I recently read an interesting article in The New York Times about raising a moral child. The article, “Raising a Moral Child,” was written by Adam Grant, a professor of management and psychology at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and author of “Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success.” The full article can be found at http://nyti.ms/1egeF4c. Below I outline the three main points I took away from the article.
Dr. Grant makes many excellent statements about research concerning people who help others without expectation for something in return. For example, according to one study by researchers Joan E. Grusec and Erica Redler, praising children’s character versus praising their behavior helps children internalize generosity as part of their identities. The difference between praising a child’s character versus praising his/her behavior can be summed up with the following example: “I guess you’re the kind of person who likes to help others whenever you can. Yes, you are a very nice and helpful person.” (Character Focused) versus “It was good that you gave some of your marbles to those poor children. Yes, that was a nice and helpful thing to do.” (Action Focused). Additional research has shown that the use of nouns instead of verbs increases the likelihood of moral behaviors. For instance, Dr. Grant references research by psychologist Christopher J. Bryan who found that children were more likely to engage in positive, helping behaviors when referred to as “a helper” than when invited “to help.” Dr. Grant comments that, “when our actions become a reflection of our character, we lean more heavily toward the moral and generous choices. Over time it can become part of us.”
Adults’ responses to poor choices were also found to be important in the development of morality in children. Most notably is the difference between the feelings of shame and guilt. When children make poor choices, it is assumed that they will feel either shame or guilt; however, the two emotions come from different sources and lead to different consequences. Specifically, according to research by psychologist, June Price Tangney, shame is the feeling that “I am a bad person,” whereas guilt is the feeling that “I have done a bad thing.” Dr. Grant makes the distinction that “shame makes children feel small and worthless, and they respond either by lashing out at the target or escaping the situation altogether.” Conversely, guilt is a negative judgment about an action rather than one’s self, so “when children feel guilt, they tend to experience remorse and regret, empathize with the person they have harmed and aim to make it right.” Therefore, guiding children toward feeling guilt rather than shame when they misbehave is an integral part of helping them learn to care about others. Dr. Grant reveals that, “the most effective response to bad behavior is to express disappointment.” He further states that “the beauty of expressing disappointment is that it communicates disapproval of the bad behavior, coupled with high expectations and the potential for improvement: ‘You’re a good person, even if you did a bad thing, I know you can do better.’”
Finally, Dr. Grant makes the excellent point that parents must be proactive in teaching children about morals and values. Being proactive is as simple as modeling selflessness and generosity. Dr. Grant cites a classic experiment by psychologist J. Philippe Rushton that found “actions speak louder than words.” Specifically, when adults behaved in selfish ways, the children in the study copied the adult’s actions, whereas, when adults chose generosity, the children also chose generosity. The key to this study was the difference between children who just watched an adult act generously versus children who watched and listened to a “lesson” on generosity. The most generous children were those who simply watched the adult give, but did not hear a concurrent lesson on giving and generosity. Talk about actions speaking louder than words!
Mary Kathleen Hill, Ph.D.
Licensed Clinical Psychologist