Amit rosszul tudtunk a gyerekekről

by Po Bronson

Po Bronson és Ashley Merryman műve 2009 egyik legnagyobb példányszámban értékesített könyve volt az Amazonon, óriási visszhangot keltett az amerikai sajtóban és a szülők körében, azóta pedig a világ számos országában kiadták. A két tudományos újságíró több évig tartó aprólékos munkával gyűjtötte össze azokat a friss kutatási eredményeket, amelyek valami újat, érdekeset mondanak nekünk a gyerekekről.

Mikor ártunk a dicsérettel, és hogyan motiválhatunk vele igazán jól? Milyen, eddig nem ismert következményekkel jár, ha egy gyerek a szükségesnél kevesebbet alszik? Miért hazudik nekünk a gyerekünk, és mit tehetünk azért, hogy ezt ritkábban tegye? Milyen módszerrel ösztönözhetjük a legjobban kisbabánk nyelvi fejlődését? Mi a testvérkonfliktusok oka, és miként csökkenthetjük gyakoriságukat? Miért követnek el a tinédzserek teljesen nyilvánvaló őrültségeket? Mikor derül ki, hogy egy gyerek tehetséges-e? Miért állítják a tudósok, hogy kamaszoknál a szülőkkel való vita a tisztelet jele, és éppen hogy erősíti a kapcsolatot? Hogyan tanítható az önkontroll, és mit nyerhet vele a gyerekünk? Miként lehetséges, hogy közösségben gyakran a legjobb családi körülmények közül jövő, népszerű gyerekek is agresszíven és kegyetlenül viselkednek?

Számos izgalmas kérdés, és sokszor meglepő, máskor ösztönös szülői magatartásunknak tudományos megerősítést adó válaszok. Egyes fejezetekhez dr. Vekerdy Tamás és dr. Kádár Annamária írt szakmai kommentárt.

Genres: Parenting, Nonfiction, Psychology, Education, Science, Book Club, Audiobook

288 pages, Paperback

First published September 3, 2008

About the author

Po Bronson has built a career both as a successful novelist and as a prominent writer of narrative nonfiction. He has published five books, and he has written for television, magazines, and newspapers, including Time, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, and for National Public Radio's Morning Edition. Currently he is writing regularly for New York magazine in the United States and for The Guardian newspaper in the United Kingdom.

Po Bronson's book of social documentary, What Should I Do With My Life?, was a #1 New York Times bestseller and remained in the Top 10 for nine months. He has been on Oprah, on every national morning show, and on the cover of five magazines, including Wired and Fast Company. His first novel, Bombardiers, was a #1 bestseller in the United Kingdom. His books have been translated into 18 languages. Po speaks regularly at colleges and community "town hall" events. He is a founder of The San Francisco Writer's Grotto, a cooperative workspace for about 40 writers and filmmakers. From 1992 to 2006 he was on the Board of Directors of Consortium Book Sales & Distribution. He lives in San Francisco with his family.

from pobronson.com

Reviews

[Christine · Rating 2 out of 5]

NurtureShock: New Thinking about Children
Po Bronson & Ashley Merryman 2009

New York Magazine journalists Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman team up to add commentary and more information to their articles in this new book published by Twelve, a division of the Hachette Book Group.

The last page of the book has this blurb about Twelve:

“TWELVE was established in August 2005 with the objective of publishing no more than one book per month. We strive to publish the singular book, by authors who have a unique perspective and compelling authority.”

They lost me at “compelling authority.”

Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman are journalists, not scientists. This book isn’t a synthesis of research; it’s an opinion piece with a conservative bent (indeed, Ashley Merryman’s back-flap bio boasts that she “lives in Los Angeles, where she runs a church-based tutoring program for inner-city children.”)

