There are countless books out there in the market which discuss success on how it's achieved, the traits needed to succeed, and the tools essential to move forward. In Malcolm Gladwell’s novel, Outliers, it has a rather different approach of being successful than most other novels that involves a rather dark approach to whether a member of society succeeds or not. This is figured out by the Matthew effect which involves statistics, age, and self esteem as evidence to help validate its claim. The idea of the Matthew effect is those with a distinct advantage over others at a young age will be presented with many opportunities in the time that comes. The sociologist, Robert Merton, believes those who are successful are more likely to be given special opportunities that lead to future success (30). The statistics can be referred to the scores of the TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study) test which is taken every four years by children around the world. It was found among fourth graders that the oldest children (by month) typically scored between four and twelve percentile points better than the youngest children (28). It's a small difference that can go a long way, for the same analysis was conducted in colleges within the U.S and found the youngest group in their classes are underrepresented by about 11.6 %.(29). This small difference carries on in the future and can be the deciding factor to going to college and having a chance to go to the middle class (29), which is why this section of the book had intrigued me and made me think of school in a different perspective. It makes one wonder if education and several other programs could become better if there were no ability grouping until a later age when the children then matured.
I agree with you when you say that a small difference can go a long way. It's unfair though to see that those who have an advantage are praised upon more and receive far more attention. Because of this, this is the primary reason to why they continue to excel and succeed farther than others. If everyone were to be given the same chance, then most likely, they will be given the same opportunities. Shouldn't we try to help everyone achieve their dream by giving them equal treatment? Don't we want to see everyone succeed? Many might argue yes, but the truth is, those who are always a step ahead will always receive more attention. They are the ones who have more practice, more exposure to what it is they want to excel at, which can be linked to the idea of the 10,000 Hour Rule.
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