I decided to join the local library in my area of San Diego, and attend the singing and story session for 1- 3 year olds. Excellent, I thought. I can meet some new mums and my son can participate in something he loves: singing and books. In fact I can’t remember meeting a child of this age who doesn’t like stories and singing: this is why I was surprised by what happened next.
We were the first people there, followed by another couple of parents and their children. As we sat waiting for the others to arrive, I heard one of the children say “I want my sticker. When will we get our sticker?” It turned out that children got a sticker for ‘listening well’ to the stories and ‘joining in’ on the singing.
You might think “That’s great, children love stickers, what a brilliant idea to get them to behave well and participate!” Or you may wonder, like me, “Why on earth are they getting stickers for doing something that they love, and which they will most likely enjoy anyway?” You may even be worried, like me, that this will have an impact upon their learning and enjoyment of such activities.
This type of incentivisation in childhood worries me, mainly because of the implications it has for motivation and learning.
Absorbed in reading
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/apr/25/children-books-advice-for-parents)
Many studies have been carried out, including a couple of meta analyses (studies which look at the findings of many studies). These clearly show that incentives undermine motivation and performance, not only of children but of adults too (unless the incentives are for very boring or simple tasks) and especially when the tasks require creativity. See here for a recent review of the decline of creativity in young people.
In the case of rewards for young children, researchers have carried out a study which looked at what happens when you reward children for doing a drawing. They took fifty-one 40-64 month olds and measured their initial interest in drawing, by observing how long they spent on the activity.
Children were selected into one of three groups: those who expected a reward after the drawing; those who did not expect an award but received one, and those who were given no award. Then a couple of weeks later the drawing activity was reintroduced and researchers observed. What they found was those who had been aware that they were getting an award showed a decline in motivation and perseverance. They had less interest in drawing than those from the other two groups. Rewarding children in this way made them less fond of the activity they once loved.
Psychologists believe the reason this happens is that children overplay the importance of extrinsic motivators, believing that their behaviour is influenced by objective rewards rather than their own internal resources and motivation.
There are, however, times when extrinsic rewards are necessary but this is usually when intrinsic motivation is low to begin with, not as in the case of singing and story time for 1 – 3 year olds.
Considering the wealth of information around, I was surprised to see the reward system in action, and at such a young age. Especially because California specifically has been targeted for such bad practices in the past.
Introducing extrinsic motivations so early in life, for things that young children enjoy, is a sure way to stop them enjoying those things. It will undermine their motivation to explore the interesting possibilities that life offers. Let’s encourage young ones to have a curiosity for life and cultivate a love of learning, rather than trying to get them to do what we want via stickers and rewards.
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600 words copyright Emily Cutts/Anne Whitaker 2010
Licensed under Creative Commons – for conditions see Home Page
I am very happy to let our increasing band of MoreBits readers know that Emily Cutts, currently visiting the USA on a six-month sabbatical, has agreed to write regularly for the site: her articles are filed under “Emily’s News and Views”. Emily is an independent thinker whose studies and experience in the teaching, research and practice of Positive Psychology creatively and deeply inform her writing. She puts forward some challenging views in this article.
Please leave your comments – agree or disagree, we like to know your thoughts!
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“If thou must love me, let it be for nought except for love’s sake only.”
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
There is no doubt that all parents, with very few exceptions, love their children. Most parents will love their child unlike any other person in the world. However, looking around, there is a paradox at play. Parental love is no longer seen as a given.
Caregivers are being encouraged, by the likes of Super Nanny, to withdraw their love when their child fails to do what they want, (and then to give it back when they conform). As a parent I find this type of advice worrying, especially because it is so influential but mostly because I think it is ineffective and damaging for the child. Love from a parent, I believe, should be unconditional. You are loved as you are, not because you are a good boy, a top student or display kind behaviour.