I’m not advocating gatekeeping; there is definitely a place for independent research and grass-roots efforts. Child Psychology isn’t one of those places. NutureShock is just another parenting book in a long line of book written by reporters for profit. The authors have a reputation for reporting on overlooked studies with rare results, and they boast in their chapter notes that their New York Magazine articles were popular. Compiling and expounding on past work seems to be the best way to write a book these days; this doesn’t mean that the articles, as a book, make a cohesive or worthy statement.

Basically, I found the book to be the amateur, armchair science that is fun to read in small bites while on the train. Read it for entertainment purposes, but don’t implement the few approaches outlined at home; they aren’t tested enough, and the results have yet to be repeated to gain respect in academia.

The book does, unwittingly, bring up some good points about statistics, studies, and systemic judgments based on those studies. Statistics and study results are nothing to respect when presented alone. The best way to make decisions about anything is to weigh multiple instances of evidence, to never rely on one event. The authors do their best to rip up school district decisions on testing, anti-obesity and anti-bullying programs, by claiming these decisions were not based on scientific results but just made using traditional thought and instinct. While some programs in districts may be made more based on hope than science, the majority of IQ testing and other educational programs are based on years of study and a large meta-analysis of results of hundreds of studies. To suggest otherwise, as the authors do, is hasty, irresponsible, and insulting to educational scholars, teachers, and parents.

The authors proceed to cite a study here, a successful preschool program there, to illustrate their point that decisions about children should be based on evidence. I agree. But A LOT of evidence. Not an anecdotal story or two (which the authors provide), nor 1 or 2 labs that keep getting the same results for their handful of articles. The authors bemoan the lack of long-term studies in almost every chapter, yet fail to mention the very sophisticated and accurate methods of behavioral statistics answers this issue. They sing praises of a preschool program called Tools of the Mind, but conveniently forget to list the challenges associated with the program. This book is a thinly disguised attempt to steer the conversation toward a conservative agenda in education.

The writing is ok. Their lack of academic tone in parts is jarring. For example, on page 190, the authors use colloquial language where they shouldn’t have:
“… a separate word to distinguish the kind of popular teen who diminishes others –in Dutch, for instance, the idiomatic expression popie-jopie refers to teens who are bitchy, slutty, cocky, loud and arrogant.”

An academic article would have used words like “promiscuous,” “disagreeable,” and “condescending,” especially since the Dutch don’t use the English colloquial words that are listed. I also question the choice of listing the derogatory words for females first, or at all.

At times the authors conduct their own “studies,” but we should disregard these results. We have no idea what the sampling was, what the control group was given (if there even was a control group), or how the study was designed at all. Until their results can be repeated many times, then one-off studies should merely bring up ideas for further study.

The only good that comes out NutureShock is the reminder to hold studies, especially those recounted by non-scientist media, in suspicion. If you are planning to pick up this book, read it for entertainment purposes only. It may make you think a bit differently in some aspects of child-rearing, like how your teen may see arguing as the opposite of lying, or how we whites actively avoid talking about race. The authors should have stayed with reflecting trends in traditional parenting, and avoided passing themselves off as authorities.

[Amanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Things I have changed about my parenting after reading this book:

I have my daughter "read" books back to me after I read them to her.

We make a plan for the day complete with drawings and handwriting practice.

I tell my kids that I can tell they worked really hard on something, instead of just telling them that they are great.

I try to respond more often when my 10 month-old son makes a voiced noise.

I have stopped letting my kids watch Arthur or Clifford.

I had a conversation with my 4-year old about how some people have black skin and some people have brown skin and that's OK.

And, the chapter about what teenaged kids do (and what they tell their parents they are doing) scared the crappity about of me. I DO NOT want my kids to grow up. Or, maybe is there a way to skip the teenaged years?

[Kristine · Rating 5 out of 5]

So far is one of my top 3 parenting books I've ever read. Scientifically backed studies on child development that go against everything you thought you knew was best, well not all of it was new -- but it was all still good.

FYI - this book was not written by child psychology experts, but by two journalists in the child psychology field whose "niche" is to report on studies that have gone unheeded.

