Since our talk in class about extrinsic motivation I have really paid attention to how extrinsic motivation is used in our society in everyday life. Here is one of my encounters with extrinsic motivation.
I work at my church in the nursery with 1 to 2 year old. When the children get dropped off in the morning before the service they have a bit of trouble when their parents need to leave. Now granted I only watch them for about an hour if that. Since it is a new environment I can understand children having this problem. Well this little boy about 2 came in with his mother, and he did not want her to leave. He started crying and crying and he would not stop. We tried to get him to play with blocks or a puzzle he would not do anything. Finally his mother pulled out a candy. She said to him that he needed to be a good boy and he would receive the treat. In a matter of seconds the little boy stopped crying, and started interacting with the other children. She gave me the candy and said I could give it to him when the time was right. I put the candy in my pocket.
Unfortunately the extrinsic motivation does not stop there. As the little boy was playing he tripped over a chair and started to cry again. I told him everything was alright but he kept crying. I remembered that I had the candy in my pocket so I pulled it out and told him that he needed to be a good boy like mommy said and he could get the candy. He stopped crying and went about playing again. When his mother came to pick him up I gave him the candy and he was happy to finally have it.
With all of our talking in class I felt bad really promoting the extrinsic motivation. I felt like if we had tried hard enough we could have gotten the little boy to stop crying. Now he will learn that when he cries he can just get more candy, and that is not a positive way to learn. How at 2 years old though do you get a child to agree with what you want when they will not listen? I wish I had dealt with the problem better. Extrinsic motivation although effective is damaging to a child's way of learning. We should encourage more intrinsic motivation and help a child help themselves instead of always taking the easy way out. If we try this we can make the world a more intrinsic motivated place.
This is such a good example of how extrinsic motivation creates negative behaviors. Like you said, that child is learning that if he cries enough someone will bribe him with something positive. It would be much more beneficial for him (and every one around him!) if he could learn to want to be good just for the sake of being good.
ReplyDeletethis is so true. unfortunately it is such a huge part of our everyday lives. i see it every single day at the daycare as well, and it's unfortunately that children are learning the wrong way to listen and follow directions.
ReplyDeleteI love this discussion!! SO interesting! If you want to read more on extrinsic vs. intrinsic motivation check out www.alfiekohn.org. He is the guru of this area.
ReplyDelete