Rewarding Techniques – The Right And The Wrong

Can you spot the difference between both situations? On the surface, both situations are a form of reward (or positive reinforcement) to get the child to behave in a way that pleases the parent. To know the difference, you must first understand that ‘reinforcement’ is a process to encourage or establish a pattern of behaviour in a child, especially by way of encouragement or reward.

There are two kinds of reinforcements: positive and negative. A positive reinforcement is a reward or encouragement given following a child’s behaviour that makes it more likely for that behaviour to occur again in the future. On the other hand, in negative reinforcement, a child’s response or behaviour is strengthened by the removal of an unfavourable event or negative outcome. For example: A child cleans up the mess in his room in order to avoid getting into a fight with his parents.

In this article, we will focus on using positive reinforcements and tips on what you can do in similar situations that are helpful in teaching your child better behaviours, and to avoid those that are harmful to them.

Understanding positive reinforcements

The rewarding techniques used in Situation 1 are considered to be ‘faulty or wrong rewarding techniques’. This is because children quickly learn that by acting out, they can gain attention from the parent, or even acquire objects that they want. This is a form of negotiating and can become an ongoing pattern. But remember, over-negotiating can put your child in the driver’s seat and ultimately leaves them in control. Essentially, parents in this situation will reinforce the child’s misbehaviour.

The right way to use positive reinforcement or rewards is when your children are actually displaying good behaviour such as in Situation 2. The use of rewards this way becomes quite effective, because you are compensating children for their good behaviour, rather than being manipulated and extorted. However, as parents, you must make sure that your children’s achievement is achieved through ethical and moral means. For example, children can cheat on a test to get high marks in order to get a reward from you.

Rewarding types

There are three different types of rewarding techniques that you can employ in order to shape the desired behaviour in your children. These are:

1. Continuous rewards – given every time children do a good job or behave appropriately. In this situation, the learning of an appropriate behaviour takes place very fast but will also disappear very fast if the rewards are eventually stopped.
2. Intermittent rewards – given at regular intervals of time (e.g. 1st, 4th, 7th, 10th). In this situation, children learn the desired behaviour quite slowly, but once learned, the behaviour does not disappear very fast when the rewards are stopped.
3. Random rewards – given at random intervals (e.g. 1st, 7th, 11th, 19th). In this situation, the children take a long time to learn and strengthen the desired behaviour, but once the desired behaviour is learned, the behaviour almost never disappears. This is the preferred technique.

If you want a fast improvement in your children, you should initially start off with continuous rewards, and then gradually move on to intermittent and finally random rewards, so that the desired behaviour becomes a habit and a norm.

In conclusion, take a look at what behaviours you might be reinforcing in your child, and how you are reinforcing it. This will lead to a change in your approach, which will give better results. Remember that when you resort to wrong rewarding techniques to control your children’s behaviour, they will not learn the correct lesson that you are trying to teach them. Instead, let your children earn their rewards by allowing them to take care of their responsibilities and make positive strides towards improving their behaviour.