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Published on: March 1, 2017
Parental praise and children's exploration: a virtual reality experiment
Eddie Brummelman1, Stathis Grapsas2, Katinka van der Kooij3
1Research Institute of Child Development and Education, University of Amsterdam, P.O. Box 15780, 1001 NG, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. E.Brummelman@uva.nl.
Scientific Reports
|March 24, 2022
Summary
Modest praise encourages children with lower self-esteem to explore new strategies after failure. This parental praise type, unlike inflated praise, supports motor skill development and learning in children.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Neuroscience of Motor Control
- Child Learning and Development
Background:
- Children need to explore new strategies after skill failure for success.
- Parental praise is a common strategy, but its impact on exploration is not fully understood.
- Understanding how praise influences children's willingness to try new approaches is crucial for effective parenting and education.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the effects of different types of parental praise on children's motor exploration.
- To determine if modest praise can encourage exploration, particularly in children with lower self-esteem.
- To differentiate the impact of modest versus inflated praise on children's adaptive learning behaviors.
Main Methods:
- A novel virtual-reality experiment involving 202 children (ages 8-12).
- Children performed a 3D trajectory-matching task with success/failure feedback.
- Intervention involved receiving modest praise, inflated praise, or no praise from a parent after task performance.
Main Results:
- Modest praise, compared to no praise, significantly encouraged motor exploration in children with lower self-esteem.
- Inflated praise did not encourage exploration in children with lower self-esteem.
- Modest praise had the opposite effect, discouraging exploration in children with higher self-esteem.
Conclusions:
- Modest parental praise can be an effective tool to foster motor exploration in children with lower self-esteem.
- The type of praise significantly influences children's adaptive learning behaviors following failure.
- These findings highlight the nuanced role of parental feedback in children's skill acquisition and resilience.
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