Why do some players fail to improve year after year?

I used to take chess seriously for a few years in late teens, but years later I don't really focus on the game. But, I just started going to a club again and I've been playing people from YEARS ago who haven't really seemed to improve at all...

I'd be curious to know why some ADULTS seem to stagnate in their development, regardless of the number of hours they seem to invest in the game.

Maybe there's a lesson we can all learn and apply to life in general?

Cheers

In most sports you'd improve with regular practice against better competition, but you're fighting the aging process.

Do you think raw intelligence matters?

The same thing happens in duplicate bridge. Players reach a certain level and then stay there.

In duplicate bridge it is because they keep making the same mistakes day after day and month after month and year after year.

It may be the same in chess. Players reach a certain level but make a lot of mistakes. Often they do not recognize they are making the same mistakes--day after day and month after month--and year after year.

If they could see and understand the mistakes they are making and if they would try to stop making these mistakes--they would improve.

Because improvement is for sissies.

Seriously... it takes more skill to spend hours doing something every day and not get better at it.

Sports is not the same as chess. Sports require physical skill levels.

However chess is mental and the reason or main reason for no improvement is that players reach a certain level and then are still making mistakes but they do not want to do what it takes to stop making the same mistakes time after time.

Instead they make excuses which are not valid.

Great points.  Regarding "mistakes", I always go through Analysis on my games here, win or lose, to see what I might have missed.  Boy, there's a lot I missed.  Mistakes.  Blunders.  Frankly, I'm glad there isn't something called Really-Stupidass-Blunder or Hey-What-the-Hell-Were-You-Thinking!  Perhaps it's my impetuous, slash and burn, don't-think-too-much nature that doesn't allow me to think too deeply.  Hence, it might be those deeper things that need to be looked at.  A psychological shakeup.  That's tough.  Also, there might be some things that simply can't be improved on.  Everyone can't be a grandmaster.  There is this thing called a bell curve.  Chess takes a lot of intensive study to get to reach the maximum point on that bell curve, and there are many real-life things that can drag one away from reaching that ultimate potential.  

So we can assume that everyone can't be a GM. But, maybe it's fair to say that most people never reach their potential because for whatever reason they're not training or studying properly?

Am I wrong to assume there's a difference between training and study? Might training be doing drills or puzzles? While studying is simply analyzing games (either your own or GM)?

What about playing? Is it possible that playing matters less than studying and analysis when it comes to improvement?

It's more like this. People don't intrinsically care about chess. They care about stimulative experiences. If someone feels that they become stimulated by besting an opponent at a game, and if they are repeatedly successful at doing so, a habit develops. If not, they turn away, seeking other things. So training at chess is pretty much a fools errand. You'll not get better, but you can have fun. Intelligence is absolutely most of the determinant in a chess player's success and practice is only relevant after a player has a certain base level of ability. 

It would be unwise to put a baby on a racetrack and ask it to train for a marathon. Most likely that baby will never run a marathon. You can have simulated run-play for them tho. That is what easy puzzles do for most players. Allow them to feel a sense of victory without requiring the actual person-to-person battle that chess is. 

I don't think there is anything chess.com can do to change the average ELO of players or even of its players, but it can be an entertaining platform, for what it's worth.

"He evidently has an extraordinary good memory, for he always makes the same mistakes" - Steinitz
People fail to improve because they fail to learn from their mistakes.

"Might training be doing drills or puzzles? While studying is simply analyzing games (either your own or GM)?" ++ Yes, that is right.

"Is it possible that playing matters less than studying and analysis when it comes to improvement?"
++ Yes, that is right. Fischer did not play in 1969, but he analysed his own games for his book "My Sixty Memorable Games". In 1970 he came back stronger than ever before.

Analysing games is a very strong method to improve at chess, I wonder how to do it correctly though. Because you also need to analyse and understand the game, lot of times I find myself just going through the moves and not really getting what's going on. 

I remember once I started going through Alekhine's best games. I analysed 1 game and saw drastic improvement in my chess. Yes I phrased it right! Drastic! 

I haven't really analysed games after that. I look at some games in the opening I wanna study but didn't analysed a single game in great depth. I also think that it requires a good amount of chess knowledge to understand the games.

Game analysis for the win! You train your Openings, Middlegame and Endgames as well. 

Some people lose focus and get caught up in extra curricular activities like stealing someone else's girl.

lol

Some people simply have limited talent for the game and they have hit their "ceiling" with no hope for improvement. This is seen in many other activities, especially in golf and tennis. The other factor is not having a good work ethic and/or practice regimen. Getting a coach/trainer might help. It's worth a shot.

Bingo!

I was considered a good player at a coffee shop next to my university where many people played with clocks and portable sets. I was a tournament player at the time and had played for decades already but was at best a C level player. A guy I played and won against easily told me about his partner in a construction business who works in flooring and tile. "He's pretty good I think," the guy told me, "he beats me and I wonder how he would do against you." A meeting was arranged between us. This guy had never seen a chess clock or read a chess book or gone to a club or tournament. He played me and actually gave me a good challenge, but I won two out of two. Eventually we became friends and then roommates. Then this new friend of mine started going to chess clubs whenever possible and playing strong players. He started winning games against me and within months he was beating masters and it became inevitable that I would lose every game we played. I could hardly believe that in a few months he was already ready to play tournaments. At his first tournament, he achieved a provisional rating higher than any rating I have ever achieved in my decades of tournament play. Within two years he was over 2100 Elo and his rating went up with every tournament he played. Eventually it dawned on me that he had developed as a player more in a few months than I had in over 15 years of experience and structured study. My friend never owned or studied a single chess book. He used to encourage me to play tournaments with him because he wanted me to share in the fun, but it was embarrassing having played for decades yet often coming in last place at club tournaments. This experience has convinced me that chess is all about talent. I'm not talented at chess.

I used to take chess seriously for a few years in late teens, but years later I don't really focus on the game. But, I just started going to a club again and I've been playing people from YEARS ago who haven't really seemed to improve at all...I'd be curious to know why some ADULTS seem to stagnate in their development, regardless of the number of hours they seem to invest in the game.Maybe there's a lesson we can all learn and apply to life in general?Cheers

Yeah that guy Carlsen's rating hasn't gone up in years!

What a weird case. I don't know how to even think of this properly. I think it is just tactics and calculation, that's what kills people below 2000. But you also should have been more than a class c player. If you put in the hours there is no way you don't improve in the long term.