Two Psychological States

To understand why placing a grade alongside a comment can sometimes be unhelpful, we must distinguish between two different psychological states that feedback can trigger in a learner. While there are certainly circumstances where teachers are required to provide both a grade and a comment—and we do not want to dissuade you from this practice entirely—it is important to be aware of how this impacts student focus.

1. Ego-Involvement: This occurs when feedback causes an emotional reaction rather than a cognitive one. The student becomes concerned with their self-esteem, their reputation, and how they rank against their peers. They enter a "fight or flight mode" where the focus shifts entirely to comparisons: "If I beat you, great. If you beat me, how can I make excuses?".

2. Task-Involvement: This occurs when feedback causes a cognitive reaction, prompting the student to think. The student is concerned with the work itself, focusing on questions like, "What is the answer?" or "How do I fix this mistake?".

The Four Reactions to Feedback

Understanding these two states is critical because, as Professor Dylan Wiliam highlights, there are really only four things a student can do when they receive feedback:

1. Change their behaviour (increase their effort).
2. Change their goal (aspire to a higher goal).
3. Abandon the goal entirely.
4. Reject the feedback outright.

When feedback triggers Ego-Involvement, it almost always leads to the last two negative outcomes. To protect their ego, a student might abandon the goal by deciding the subject is "stupid" (e.g., "Maths is stupid"), or they might reject the feedback by deciding the teacher is unfair (e.g., "My maths teacher is stupid").

Polarisation of Attitude

Grades inherently trigger Ego-Involvement. In the Butler study, providing a grade completely polarised the students' attitudes. The high achievers felt good and were happy to carry on, while the low achievers felt bad and wanted to stop and do something else. In both cases, the presence of the grade shifted their focus away from learning and onto their ego, resulting in zero overall gain in achievement.

Motivation and Keeping the Focus on the Task

In contrast, the "Comments Only" group in the Butler study maintained a high interest in the work, with both high and low achievers feeling positive about carrying on with the tasks.

Since you may still be required to provide a grade alongside your comments, one highly effective strategy is to withhold the student's grade until after they have read and reflected on their written feedback. (Please note: The ability to easily withhold grades until feedback is reviewed is a feature of Nurture.) By temporarily withholding the grade, the teacher successfully prevents the immediate emotional reaction and keeps the student in Task-Involvement. The best feedback causes students to think rather than react emotionally, ensuring they focus on improvement rather than their ranking.