I recently had a conversation with an acquaintance of mine, a mother to a 19 month old boy. She told me that she was using the Naughty Step (NS) to discipline her son John (not his real name) for throwing tantrums. ‘NS for a 19 month old?‘ I thought. Does a child this age really intend to do bad things and to be naughty? Is this an appropriate way to encourage good behaviour? It made me wonder what caused the tantrum in the first place, and was it really the child’s fault? It also made me wonder whether people are thinking through the consequences of such an approach.
For those of you who don’t know, NS is a technique used to discipline a child. If they do something naughty then you put them on a step (or mat if they are under 3) away from toys and people. They stay there for a minute for every year of their life, so a 2 year old would stay on the step for 2 minutes. Attention, praise and love should be withheld until the child apologizes.
The use of the NS is widespread. A UK charity called Raising Kids (dedicated to giving advice and tips to parents on positive parenting practices, but which now no longer exists in the UK) carried out a survey, in 2006, of 3,388 mothers and fathers. They found that half the parents had used time outs (a similar method to naughty step) and reward charts to influence their child’s behaviour: 43% used the naughty step.
People obviously like this technique and are using NS, but what are the consequences? There are various reasons why I think that parents should think twice before putting their child on the NS and adopting such an approach.
Firstly, the naughty step encourages parents to believe that the problem lies with the child, rather than looking at their own actions and taking responsibility for things that they might be doing to cause the problem. Often a child plays up because we have not listened to them, or met their needs in one way or another.
We should be changing ourselves first, and not expecting so much of our young ones. Parenting styles can have a huge impact on the behaviour of a child.
Secondly, I think that people tend to use the naughty step as a panacea. If you go onto Super Nanny’s website, for example, you will see comments from parents, complaining that the NS isn’t working any longer, when it once did. This is usually because parents use NS for all problems, and therefore undermine its value. Others have noted this too.
For example, The National Family and Parenting Institute, a UK Government-supported family advice charity, said it was concerned that parents saw the naughty step as a “cure-all” when every child was different and had individual needs. The families on Super Nanny’s show are extreme cases, and often the naughty step is needed because of extremely bad parenting over a long period. These families are far from the norm.
Thirdly, the NS labels the child, and encourages them to think badly of themselves. This is because it has such a negative connotation and can lead them to think that they are a bad person when sent there. Stereotyping young people in such a way can have a long lasting impact upon their motivation and well-being, and could also make them feel resentful. I think this reflects some of our views of young people in the UK.
A friend of mine recently told me about two experiences of schooling, one in Denmark and one in the UK. She said that the difference was enormous. In the UK, she was viewed negatively, believing that people thought the worst of her and her peers; in Denmark, the polar opposite. I think NS reflects a wider belief about young people: they are going to be bad and do naughty things, therefore we need to nip this in the bud.
One way to do it is the NS, and so people end up using it with 19 month olds.
Fourthly, the NS manipulates the parents’ love towards their children – the unconditional love which a child needs to help them understand the boundaries and limits in life. Carl Rogers, the famous psychotherapist and founding father of the humanistic movement in Psychology, said that the goal of therapy should be to recreate this unconditional love which the client had never received - clearly he thought that the conditional love of parents causes, and is the root of, many long term mental health problems.
Happy parent and child
Does conditional love negatively effect young people? Researchers asked students about whether the love they had received from parents was conditional (1). For example did their parents show them love when they got good grades, or suppressed negative emotions like anger or fear, or when they were nice to people?
The study found that those who had received conditional love did indeed act as the parent wanted them to. But they disliked and resented their parents. They felt that the choices they made were not really their own and that feelings of success were fleeting, leaving them feeling guilty or ashamed. Not only this, but conditional parenting leaves people feeling unworthy. Most recently researchers have revealed that conditional love, especially when it is withdrawn, eg via the NS, doesn’t always work.(2)
Bringing up children is complicated and complex with parents forever feeling under pressure to do the right thing. I think that we are often, wrongly, led to believe that some things work when maybe they don’t. Therefore we need to think through some of these approaches and whether they may be useful, helpful and constructive to our goal of raising healthy, resilient and happy children.
Yes, children do sometimes need to cool off and reflect on their behaviour: but the NS should not be the answer for normal families.
