Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't have any problem with studies of child development, and have found some of them quite interesting. The problem comes not from gaining knowledge, but from attempting to apply that knowledge inexpertly. Most humans are not equipped deceive at that level, and a child unconsciously can tell the difference between an authentic reaction and a deliberate one. All humans are mechanisms in the physical sense, certainl…
You're clearly making value judgments when you use words like "manipulate" and "deceive," neither of which occur literally or conceptually in the article. Edit: the article does use the word "tricks", although I would argue as shorthand for technique rather than deceive. Nevertheless to be fair I replaced it above with "manipulate".
It's exactly the kind of junk I invariably see when a good journalist attempts to write about any kind of science - they try to draw conclusions from the study that the study does not draw, because the conclusions drawn from a real study are never interesting to a normal readership.
The study most likely does not prescribe behaviors or approaches on the parts of parents when raising their children. The study ought to be purely about how individuals react to controlled and described stimuli - the study will draw reasonable conclusions, make appropriate cautions about the mapping between reality and experiment, and be very careful about inferring any real-world implications. I haven't purchased a copy of this particular study, so I can't judge it on its own merits, but it's from a reputable source, and the abstract makes reasonable claims.