Grit

How to graduate from West Point. Also, 7 other things worth your time.

What makes people successful? Is it some kind of inherent advantage? Is it privilege? Is it talent? Hard work? Having a good idea to begin with?

A study of 11,258 cadets at West Point, conducted over 10 years, says it's something else: "grit."

Led by professors Angela Lee Duckworth of the University of Pennsylvania and Michael Matthews of West Point itself, the study tried to determine the degree to which measures of three attributes could predict whether a cadet would succeed or fail at the famously challenging academy:

1. cognitive ability (smarts), 

2. physical ability (brawn), and 

3. grit (defined in the study as "passion and perseverance for long-term goals of personal significance.")

They found that grit was the most important attribute to predict whether cadets would make it through the initial six-week West Point basic training known as Beast Barracks.

They also found that high levels of grit and physical ability were associated with whether the cadets went on to graduate from the academy f…