Pecodad said:
I am curious, what is your field of study. I understand you referrenced a book about the topic. But have you studied developmental psychology?
Yes, several years. My background is in Family Life Education, a degree that combines some neurobiology & attachment theory, facilitation, group dynamics, lifespan and developmental psychology, etc.
I am also a certified instructor for the Gordon Institute, for the "parent effectiveness training", and a student at the Masters level in a similar field, for the next few years.
This being said, as you probably know, there are a lot of different school of thoughts in developmental psychology; there is still a heavy and influencing "old school" clan of behaviorists, who still think that only extrinsic locus of control are possible - despite the plethora of more recent research in psychology.
The book I referenced is a very exhaustive and powerfully presented 430 pages literature review on the topic of behavioral reinforcement and their recently discovered ill-effects. Over 100 pages - about one fouth of the entire book - are references and notes to bacl up the author's analysis. This is why I can hardly start to explain it all just in an email. It's a worthy read.
Pecodad said:
A token economy can be very useful at establishing behaviors.
Yes, it certainly can. I am not arguing this!
The point is:
a) How detrimental it is to the child on the long term?
b) Is "establishing behaviors" the only goal a parent should aim for?
c) How permanent and meaningful is a behavior change, when the underlying root motivation has not been addressed?
Pecodad said:
In a later post you indicated one rational for why it would be harmful. You mentioned the child creating an external locus of control instead of internalizing the behavior.
No, this not what I said. What I said was:
<I>It promotes external locus of control (motivation develops from the outside, not from the inside)</I>
You speak about
<I>behavior</I>. I speak about <I>
motivation</I>.
"internalizing the behavior" is how you are <I>
reframing</I> what I said to fit it into the "behaviorist" conception of things, which is a false dichotomy.
I am saying that children can find their own internal motivations.
I am not saying that their "behaviors" would "internalize". To make it really clear: I am not talking about how a repeated behavior can become automatic because it becomes a "habit".
I am talking about developing a <I>mental model</I> which allows a child to <I>purposely</I> decide <I>on his own</I> to do an action, because he feels and believe it is the right thing to do.
Pecodad said:
A token economy does not necessarily create an external locus of control or cause the child to externalize rationals for why certain behaviors are socially, culturally, or morally acceptable.
Whether you <I>
internalize</I> these rationals or not, the point is that as long as these rationals are <I>
externally imposed</I> through a reward system, they are not triggering a true, profound change. Worst: research has proved that children are more likely to act LESS a certain way if rewarded for it, when the conditions for the rewards are no longer around.
The more a child has been "motivated" through rewards, the less he becomes self-motivated on the long run. It's quite striking.
Pecodad said:
Infact, if we look at society we establish norms of acceptable behavior off of token systems.
This question alone has been investigated for decades by sociologists and I would dare to say, we are far from having any definitive answer about it. It's quite a claim you make here!
If you walk next to a well and suddenly a child yells and falls into the well, my guess is that (like 99% of the population) you will jump and try to save the child, <I>
without even thinking about it</I>. Could you make the case that without a token system of reward, you would never have acquired the reflex to save that child? This question is explored in great detail by Varela, he calls this concept the "ethical-know-how", if you want to read about it. See: Varela, F. J. (1992). <I>
Ethical Know-How: Action, Wisdom and Cognition</I>. California: Standford University Press.
Pecodad said:
From my research and education a token economy can be useful to reinforce the behavior you want.
Yes, it can.
But have you researched the long term consequences? Especially in the case of a systematic use, like the OP suggests?
Pecodad said:
Your parenting and modeling the behavior can help the child internalize the behavior as what should be done.
Again, here is the blind spot. You speak about "internalizing the behavior". Which is similar to training a dog: the "habit" kicks in and makes the behavior a "learned" behavior. But this is not what I am talking about.
As for modeling the behavior? Yes, modeling though parenting is one of the most powerful way we can teach children and help them grow and develop a set of ethical values.
But when we use a token economy at home as the main discipline and teaching technique, what are we <I>
effectively</I> modeling? The parent controls the "bank" of token, so there is no modeling there. Is the parent also "saving" some "token" to allow them to watch TV? And if they do (which I highly doubt), what meaning doe sit has for the child anyway, since they hold the "bank"?
Because, yes, in the OP example, parents ARE modeling something: greed? control? Who ever has the money can do what they want? Which part of the desired behavior are they really modelling?
). Our kids are 8 and 6 so we have all those things like, homework, chores and TV that compete for our kids time and interest. We have recently started doing a system of reward/consequence that has made this very easy in our house. It's called (removed by mom2many) and it has helped us heaps. I'd be interested to hear if anyone has tried a similar system and how it has worked/not worked for you.