Showing unconditional love for a child does not mean adopting a laissez faire approach and letting them do what they want. Rather the research shows that when parents set limits and boundaries and are firm with their children, then they grow into happy confident individuals.
This can be done with the understanding, support, compassion and forgiveness that comes with unconditional love.
In conclusion, let’s revisit the example I offered at the beginning, about 19 month old “John” being put on a NS. It turned out that he fell asleep just afterwards – he was tired. Unfortunately, the mother didn’t pick this up and punished him for something that could have been avoided– taking away her love when he needed it – instead of listening to him and responding in a more loving way to his needs.
Of course, as I have said, parenting is a difficult business. We don’t always see things objectively in the heat of the moment. However, if we can learn to take a step back, think a little more about our reasons for doing the things we do, and call upon love during hard times, then the naughty step should be redundant.
Why would we want to use a method which not only undermines our relationship with our children but the relationship they have with themselves and others?
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References
(1) Assor, A., Roth, G., & Deci, E. L. (2004). The emotional costs of perceived parental conditional regard: A self-determination theory analysis. Journal of Personality, 72, 47-87.
(2) Roth, G., Assor, A., Niemiec, C. P., Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2009). The emotional and academic consequences of parental conditional regard: Comparing conditional positive regard, conditional negative regard, and autonomy support as parenting practices. Developmental Psychology, 45, 1119–1142.
Book on unconditional parenting, by authoritive figure on the topic, Alfie Kohn.
Emily and son Lauchie
Emily worked until recently for the pioneering Centre for Confidence and Well-being in Glasgow, Scotland UK, on a freelance basis as a Psychology researcher. She has also co-created and taught on Psychology of Well-being courses. She is currently on a six-month sabbatical in the USA with her husband and son.
Her interests lie in the science of motivation and education, though also in the general area of well-being: anything which helps us understand what makes people tick, and how to improve life.
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1600 words copyright Emily Cutts/Anne Whitaker 2010
Licensed under Creative Commons – for conditions see Home Page
Emily Cutts: Constructive criticism is a gift
November 5, 2010
I was surprised recently when a close friend of mine told me her reason for leaving a secondary school teaching position in a prestigious private school in Scotland. One of the parents didn’t like the critical feedback she was giving their daughter, saying that it was damaging and un-motivating. In reality it was constructive feedback: factual, and given with the intention of improving performance.
Criticism is a gift: Carol Dweck pictures
http://www.centreforconfidence.co.uk/pp/tools.php?p=c2lkPTEz
The parent was blaming my friend for their daughter’s poor performance in this particular science subject. Another parent, a psychiatrist, was complaining for similar reasons, but also demanding to know why their son wasn’t doing well at science – blaming the teacher for their son not ‘getting it’. My friend was disciplined by the head of department. From then on, she was required to put less ‘negative’ feedback comments on work and to be more positive.
I have heard that this type of behaviour from parents has been increasing in schools across Scotland – parents blaming teachers for their child not doing well or not getting what they want.
Why would parents put pressure on schools not to give a child accurate feedback during the learning process, instead wanting them to paper over the cracks in understanding with positive praise? Why would schools take them seriously?
The answer could have something to do with feelings:
(an argument most clearly put forward by Dr Carol Craig at The Centre for Confidence and Well-being(1))
We don’t want to hurt a child’s feelings because we falsely believe that doing so will undermine their confidence and consequently their learning. This causes teachers/parents to modify their behaviour in various ways to make sure that feelings are not damaged: restricting critical ‘negative’ feedback; reducing standards to make things easier; avoiding certain tasks for fear of hurting a child’s feelings should they fail – and unwarranted praise for tasks which the child can already do and for meaningless activities.
The problem with these behaviours is that they undermine the learning process, sending an important message to the child that they cannot cope with failure: failure is to be avoided. Another message is that they can’t handle challenging tasks. If we thought they could cope, then we would allow them to hear the constructive feedback.
How could anyone learn if they lived by this philosophy?
