Parenting Crisis III: A Follow-Up

Here is an interesting quote that I found in this book. This quote confirms my suspicions, found at The Parenting Crisis III, regarding rewards, especially rewards that are really bribery or rewards that are offered too quickly or for very little accomplishment. If you already own Balanced Parenting: A father and son - a Rabbi and psychologist - examine love and limits in raising children, you can find this quote beginning on the bottom of p. 42:

"As discussed earlier, an overly punitive approach is not an effective
method of motivating children. One the other hand, parents assume that a reward
system is a beneficial way to motivate children. What is surprising to many
parents [not me!!!], are the potentially debilitating effects that the use of
rewards can have on children's motivation. A recent statistical analysis of over
100 studies examined the effect of rewards on children's' inner motivation to
complete a task. The surprising consensus of these studies was that even
rewards, such as money or stickers, significantly undermined a child's natural
drive to succeed. Rewards may result in temporary improvements, but once they
stop, children typically become unmotivated. The develop an externally driven
attitude with regard to learning that is predicated on a "What do I get for
doing this?" approach. "

The authors then go on to speak about a study where a group of children were promised a reward in advance for completing a task, while another group was not promised any rewards. The rewarded children chose the easiest task, while the children who were offered no reward chose tasks that were beyond their current ability level. [This is also no surprise to me. I remember in high school that a number of potential valedictorians dropped an extremely difficult class in Advanced Placement (AP) class because the teacher was known to only give a limited number of A's. In my four semester in this class, he never gave more than 6 A's to a class of about 35. And 6 was generous! These students opted for an easier class and were able to maintain their standings. Incidentally, the year after, the administration instituted a new grading scale that reward students who took Calculus, AP Composition, AP Science, and a fifth level in language.]

The authors also spoke about a study were young students were broken into three groups and given a new drink to try. The first group was offered no reward or praise for trying the drink. The second group was offered lavish praise. The third group was offered material rewards. Surprisingly enough [or not so surprising], the second and third groups eventually came to dislike the drink, while the first group settled into drinking it.

The author's conclusion is that motivation requires time, love, support, and nurturing unique abilities. Instant gratification is no solution in child rearing.