Why bribing children is bad for their education

By Wendy Berliner

Many parents have been there. They have a child who will not eat vegetables or won’t tidy their room. Or any other behaviour from a long list!

With battle lines drawn and no significant improvement from hectoring or cajoling, bribery can follow. If you eat your broccoli, you can have your pudding; if you put your dirty laundry in the washing basket, you get extra pocket money.

It seems so simple, especially if it gets results. But should you be doing it? The answer from half a century of research is a resounding NO. Bribes and their frequent partner, punishment, don’t help children become capable of their most creative work.

A highly influential motivational theory known as selfdetermination developed in the 1980s after research found that paying students for solving puzzles actually demotivated them.

In essence, students offered money for solving Soma puzzles (precursors to Rubik’s Cube) lost interest when they were given extra unpaid time at the end of experiment to carry on solving puzzles. Students in a separate test who were not offered money carried on trying to solve the puzzles after they were told the test had finished.

Subsequent research with children and students of different ages with differing tasks has repeatedly confirmed the phenomenon.

The nub of the theory is that by offering rewards or bribes you undermine the value of the task and the motivation to do it.

Audiobooks Improve Literacy

Audiobooks can benefit children’s reading skills, according to new research published by the charity, the National Literacy Trust.

The report looks at the advantages of listening to a recording of a novel being read, and the impact on young readers.

The research suggests that listening to a recorded story requires the same mental skills as reading in print, so audiobooks can help with understanding words and remembering information. They can also give children access to a broader range of texts and engage readers who might be reluctant, struggling or developing.

Emily Best, from the National Literacy Trust, said: “Audiobooks can be the key to unlocking a child’s love of reading. They enable children of all reading abilities and interests to access and explore the incredible world of stories, which are brought to life by a range of exciting voices, different accents and sound effects.” There are two types of motivation – extrinsic and intrinsic (also known as controlled and autonomous). Rewards and punishment form extrinsic motivation. Someone is doing something to you to make you do something. It isn’t something you are doing by choice.

Intrinsic motivation comes from within and is what is needed to become an independent learner capable of your best work. It means you do things because of the enjoyment, interest and value you get from them not because someone tells you to.

A child who spends hours playing computer games is intrinsically motivated – it’s just not the kind of motivation that is necessarily good for them.

So how do you develop that all-important intrinsic motivation in your children?

The theory argues humans require certain needs to be met before they can become motivated from within.

Competence – we need to feel confident and effective in what we are doing. We have a human need to build our skills. To facilitate this, don’t tell your children they are no good at things if they struggle. That includes when you are trying to be kind – a comment like “I wasn’t any good at maths either” is telling them they aren’t competent.

Relatedness - we need to feel a sense of belonging to others, to feel cared for by groups that are important to us and to care for others. So make the atmosphere at home kind and supportive.

Autonomy – we need to be able to decide what we do rather than be coerced. To assist with this, help your children learn to take responsibility for what they are doing, so that they can make good choices by themselves on how to use their time.

That last one is really important. The child who understands the importance of getting good grades at school if they want a worthwhile and interesting career, may internalise those arguments and do their homework willingly because they see the value of doing so; they have become autonomously motivated.

Over to you!

Wendy Berliner, with co-author Judith Judd, are authors of the book How to Succeed at School: Separating Fact from Fiction: What Every Parent Should Know. Published by Routledge and available from Amazon and good book stores.

Sources Deci, E. L. (1971). ‘Effects of externally mediated rewards on intrinsic motivation’. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 18(1), 105-115. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/h0030644 Deci, Edward L., Ryan, Richard M. (1985) ‘Intrinsic Motivation and SelfDetermination in Human Behavior’. Springer Science & Business Media.