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Raising a moral child

nytimes.com

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Re: Raising a moral child

#41

Post by jawns »

jcampbell1 wrote: post #27
jawns wrote: post #4

The experiments this op-ed describes are really neat. I especially like the one that demonstrates the importance of "practice what you preach." Here's another cool experiment related to social/moral development, which you can perform on your own kid: Have two grown-up friends each show your baby a toy. The first friend should offer the toy to your kid but then retract the offer and keep the toy to himself. The second…

I don't understand this at all. At 21 months, a toddler can walk and talk, and you can play keep away with them for fun. I don't know what it means to drop a toy out of reach. Do you drop it on a high counter or something?

In the original experiment -- see http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20424094 for the abstract -- the toddlers stood on one side of a slanted table, so that anything placed on the table would roll down to the other side, where the adult actresses were. Presumably, the toddlers were not able to walk around the table.

One way to replicate this at home, albeit imperfectly, is to place your toddler in a high chair, so that if you drop the toy on the floor, she is unable to reach it.

Re: Raising a moral child

#42

Post by yukichan »

reubenmorais wrote: post #40
yukichan wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My personal experiences doesn't lend me to think much about news articles regarding such studies.

>I love [...] science >So guess what I think about these studies. My guess is that you think your experience alone is not statistically relevant.

My experience is definitely anecdotal. I probably misspoke, my problem is with the reporting of the studies, not the science itself.

Re: Raising a moral child

#43

Post by kemayo »

nevinera wrote: post #39

Modern parenting literature seems largely to be about manipulating your child into being who and what you want them to be. 'Tricks' and 'techniques' abound, and every other article is about 'teaching' your child to achieve/empathize/compete. You know what works extra- extra- well? Be the kind of person you want your kids to be. Treat them like a decent person treats other decent people and that's the behavior they wi…

Yes, that's a good trick to use.

The article actually covers this, note. The entire last section is about how children watch adults and decide based on their actions how they should act, paying comparatively little attention to their words.

Re: Raising a moral child

#44

Post by Taek »

What stood out the most to me was the distinction between guilt and shame. When you belittle a child and insult their character, they're less likely to make amends and more likely to withdraw.

I draw parallels to the way we treat criminals in our society. We cast them out and question their character and distance them from ourselves. This dumps a lot of shame on them, and might produce the same results as seen with the children; rather than feel guilt and make amends, they feel shame and withdraw.

Re: Raising a moral child

#45

Post by AJ007 »

nevinera wrote: post #39

Modern parenting literature seems largely to be about manipulating your child into being who and what you want them to be. 'Tricks' and 'techniques' abound, and every other article is about 'teaching' your child to achieve/empathize/compete. You know what works extra- extra- well? Be the kind of person you want your kids to be. Treat them like a decent person treats other decent people and that's the behavior they wi…

The best thing my parents did was be consistent. Early on I learned how to behave because I could predict my parent's reactions. How can a child learn to behave when all adult figures are erratic and irrational? Even the smallest things, like telling a kid Santa Claus is real can cause them to discount the value of truth.

Reading behavioral psychology studies should require a skeptics hat. I'm not calling out these specific studies, but when it comes to miniscule sample sizes, unreproducible and sometimes out right made up results, this area is very suspect due to ease of fudging results. (Diederik Stapel comes to mind as an extreme case.)

Re: Raising a moral child

#46

Post by Taek »

nevinera wrote: post #39

Modern parenting literature seems largely to be about manipulating your child into being who and what you want them to be. 'Tricks' and 'techniques' abound, and every other article is about 'teaching' your child to achieve/empathize/compete. You know what works extra- extra- well? Be the kind of person you want your kids to be. Treat them like a decent person treats other decent people and that's the behavior they wi…

I felt a lot of this when I was growing up. A lot of times I could feel my dad trying to mold me into the best type of person possible. Not that it was unwelcome or that he was doing the wrong thing, but in a lot of ways it felt weird and unnatural. Sometimes it felt like he was a lot more guarded around me, like he couldn't be who he really was because he was trying to set the best possible example and be the best possible parent.

In hindsight, I think that left me unprepared for a lot of challenges I faced in college. A lot of times, I would ask him a question and get only half of a response, because answering truthfully would involve revealing less-than-ideal character. I wish that there had been more heart-to-heart and less 'raising your kid the right way'

Re: Raising a moral child

#47

Post by taybin »

sergiotapia wrote: post #16
taybin wrote: post #13

Oh good. More ways I can mis-raise my child. I complimented the object instead of the subject in a sentence! Oh shiiiiiiit. http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/shouts/2014/03/new-par...

Don't know why you're being downvoted. As a parent, every single time I read something about 'raising your kids X', Dr. Lipschitz (from The Rugrats) comes to mind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNTesmh1wpI

That video is...something else.

Re: Raising a moral child

#48

Post by hyp0 »

jawns wrote: post #41
jcampbell1 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand this at all. At 21 months, a toddler can walk and talk, and you can play keep away with them for fun. I don't know what it means to drop a toy out of reach. Do you drop it on a high counter or something?

In the original experiment -- see http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20424094 for the abstract -- the toddlers stood on one side of a slanted table, so that anything placed on the table would roll down to the other side, where the adult actresses were. Presumably, the toddlers were not able to walk around the table. One way to replicate this at home, albeit imperfectly, is to place your toddler in a high chair, so th…

I wonder if they controlled the effect of the actresses own response. Although they might be excellent actresses, being mean to a baby is probably going to make you feel pretty rotten, at a level it might be hard to control, and the baby could be picking up on that.

Animals can pick up subtle cues that are not apparent to adults; I'd be amazed if babies weren't at least as good.

I'm thinking of Clever Hans http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clever_Hans

Re: Raising a moral child

#49

Post by taybin »

jamesaguilar wrote: post #35
sergiotapia wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't know why you're being downvoted. As a parent, every single time I read something about 'raising your kids X', Dr. Lipschitz (from The Rugrats) comes to mind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNTesmh1wpI

I would say that, no, parents should not be expected to internalize all of the thousands of different things we're finding out about the best ways to raise kids. It's far too much to know, and the knowledge is currently too tentative. But, it's also pointless to bring that up every time a new study comes out, because these things are good to know. That's probably why the GP is catching downvotes.

I've seen how parents can get amazingly OCD with these studies. They'll form cliques and look down on parents who don't perform what the current best practice is. Because of that, I think it always bears repeating.

Re: Raising a moral child

#50

Post by taybin »

yukichan wrote: post #34
taybin wrote: post #13

Oh good. More ways I can mis-raise my child. I complimented the object instead of the subject in a sentence! Oh shiiiiiiit. http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/shouts/2014/03/new-par...

My personal experiences doesn't lend me to think much about news articles regarding such studies.

Congratulations on overcoming that.
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