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When they actually track/ athletes over the course of their development/ the pattern looks like this, / the future elites actually spend less time / early on / in deliberate practice / in their eventual sport.// They tend to have what scientists call / "a sampling period," / where they try a variety of physical activities.// They gain broad general skills.// They learn about their interests / and abilities / and delay specializing / until later than peers who plateau at lower levels.// And so / when I saw that / I said / "Gosh / that doesn't really comport with the 10,000-hour rule, / does it?. // So I started to wonder about other domains // that we associate with obligatory early specialization / like music //. Turns out the patterns often similar. // This is research from a world-class music academy / and I want to draw your attention to / is this / the exceptional musicians didn't start spending more time in deliberate practice / than the average musicians until their third / instrument //. They too / tended to have a sampling period. // Even musicians we think of as famously precocious / like Yo-Yo Ma.// He had a sampling period //. He just went through it more rapidly than most musicians do.// Nonetheless, / this research is almost entirely ignored / and much more impactful / is the first page of the book Battle Hymn of the tiger mother / where the author recounts assigning her daughter violin /, nobody seems to remember the part later in the book / where her daughter turns to her and says / "You picked it, not me." / and largely quits.//

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So having seen this sort of surprising pattern in sports and music, I started to wonder about domains that affect even more people like education. An economist found a natural experiment in the higher ED systems of England and Scotland. In the period he studied the systems were very similar except in England, students had to specialize in their mid-teen years to pick a specific course of study to apply to. Or in Scotland, they could keep trying things in university if they wanted to. And his question was, Who wins the trade-off; the early or the late specializers?". And what he saw was that the early specialized jump out to an income lead because they have more domain-specific skills. The late specializers get to try more different things and when they do pick they have better fit or what economists call match quality and so their growth rates are faster. By six years out, they erased that income gap. Meanwhile, the early specializers start quitting their career tracks in much higher numbers essentially because they were made to choose so early, that they more often made poor choices. So the late specializers losing the short term and win in the long run.

Let's follow David...

So, having seen this sort of surprising pattern / in sports and music/ I started to wonder about domains that affect even more people like education.// An economist found a natural experiment / in the higher ED systems of England/ and Scotland.// In the period he studied the systems were very similar / except in England / students had to specialize/ in their mid-teen years to pick a specific course of study to apply to //. Or in Scotland,/ they could keep trying things in university/ if they wanted to.// And his question was,/ "Who wins the trade-off;/ the early / or the late specializers?'" // And what he saw was that the early specializers / jump out to an income lead / because they have more domain-specific skills. // The late specializers get to try more different things / and when they do pick , / they have better fit / or what economists call / "match quality" / and so / their growth rates are faster. // By six years out,/ they erased that income gap.// Meanwhile / the early specializers / start quitting their career tracks in much higher numbers / essentially because they were made to choose so early / that they more often made poor choices.// So the late specializers losing the short term / and win in the long run. //