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Punished by Rewards: A Talk with Alfie Kohn

by Ann Svensen

Do this and you'll get that. Sound familiar? It's the basic strategy we use to raise our children, according to Alfie Kohn. As the author of Punished By Rewards: The Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A's, Praise, and Other Bribes (Houghton Mifflin), Kohn has ardently spoken out against incentive plans to encourage good grades and behavior. FamilyEducation editor Ann Svensen spoke with Mr. Kohn about why this reward-based mentality is harming our kids.

Question: What's the trouble with rewards?

Kohn: First let's define the term. A reward is not just something nice or desired, it's something nice or desired that is offered contingently when someone complies with our wishes or does something we like. If I give you a banana, that's not a reward. If I give you a banana for having helped me around the house, that's a reward. I have no objection to taking a kid out for ice cream, but I have a serious objection to saying, "If you are good this week, I'll take you out for ice cream."

Question: What is your objection?

Question:More than 70 studies have found that the more you reward people for doing something, the more they lose interest in whatever they had to do to get the reward. It's not just that rewards are ineffective over the long haul; it's that they are actively counterproductive.

Question: But I'm sure most parents would argue that rewards work.

Kohn: They do work in the short term, but at a great cost. Rewards, like punishments, are useful for getting exactly one thing: temporary compliance. By bribing or threatening kids, you can get them to do what you want as long as the reward or the punishment keeps coming. You'll never get anything more substantial than that.

Two recent studies have found that children whose parents reward or praise them frequently tend to be less generous and caring than their peers. That might strike some people as surprising, but when you think about it, it makes perfect sense. The child who has been praised or rewarded for doing something nice has learned that the only reason to continue being nice is to get something for it. When there is no longer a goody to be gained, there is absolutely no reason for the child to continue helping. And indeed, less reason than if the child had been authentically supported in becoming a compassionate person from the beginning.

Question: What do you mean by "authentically supporting" kids?

Kohn: In general, we can talk less and ask more. In the course of a day, we tell people things over and over instead of bringing them in and getting their perspective and solutions. For example, a child who comes up with her own remedy for getting out the door on time, every morning, is a child who has been helped to take charge of her own life. She's been encouraged to think about how to solve problems. The child has taken ownership of the solution, and that makes it more likely to succeed. Regardless of the specific result, the process itself is also terribly important. It creates a very different dynamic in a family that's based on respect, not on treating kids like pets.

Question: If rewards don't work, why are they so popular?

Kohn: Rewards buy temporary compliance so they seem to work. And we often fail to understand that when things do get worse, it's because of the use of rewards. Another reason is that rewards are familiar: like punishments, they are often the way we were raised and taught -- we don't know what else to do. And finally, rewards are instruments of control.

A lot people who say, "No rewards? Well, what's the alternative?" are really asking for another gimmick to get obedience in the short run. If you try to offer a deeper, more challenging strategy that involves bringing the child into decision making, they say that's not realistic. Many of these parents and teachers sense that the alternative to rewards is a more democratic family or classroom. This is profoundly threatening to people who need to have others do exactly what they are told.

Question: What's the alternative?

Kohn: Ultimately, we have to look hard at the assumption that if we are not in control of children, then there will be chaos, and children will do evil things. We also have to recognize that the alternative to control is not a hands-off, permissive approach. It is an approach to problem solving that supports kids' capacity to make responsible decisions; one that offers them guidance and help. The alternative is not to do nothing.

Question: If rewards are out, then what should we do when kids refuse to cooperate?

Kohn: I think we have to look at the deeper reasons why the child is not interested. In many cases involving school, the trouble lies not with the child's motivation, but with the task and the way it's being taught. That's why I spend a lot of time working with educators to rethink what they're teaching and how they're teaching it.

Question: Can you give an example?

Kohn: If you're asking a child to memorize the Dewey Decimal System or to work on numbers on dittos, you'd better have some bribe available because there's no reason any member of our species should find that kind of task worthwhile or engaging. The skills and intellectual exploration nested in the tasks we ask kids to perform must be connected to their own questions and interests. Many schools don't do this, so they "have to" manipulate kids with grades, stickers, and the like. It's a reflection of a problem with their teaching strategy, and parents should know this.

Question: Are you saying that it's easier to use rewards than to figure out what really motivates kids?

Kohn: No question about it, and exactly the same is true for how parents reward and punish kids for their behavior at home.

A lot of my work turns on the distinction between doing things to kids and working with kids. The only way to help kids become generous, responsible people and life-long learners is to work with them to solve problems and make decisions. But that takes time. It also takes care, skill, and in some cases, courage because we have to reconsider the validity of our requests. We need to begin by thinking hard about what we're asking kids to do: Who benefits from our requests? Is there another way?

Question: I've always thought of rewards as a positive alternative to punishments, but you seem to put them in the same category.

Kohn: A lot of us have been led to believe that we have to choose between this kind and that kind of punishment. We've narrowed the debate down to "Do I spank the kid or do I forcibly isolate him?" Do I think a time-out is better than spanking a kid? Well, sure -- spanking a kid is also better than shooting a kid, but that's not much of an argument for spanking.

Now, some people move a little bit beyond this and say that the choice is between punishments and rewards. From my perspective, that's not much of an improvement. They are just two different ways of doing things to children -- of controlling them, of acting in a way that is manipulative and disrespectful. The real choice is between doing to and working with. It is clear to me that rewards, including praise as it is normally used, belong on the wrong side of the ledger. We need to move beyond them if we are concerned about the kind of people our kids will turn out to be.