Negative Reinforcement In Child Behavior

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“The monster you feed is the monster that grows”. I was told this by my youth pastor at church when I was a little younger than I am now. The ‘monster’ can be anything, not necessarily evil, but can take form of any action that is of importance to a particular person. For example, if I love to play basketball and I play often, eventually, to some degree, I will get better at some aspect of the game. On the contrary, if I love drinking alcohol and I drink often, eventually I will get better at it. As a result, my tolerance for alcohol will go up and most likely my appetite for alcohol will go up as well. This same principle can apply to child development. With proper diet and nutrition a child can be expected to grow into adulthood. However, …show more content…

The absence of either one produces a major paradigm shift. For example, if a child is only reinforced with rewards and gifts then they do not have any real guidance. It can cause them to overlook or ignore their mistakes. On the contrary, if a child is only reinforced with negative behavior it could lead to low self-esteem and/or children acting out. “Children who receive negative attention (reprimand) for noncompliance but do not receive positive attention for compliance may be socialized not to comply because these children learn that noncompliance yields attention.” (Owen, Slep, Heyman 2012 p.365) Everything is good in moderation is a phrase we all should know well; too much of anything can be a bad thing. The method for this concept was made by B.F. Skinner he coined it a “Operant Conditioning”. (Winsor, Murrell, Magun-Jackson pg 34) Skinner believed that negative reinforce was divided into two types of punishment roman numerals one and two. The first type required adding a negative consequence to an undesirable action. They second type recommended subtracting a preferred privilege in the presence of behavior deemed inappropriate (p.35). However, many people argue that spanking is not an acceptable form of punishment; nevertheless, some will still practice it. Regardless of the specific form of punishment, most people will agree that there should be consequences for unacceptable behavior. If we look at today’s society, even adults are subject to punishments and reinforcement. Our prisons and highway patrol offices are example of the price we must pay if we do not follow rules. Why should we not prepare our children for the rules already in place. An artificial environment of constant permissive behavior enables children to believe they do not have to accept the consequences for their objectionable behavior. Generally children are punished in some form or fashion; by nature, punishments are

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