Purpose of study
Research Questions
What motivates a child, rewards or punishment
What are more effective rewards or punishment
What are the types of motivation
Compare and contrast intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.
Want is cross-cultural motivation
How does the milieu and socio-cultural background affect motivating a child
What would be the best solution and approach to motivate children
Hypothesis
Children need to understand the goals and process more than the consequence of what they are doing. Socio-cultural milieu creates an impact on childrens motivation.
3. Literature search and review
Introduction
Motivating children can be an arduous task for parents these days. Indeed, parents have to compete with the modern technology, from television, computers, personal play stations, and even cellular phones. Children nowadays are manipulative and tricky, thus parents should know when to give in or really be firm and thats when discipline and punishment would come in.
Children can either use this ploy and get there way to be rewarded if they know they would be rewarded as a form of motivation. That would not justify the means, children should earn their reward and know that the reward is just a bonus factor for what they really worked hard for and not just excel because of the reward.
In the advent of gadgets, parents are now in a dilemma to discipline their children. Parents should still punish their children and let them feel the loss of what they like doing, like for example if they do not perform well in school, and the reason was that they spend longer hours watching television then they should be punished by lessening their TV hours or better not allowing them to watch television during school days.This form of punishment will make them realize the value of the consequence. Moreover, if they perform well, then they would either get longer television hours or as a bonus get them a flat screen television, if the parents could afford it.
Forms of punishment and rewards should always be parallel to the fault of the child or what the parents is rewarding the child for. Any rewards or punishment should only be limited to the reason for rewarding the child or punishing the child. The child cannot be punished for not giving him dinner if he lost his or her cell phone, that punishment is not related to the offense. Rewarding or punishing not correlated to the offense or achievement would only be tantamount to manipulation from the child, as well as spoil the child and the point of disciplining the child.
Children need proper reinforcement and the right motivation must always come from the parents.
Motivation
Parents should know how to motivate their children. Parents must always have the right motivation and justifiable explanation on why they are encouraged or being praised for their correct behavior and why they get the consequence for their bad behavior.
Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation
In Alfie Kohns book Punished by Rewards he said that there is the The Unspoken Premise or Goal, If we think school should prepare people not just to earn a living but to live a life - a creative, humane, and sensitive life, then childrens attitudes towards learning are at least as important as how well they perform at any given task. (Punished by Rewards, Allen Khon) Thus, parents should always make it a point to show the child the difference of doing things as a task or what they would gain from it. There are ways by which parents can influence their childrens way of thinking. Everything that they would do will have a long term reward rather than give them short term reward and that would only create a vicious cycle on trying to hone a child. The child would only be doing it for the reward instead what it can do to him as a whole. Parents should have holistic approach rather than have a carrot and stick approach. Furthermore, Khon explained that Motivation has two categories namely Intrinsic - because it feels good or we just like it. Extrinsic - we do it because of a reward, praise, or to avoid being punished .(Allen Khon) Khon, also added that sometimes by concentrating on one particular and giving a reward it displaces the goals of the other motivation. Thus, parents should know when to give reward, praises and punishment so as not to confuse the child. Otherwise, the child might end up thinking like a horse, unless rewarded it would behave or move when hit.
In another study it says that In early education, an extrinsic motivational base is set due to a students desire to succeed, moreover they do not want to fail and be looked upon negatively by their peers. The constant striving for extrinsic rewards causes the child to place an emphasis on attaining these rewards rather than their own effort. This altered perception is far from truthful because most of these rewards are out of the students control. (Boggiano, 1985) An example cited in this study said that a child seeks the approval of the teacher, but doesnt realize that the teachers mood could be influencing who he calls on and, moreover, what behaviors he praises. This false perception can be difficult to change because of social environment that exists within educational settings.
In the study made by the University of Michigan on Rewards and Punishment it clearly indicate that parents should learn to balance well between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation as it clearly states the difference it is often believed that someone cannot be both extrinsically and intrinsically motivated. That is, extrinsic motivation is detrimental to intrinsic motivation and vice versa, but not all extrinsic motivational factors decline the intrinsic motivation. (Gottfried, 1994) A parent can offer many of these beneficial, extrinsic, motivational factors, but one important part is the context and manner in which the motivation is givenreceived. Mainly, an underlying self-efficacy must always be present because if a child believes she can do well, then she will. (Pintrich, 2004) If a student believes that a goal is unattainable, then there is really no need to attempt to achieve that goal. Extrinsic motivation causes students to perceive more goals as unattainable, whereas and intrinsically motivated student will see very few goals as unattainable because that student believes that anything is possible with effort. This is where parental involvement becomes crucial. Encouragement rather than reward will cue a child in to intrinsic motivation. Furthermore, encouragement can be a form of reward because it displays one of the most basic forms of reward attention. Children, of course, need more than pats on the back and positive sayings to encourage them and many other forms of encouragement exist.
