Reward Charts
When parent’s find themselves struggling with their child’s behaviour they often try any strategy they can in hopes of changing their child’s behaviour. The thing is do rewards work long term and can they do more harm than good?
Why do parents use reward charts?
Parents use reward charts because they want to motivate their children with incentives to change their behavior. They often resort to rewards when they feel powerless and struggle to get their child to listen and conform. By saying, “Do this and you’ll get that,” parents dangle treats like sweets, chocolate, or stickers in front of their children to encourage good behavior.
Do reward charts work though?
Do reward charts actually work? If you do a Google search, you will find hundreds of pages supporting reward charts, along with examples you can print out for your own children.
As a parenting coach, I do not advocate for reward charts; instead, I help parents move away from using them. One main reason is that these approaches focus on managing surface behaviors and do not align with current neuroscience or understand emotional development.
When we adopt an approach backed by neuroscience, we can effectively meet a child’s relational, emotional, and physiological needs, which naturally improves behavior without relying on rewards or consequences.
The risk of rewards
Studies conducted over many years have shown that behavior modification programs rarely produce lasting changes in attitudes or behavior. When the rewards stop, people typically revert to their previous behaviors. More disturbingly, researchers have discovered that children whose parents frequently use rewards tend to be less generous than their peers (Fabes et al., 1989; Grusec, 1991; Kohn, 1990).
Extrinsic motivators do not change the emotional or cognitive commitments underlying behavior—at least not in a desirable direction. A child who receives a treat for learning or acting responsibly finds every reason to stop those behaviors when no reward is available.
Research and logic suggest that punishment and rewards are not opposites but two sides of the same coin. Both strategies aim to manipulate behaviour—one prompts the question, “What do they want me to do, and what happens if I don’t?” while the other leads a child to ask, “What do they want me to do, and what do I get for doing it?” Neither strategy encourages children to consider the question, “What kind of person do I want to be?”
(https://www.alfiekohn.org/article/risks-rewards/)
