Conditioning techniques to control the behaviour of children- Behaviourist

Useful- Supernanny and Gill

‘Naughty step’ - Positive reinforcement

Parents fuss what a child does right

Gill- Control over pocket money increased moral behaviour

Found 20% of children did chores when they were encouraged by praise

Useful- Le francois

Classical conditioning can be used to improve performance e.g smelling stimuli creates positive feelings

Not useful- Morris and Bricker

Morris- ‘Naughty step can have long term emotional effects as they become adults

Bricker- found that children as young as 10, were more likely to smoke if their peers did

Not useful- Dweck

Found that those who were praised for doing well on a test, did worse on a later test, suggesting they gave up easily after being praised

This was known as ‘learned helplessness’

At home conditioning techniques are not as effective as in schools, which may confuse if they’re useful or not useful

Ethical and social implications- Gneezy Et Al

Ethical- Is it ethical to pay or reward students for their performance? because that money could be spent somewhere else

Social- Vulnerable children may actually benefit from conditioning techniques making their behaviour ‘normal’ and this will make them more likely to be accepted in wider society

However, the frequent use of praise can lead to extrinsic favours and selfishness in society, as they expect a reward for being good

And this therefore leads to inequality in society between different behaviours in children