Cross-cultural motivation
Every individual is unique, yet it is the milieu that builds character. Thus, in this study conducted by the University of Michigan on cross-cultural motivation it is explained that Individually, we develop our personalities and yet certain personalities exhibit almost identical behaviors. However, one difference that exists within our culture is motivation. Furthermore, the difference is generalized across cultures which exemplifies the positive (or negative) effect that environment can have on motivation. The basis for this motivation boils down to the idea of the self, or self-efficacy. Heine et al. (2001) describes the cultural differences of the self this way North Americans are more likely to view the self as independent, unique, and relatively immutable, whereas East Asians tend to embrace theories of the self as interdependent, embedded, and malleable. This demonstrates the constant need for Americans to impress other people and achieve mainly to attain reward, whereas East Asians achieve to improve their self and become better people. Granted, most Americans believe that if they achieve money, then they become better people, but we all know that in the end this is not the case.
Obviously, two cultures as historically and geographically distant as North America and East Asia would exhibit extraordinarily different ideas of self-efficacy. However, differences can be found within a culture. The main differences do not lie in the final goal, but, the means to that goal. In other words, within a culture people have the same evaluation of themselves, but the method in which they evaluate themselves differs greatly. (Klassen, 2004) A possible explanation for this difference is cultural background. A child who is raised in an environment where academic success is determined by comparison to other students is more likely to exhibit an extrinsic evaluation of achievement, whereas a child who learned by discovering or was in a cooperative classroom will have the same value of achievement, but the reason will be based on an internal self-worth. This implies that the end result is the same across culture, but the means differ similar to two different recipes for lemon meringue pie both recipes produce the same delicious pie, but the methods and ingredients differ. Thus, the environment and culture plays a significant role in a childs growth. For example if a child lives in an environment where parents swear at each other, the child will imbibed that and no matter how the parents will motivate the child either through rewards or punishment still the child would follow what they say and it defeats both process to attain ones goal to discipline or instill good values in the child.
Punishment
In Khons book he extensively explained that punishment sometimes will not make parents achieve their goal, this can adversely affect the child and would lead to rebellion. He said that children who are always punished to be disruptive, aggressive and hostile. These children he said who grew up in a highly controlling environment tend to break the rules more when they are away from home.
a. Classic Forms of Punishment
Khon also cited one very classic example as to why children bed wet, and other situation that would support his contention that punishment is not the answer to discipline children.
Mothers who punished toilet accidents severely ended up with bed-wetting children. Mothers who punished dependency to get rid of it had more dependent children than mothers who did not punish. Mothers who punished aggressive behavior severely had more aggressive children than mothers who punished lightly. The result of these studies ... punishment is ineffectual over the long term as a technique for eliminating the kind of behavior toward which it is directed. Punishment leads to three possible outcomes calculation of risks (which means children spend their time figuring out whether they can get away with something), blind conformity (which fails to teach responsible decision-making), or revolt. Piaget put this point succinctly punishment... renders autonomy of conscience impossible. Researchers have found that the more heavy-handed we are - the less likely they will comply. Authoritarian parenting and teaching therefore generally fail even on their own terms forget about such ambitious goals as helping kids become responsible, decent people this approach ultimately doesnt even succeed at getting them to do what we tell them. And when it fails, many invoke the need for even stricter discipline and punish them some more.
For Khon, he believes that punishment would only lead to failure in terms of raising children, as they may not be the kind of adults parents want their children to be when they grow up.
Solutions and Alternative Approach
Khon suggested the 3 Cs towards discipline and raising children well by explaining to them the content, why they are doing it, and what is expected from them. Then, he further said there should be collaboration so that children would be more responsible. Lines of communication must be open, specially when solving problems. Scolding them would only fall on deaf ears, instead involve the child in finding solution to his problem, in short active-participation is important, rather than ranting and raving at the child. And the last C Khon said should be choice children should be given the chance to decide. By making them be involved in the discussion of their problem, they would be responsible for their action. Children who actively take part in decision making tend to be more responsible and that they would be careful with their actions next time. If they are given options Khon said they learn to make real choices in the future.
Conclusion
Rewards according to Khon would not motivate children to do what is expected of them instead they do it because of what they would benefit from it. Which personally, I believe can be scary when they become adults, as this would teach children to be exploitative, and they would learn to bribe people to get what they want. Thus, rewards can thwart good values based on Khons studies. While punishment on the other hand, would make the child rebel and become notorious to some extent, as there is no love, encouragement, and real sense of appreciation.
4. Research design
Socio-cultural survey and case study
comparison
trend analysis
5. Sampling
Random Sampling
6. Variables
Independent and dependent variables. There should be those who were motivated by rewards and those motivated by punishment. Another variables should also have the success rate of motivated by rewards and the success rate of motivated by punishment. Variables should be from different social strata.
7. Methods of data collection
A. Qualitative and Quantitative Data
in depth interview
observation
document review
Sample survey questionnaires
8. Data analysis procedures Qualitative data analysis
9. Ethics and human relations
Sample surveys will be kept confidential. This will be cross-cultural.
10. Timeline
1. Gathering of data, interviews, and creating and processing of sample survey will be 2 weeks
2. Analysis of data will be one week.
3. Research will be one week.
4. Writing of report will be one week.
5. Revisions will be one week.
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