According to this approach, people speculate that causes about their behavior are based on external constraints. The presence of a strong constraint (such as a reward) would lead people to believe that they are performing the behavior for the reward. This would then change the individuals motivation from intrinsic motivation to extrinsic motivation.
Overjustification is a much criticized form of motivation. Many people believe that it is a good thing, as many people also believe that it is a terrible thing. My own belief is that Overjustification is by far the worst thing that can be done to a child. By using this form of motivation on children, it gives them a feelin
g of accomplishment, when in reality they may not have accomplished anything at all (e.g. last place finisher).I cannot give an adequate example as to why Overjustification is a good thing. I mean, how is telling your kids there entire life that "life is fair" in the form of Overjustification, a good thing? Yea sure, life may be fair when you are a child. But by teaching children that life will always be fair and they do not have to give any effort to receive they same reward as everyone else is like saying that every child in the world will grow up to be a millionaire. It is just untruthful to the child and most of all, it is a lie!
The worst part about Overjustification is that, it can be very offensive to many people. In competition, most people believe that the winner should receive a reward that's quality is better or above that of a loser's reward. Should a child who wins a Spelling Bee, be given the same reward as a child who goes out in the first round? NO, the winner deserves a reward as the loser does not deserve anything as they did not accomplish anything. It would be very offensive to the winner of the Spelling Bee by giving all the kids that competed in the competition a first place ribbon a
s well. That is like saying every child in the world has the same IQ or Intelligence, which we all know is not true. The use of Overjustification in society is clearly a bad thing. It only represents false motivation, which will do nothing for a child when they are grown. Children need to learn the difference between being a winner versus being a loser. This a part of the whole "life is not fair" theme, as everyone who is alive today reading this post knows that LIFE IS NOT FAIR. Not everyone can be a winner all the time. Overjustification puts a false belief in a child's head that, they do not have to work for anything their entire life. They now believe that everything will just be given to them, and we all know this is not true.
That is really interesting. Participation alone is being rewarded for fear of damaging people's self-esteem. There are a few resources out there, pointing out the flaws in this practice. One of them is a book called Nurture Shock and the other is very recent. It's called the Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. Both emphasize rewarding hard work and success rather than praising participation.
ReplyDeleteI really believe the practice of rewarding children for participation alone to keep from damaging their self-esteem will completely backfire. If they do not ever understand what hard work is, how will they ever learn to work hard?
ReplyDeleteI have always believed that trying your best is admirable and even a good thing that should reward oneself. However, if a child is rewarded for just showing up then what’s the point in that? It would never really work because I know this may seem kind of a radical idea but it’s almost like a communistic Society. If you give everyone the same thing what’s the point in trying to push oneself to achieve better? It would be the same as taking two people one goes to college and gets a doctors degree and the other decides just to live at home with mom and play video games all day, but we give both of them the noble prize for finding a new cancer treatment or something. It would be a completely ridiculous idea.....
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