[SOUND] All right, so you've completed the self assessment activity,

and if you've found it to be a very humbling experience, you're not alone.

Most people find self assessment, especially recordings of themselves,

to be extremely challenging.

And it may have brought up some feelings of,

sort of feeling like maybe you're not good enough, or

some negative feelings, and if that happened, you're also not alone.

So in this video we're going to talk about that phenomenon called

the Imposter Syndrome, as well as something called Stereotype Threat and

the growth mindset.

So by the end of this video, you'll be able to define those terms,

talk about what contributes to Stereotype Threat and the Imposter Syndrome.

And then talk about some strategies for

overcoming these, in particular talking about growth mindset as a strategy for

overcoming Stereotype Threat and the Imposter Syndrome.

So let's imagine a situation that I know I've felt before,

and probably you felt before, where you've been given some task or some job.

And you start to work on it and then you look around and you start feeling like

wait a minute, I don't feel like I'm the same as everybody else here.

I feel like people are seeing me as something I'm not.

I'm maybe not qualified to be doing what they want me to be doing.

How did I get here?

This was a mistake, somebody made a mistake.

How did I get in this position?

My gosh, I'm an imposter, and they're going to figure me out.

So, if you've ever felt like that, you're definitely not alone.

This is a very common phenomenon called the Imposter Syndrome.

This is this idea that you get into some position, and

you feel like you're not qualified to be there, that you're an imposter,

and you're going to be found out.

And, it can be very stressful.

The Imposter Syndrome actually can be detrimental to your performance.

It can really hurt you.

So it can keep you from applying for positions that you are qualified for,

because you feel like in those positions you'll feel like an imposter, and

won't really fit in.

It can make you not take appropriate credit for your work,

because you'll be found out that you didn't really do the work well enough.

You've somehow snuck it by, and nobody else really figured out.

So you won't stand up and take appropriate credit.

And from our perspective in this class,

it can make you doubt your abilities in high pressure situations.

For example, interview situations, you definitely

don't want these Imposter Syndrome thoughts running through your head,

when you're trying to focus on technical explanations and technical content.

And then at the end of the day, it's just extremely stressful.

It can stress you out and make you very unhappy.

So the Imposter Syndrome is real.

And unfortunately, it's not always just in your head.

So I want to tell you a little story that was published in The New York Times

back in 2014, that can show that external factors can also

influence these thoughts that are running through your head.

So this story is about a young woman named Vanessa, and

Vanessa was the first in her family to go to college.

So her mother worked really hard, single mother, raised her well,

raised her up to get into a really good school.

So Vanessa worked hard and got into a really good school.

She entered the University of Texas at Austin.

The flagship University in Texas.

And Vanessa is very proud, very exited to be going to UT Austin.

But unfortunately during her first semester there, she gets an F on a test.

And she is just devastated.

She feels like she's put in all this hard work, and how could she get an F?

And so she calls home to her mom, hoping for some reassurance.

And what her mom actually says to her has the exact opposite effect.

Her mom says, well honey, you know, maybe you were overreaching.

Maybe it just wasn't meant to be.

Maybe you should've gone to a community college first.

So Vanessa is not only internally facing all these feelings of Imposter Syndrome,

but then she's hearing it externally, as well.

She shouldn't be there, she should be somewhere else.

And so Vanessa is experiencing one manifestation of

something that's essentially called Stereotype Threat.

There's these expectations, these external expectations for what she should and

shouldn't do as, for example, a first generation young black college student.

She maybe should have gone to community college first instead of going to

the flagship university.

That's of course not true.

Vanessa should do very well at UT Austin.

She deserves to be there.

But she's seeing all this external pressure

that maybe she's made the wrong choice.

It can happen in more subtle situations, as well.

So, there are many stereotypes out there, and

one in particular in the Western world is that men are better than women at math.

So, when you're asked to think about somebody who's good at math,

typically a Western person thinks about this guy here, this white guy,

nerdy, pocket protector, with a sheet full of equations.

And that's just kind of the stereotype that exists.

So, let's say that I, being a woman, am going to go in and

take a very challenging math test.

Now, I'm good at math.

The other people who are taking the test are good at math.

But when I walk into the room, here's what I see.

I see a bunch of people who uphold the stereotype that I have in my head

that men are good at math, and women aren't as good.

Now what happens to me when I walk into that room is that,

that stereotype activates in my head.

And it turns out there are some researchers who did a study, Spencer,

Steele, and Quinn, that when women are put into these situations and

they're reminded of this stereotype, that men are better than women at math,

they actually perform worse on the test.

It's not that they are worse at math.

It's just that their performance is hindered by being reminded of

these stereotypes.

And this again, is what's known as Stereotype Threat.

It's the idea that, I am now a representative of this class of people,

of women.

And so I have this added pressure to do well on this test.

Because I worry that if I don't do well on this test, I'm going to be upholding this

stereotype, this negative stereotype that I really don't want to uphold.

And that thinking just gets in my way of my ability to

think about the mathematical problems that I would need to be working on.

And for people who are in the majority group, they've shown that

they don't have this extra thinking that they have to cope with.

They're not worried about upholding some stereotype,

because it's just sort of that's the norm, that's what everybody accepts.

And so they do better on the test itself.

So, this is something, obviously we want to work to combat in a job situation.

Because when you're in a job, you might have some stereotype.

There might be stereotypes about who fits into that job.

For example, again, in the Western world,

there's a stereotype that men are more competent than women in technical jobs.

It's not rue, but that stereotype exists.

So when I walk into an interview, and I happen to see a bunch of men sitting

around in the position that I'm going for, that stereotype is going to be activated.

So how do we combat both the feeling of the Imposter Syndrome and

the Stereotype Threat?

Well, one way is to find really good role models.

So, when you see people like yourself, that you can relate to, that are in these

really high positions and doing very well, that helps you believe that you can do it.

And, speaking of which, the more you can focus on yourself and

your own accomplishments, the more you're going to distance yourself

from those stereotypes, and be able to perform without

thinking of all those negative thoughts that kind of come into play.

The other thing that really helps is shared experiences with peers and mentors.

When you realize that you're not alone,

and that other people go through this too, that can help you take some of

the pressure off that you're putting on yourself.

The last thing that we're going to talk about is what's coming up next,

this idea of developing a growth mindset.

So, in the next piece we'll be diving into that.

Imposter Syndrome and Stereotype Threat

Mastering the Software Engineering Interview

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