There are ten chapters, each reading like its own essay:

1. The Inverse Power of Praise
2. The Lost Hour
3. Why White Parents Don't Talk About Race
4. Why Kids Lie
5. The Search for Intelligent Life in Kindergarten
6. The Sibling Effect
7. The Science of Teen Rebellion
8. Can Self-Control Be Taught
9. Plays Well with Others
10. Why Hannah Talks and Alyssa Doesn't

There was A LOT I loved about this book. One of my favorites was the chapter on race. Basically the conclusion is that while non-white parents talk about race in their homes most white parents don't. They (white parents) just assume if you don't say anything, that kids will know that everyone is created equal; in fact they aren't even pointing out we are different - so saying nothing is better than accentuating it. Right? The problem is if you don't help young kids (think 3-6) think through this they'll make their own conclusions about why people have different color skin, which could lead to some problems.

So after I read that chapter I sat down and decided to test it. I asked Ellie what color skin she has and what color other people have and why. She says, "There is white and brown and black. Other people have brown skin because they like it the most." So I asked her does that mean she likes white the most? "Yes."

Hmmm. Yikes. I guess it doesn't hurt to explain to little kids that some people are from different lands/countries where EVERYONE is that color. And in this country usually you have the color of skin of where your grandparents came from. It's like family.

I am planning on using this book for next time I host a bookclub.

[Breck · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting book. There were a lot of interesting ideas, however, I feel more confused about children than I did before. I guess the point is to open your eyes. One theme throughout is that kids are different than adults and need to be understood differently. A few interesting points:

1. Praise specific achievements and praise effort
2. Regular lack of sleep is damaging to children's health
3. Naturally, we tend to racially segregated, so it's wise to take steps to help your kids learn not to be racially bias.
4. Lying needs to be addressed at an early age, rather than ignored
5. Toddler intelligence tests are very inaccurate
6. Kids better improve social skills with friends than siblings
7. Teens argue to strengthen relationships
8. Teens who have higher standards and basic rules get in a lot less trouble, and generally lie less
9. School programs don't work very well (D.A.R.E., Drivers Ed)
10. Kids shows (even educational ones, Arthur, etc.) teach kids to be "relationally aggressive"
11. Popular, more social kids tend to be more "relationally aggressive"
12. Baby videos don't help with language - better are one-on-one communication with parents - responding to babbling

All observations by the authors and researchers, not sure I agree with everything, but interesting nonetheless. I still think one of the best books is "Children The Challenge". Thanks for that, mom!

[Paul Eckert · Rating 2 out of 5]

Since I'm now a parent, I've been looking for parenting books that would interest me, something that was more than repackaged conventional wisdom and phoned-in encouragement. I wanted something scientific, not the new pop-psychology of the week.

Nutureshock met my expectations with its science, but that's also where it seemed to lose itself. There are some interesting bits early on in the book regarding praising children (e.g. studies show that telling kids they are smart, as opposed to praising their effort, leads to kids not trying as hard) and the psychology of why children lie (and how parents react to lying), but most chapters afterward seemed to flounder in the details. For instance, one of the last chapters is about how kids learn to speak. Though it was interesting to find out why the Baby Einstein merchandise is ineffective and based on incorrect interpretations of research, the chapter then carries on about how babies learn to talk and ways that babies can learn to speak faster, and it spent a great deal of time on this subject whenever it presented no evidence that there was any great benefit to having a child learn language a few months sooner. At one point, it even says that the methods that best work for teaching babies to speak shouldn't be attempted consciously because it might be used incorrectly and actually hinder a child's language abilities. Which brings a parent back to doing what they would have done anyway...

The same thing happens in a chapter about a kindergarten program that works so well called "Tools". Instead of telling more about why the program works so well, the reader is barraged with regurgitated statistics on how much better the "Tools" program is than regular curriculum, and at the end left me rewinding to figure out what was so great about the program anyway.

