Why do some people attain high levels of skill while others, who may appear
to put in equal amounts of time at the activity, do not? Attempts to address
this question often revolve around the existence and definition of innate tal-
ent (Howe, Davidson, & Sloboda, 1998; Simonton, 1999). However, careful
consideration of the available scientific evidence leads to a more complex sce-
nario. Regardless of any innate biological advantages that some individuals
may possess, all people must engage in significant amounts of what has been
called deliberate practice, that is, practice aimed at improving performance
with appropriate subgoals (Ericsson & Charness, 1994; Ericsson, Krampe, &
Tesch-Romer, 1993) in order to reach and sustain elite levels of skill. In fact,
established experts in a variety of domains report thousands of hours of de-
liberate practice prior to reaching professional levels of performance (e.g.,
chess: Charness, Krampe, & Mayr, 1996; music: Ericsson et al., 1993; sports:
Starkes, Deakin, Allard, Hodges, & Hayes, 1996), and even the most preco-
cious individuals in these domains show evidence of extended periods of in-
tense preparation prior to their greatest achievements (Charness et al., 1996;
Ericsson et al., 1993; Howe et al., 1998).
However, the concept of high-quality goal-directed practice usually im-
plies difficult and repetitive activities that are undertaken during extended
periods of isolation, and thus it is not surprising to find that deliberate prac-
tice is rated as particularly effortful and unpleasant compared with other do-
main-relevant activities (Ericsson et al., 1993; Starkes et al., 1996). Thus, an
important subquestion arises: Why would anyone take on an inherently dis-

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Motivation, Emotion,

and Expert Skill Acquisition

Neil Charness
Michael Tuffiash
Tiffany Jastrzembski
Florida State University

299