Think about learning something difficult, and receiving feedback after you didn’t do very well on the task. Would you rather someone told you what you wanted to hear eg ‘Well done you did really well, you are going to be the next Nobel Laureate’. In this case you would gain no useful information – only a good temporary feeling…and could you ever trust that person’s opinion again? Or, would you rather find out about where you went wrong and how you could rectify it? You might not like it at the time, but the feedback would help you to learn and do better in the future.
The first type of praise (currently widely applied) has been criticised by some psychologists because of its capacity to undermine learning (2,3). It is thought that people praise in this way when they want to boost a child’s self-esteem, and protect young people’s feelings (1).
However, if you praise a child for activities that they can already do well, this sets up behaviours which undermine learning and paradoxically decrease self-esteem. The other aspect of this is to praise young people for being clever or smart (85% of American parents think that it is good to do so).
Praising for talent in this way sends a message to the child that you, the adult, value intelligence – since children are very sensitive to the messages they receive – they then want to demonstrate their intelligence to prove they have the talent. The highly negative consequence of this is the avoidance of anything challenging which might show up weaknesses, or hiding/avoiding failures and sticking to things they do well.
In addition to this, people become more likely to blame others for failure, rather than taking ownership of their own setbacks and learning. This is salient in the example at the beginning of parents complaining about my friend’s teaching i.e If they believed their child to be smart, but yet they were not understanding science – then it must be the teaching at fault and not the child.
Our culture has an obsession with natural talent. However, there is a problem with this fascination: we cannot predict who will succeed and who won’t. Someone could start out seemingly talented at science, for example.This does not necessarily mean that they will always be successful – research demonstrates that people need to work at growing their talent or else they do not reach their full potential.
Other studies show the converse. Those who start off seemingly talentless can flourish later on– the late bloomers – exceeding all expectations and predictions about how well they will do in life. Some famous examples are: Einstein, Beethoven, Robin Williams, Magic Johnson,(4) – but I am sure you can think of examples of people who you went to school with (or other walks of life) who exceeded your or other peoples expectations?
Overwhelmingly, the research shows (e.g. 6) that talent is something which requires practice, perseverance and a lot of effort. For example, Malcolm Gladwell (5) says that to become an expert at something takes around 10,000 hours of practice. It takes thousands of failures and setbacks along the way and all of this activity changes the structure of the brain (e.g.6).
The brain is like a muscle: Carol Dweck pictures
http://www.centreforconfidence.co.uk/pp/tools.php?p=c2lkPTEz
Young people can develop all of these abilities, as well as resilience, through accurate, useful feedback, and praise for their hard work and effort. Not only will this increase motivation for learning, but by default, performance too. (6)
Going back to the example of my friend being told to restrict critical feedback and increase praise, this does not seem like a good long term learning strategy. A better method would be to encourage teachers to give students negative feedback, harnessed with the encouragement to take this feedback as a learning opportunity and not as a personal attack.
Learning takes time, it’s frustrating, hard work and effortful – these messages might be more important for the child to hear than more praise and little critical feedback (7). This may also provide hope for the future, to students such as those mentioned earlier who may not initially do very well at some subjects.
Parents need to stop blaming teachers for their children’s learning – it is not all their fault – and help their children to take responsibility for their own learning. One way to begin this is by cultivating a love of learning, valuing critical feedback, and treating failures and frustrations about learning as a normal and natural process in education and nothing to take personally.
Constructive criticism is a gift, we just need to view it that way more often.
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Links:
1. http://www.centreforconfidence.co.uk/projects.php?p=cGlkPTUz
2. http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/AmericanFamily/story?id=2877896&page=1
3. http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/
4. http://www.des.emory.edu/mfp/OnFailingG.html
5. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0316017922?ie=UTF8&tag=stormysblog-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0316017922
6. http://mindsetonline.com/ and http://www.centreforconfidence.co.uk/projects.php?p=cGlkPTU4
7. http://www.centreforconfidence.co.uk/projects.php?p=cGlkPTU3JmlkPTQ3OA==
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1200 words copyright Emily Cutts/Anne Whitaker 2010
Licensed under Creative Commons – for conditions see Home Page
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