Punishing kids for lying just doesn’t work
Children more likely to tell the truth either to please an adult or because they believe it is the right thing to do
McGill University
If you want your child to
tell the truth, it’s best not to threaten to punish them if they
lie. That’s what researchers discovered through a simple experiment
involving 372 children between the ages of 4 and 8.
Children more likely to tell the truth either to please an adult or because they believe it is the right thing to do
How the
experiment was done
The researchers, led by Prof. Victoria Talwar of McGill’s Dept. of
Educational and Counselling Psychology, left each child alone in a room for 1
minute with a toy behind them on a table, having told the child not to peek
during their absence.
While they were out of the room, a hidden video camera filmed what went on.
When the researchers returned, they asked the child, a simple question:
“When I was gone, did you turn around and peak at the toy?”
What the researchers discovered was that:
1.
Slightly more than 2/3 of the children peeked at
the toy (67.5 % or 251 children out of the 372 who were involved in the
experiment). For every 1-month increase in age, children became slightly less
likely to peek.
2.
When the children were asked whether or not they
had peeked, again about 2/3 of them lied (167 children or 66.5%) – and
month-by-month as children aged, they both become more likely to tell lies and
more adept at maintaining their lies
But what was more interesting to the researchers was that:
1.
Children were less likely to tell the truth if they
were afraid of being punished than if they were asked to tell the truth either
because it would please the adult, or because it was the right thing to do and
would make the child feel good.
2.
The researchers expected and found that while younger
children were more focused on telling the truth to please the adults, the older
children had better internalized standards of behaviour which made them tell
the truth because it was the right thing to do.
“The bottom line is that punishment does not promote truth-telling,” says
Victoria Talwar, the lead researcher on the study. “In fact, the threat of
punishment can have the reverse effect by reducing the likelihood that children
will tell the truth when encouraged to do so. This is useful information for
all parents of young children and for the professionals like teachers who work
with them and want to encourage young children to be honest.”
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