism can often become contaminated through the well-known confirmation bias or by measuring oneself—or by being measured—against an imagined end. In 1962, Ivan Galamian presented an early working definition of what would later be known as confirmation bias: “The things [students] actually hear are strongly distorted by what they want and hope to hear.”
Many outstanding artists from the past wrote about reliable self-criticism as a crucial ingredient to success. Pianist Teresa Carreño was taught how to effectively criticize herself: “Part of my training consisted in being shown how to criticize myself…. I attribute much of my subsequent success to this ability. I still carry out this plan.”
Chapter 9 explores the importance of trustworthy feedback and self-criticism and how these can become contaminated if they do not correlate with well-designed practice.