In one instance, the authors spend a whole chapter championing the virtues of kids getting more sleep (duh?). But their answer to the problem is making schools start later. They pose one line of opposition, the fact that, despite the positive statistics from other school districts that started their schools one hour earlier, many school districts are hesitant to implement the policy because the district would have to buy more buses since junior high and high school would start so close together. But then they never pose an answer to this opposition, which is a damn good reason not to implement this "one hour earlier" policy. It's not cheap to have to order a whole fleet of new buses, not to mention a whole fleet of new bus drivers as well, and the stress on parents to try to schedule kids that are different ages and whose schools start at different times. Why don't the kids just go to bed an hour earlier?

The chapter on teen rebellion was fairly interesting, but also seemed to confirm some conventional beliefs. The most interesting thing was that while the majority of adults felt that arguing with their teenager was detrimental to their relationship, the kids actually felt it strengthened their relationship because they felt they were being listened to. The kids who had constructive arguments with their parents, and even were conceded to time and time again, were also the kids that were more truthful, honest, and respectful of their parents.

There was one line in this book that really pissed me off, and I don't mind ranting about it. It was in the chapter about race relations. The authors talk about how minorities are often taught to embrace and celebrate their heritage and ethnicity to cultivate pride. But then the author says that white children are not taught so because it "would be abhorrent" (author's words) since white people hold the majority of the power in the world. First of all, that is some serious PC hyperbole. Power is relative. No one has any inherent "power" over anyone because of their race. Second, what is the alternative? Should white kids be ashamed because they're white? And what if the tables were turned, if what we consider minority race suddenly had 'a majority of power'? Should we then teach 'white' kids to be proud of their heritage and 'minorities' to be ashamed? To be sure, this was just one line in the book, but it was a little upsetting.

I think the disappointing thing about books like this is that you expect to learn really exciting new things, and by the end you only remember a few good points.

Kind of interesting if you have kids, but there's not a whole lot in this book that one can apply to one's parenting. The conclusions reached are often weak and seem to result from bombarding the reader with dubious statistics like "students' happiness increased 25% after the initial study..." Some things I believe you can objectively test, but measuring happiness in percentages seems a bit ludicrous.

[Brett · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fantastic at times and awful the rest of the time. Bronson and Merryman do a great job getting back to the "basics" in many areas. Noticing the inverse power of praise, the need to discuss race and the idea that self-control can be taught can't be mentioned enough in our culture. Yet, the authors completely avoid the heart of the matter. Child rearing, in their view, can be perfected if we are willing to do enough scientific studies and research to determine what is most effective. The studies included in the book are fascinating but the conclusions are very questionable. The aggression studies related to TV watching come to mind. I believe the heart of the issue is the matter of the heart. If parents, themselves, are being humble, working hard, living disciplined lives, loving their neighbors, and so on, our children will develop well beyond the child enrolled in the various 10 point developmental programs (Tools of the Mind, etc.). The back cover states that the book "gets to the core of how we grow, learn, and live." I would argue the book lightly touches the surface of how we grow, learn, and live. The core of child rearing is in parents developing the character they would like their children to develop and not simply discovering innovative techniques and programs to manufacture children of virtue.

[Wealhtheow · Rating 2 out of 5]

A pair of journalists sum up recent research on childrearing. Some is seemingly obvious:
Praise efforts, not intrinsic qualities.
Make sure children get enough sleep, in a consistent pattern.
Talk about race with children, because they're noticing on their own and they may come to erroneous conclusions. (I actually really liked part of this section, because it talks about how children watch their parents for how to respond to others--and if white kids see that their white parents only have white friends, or are uncomfortable around people of color, they'll mirror that.)
Adults are bad at telling when a child is lying, and need to respond when their children lie.
Siblings fight, but this isn't necessarily harmful or the sign of a bad relationship, and they rarely fight over parental love or attention.
Having conversations with babies helps them learn language.

I was surprised by the research into teen arguments with their parents: apparently its often motivated by a desire to connect and find agreement. It's not necessarily a sign that they're trying to destroy the relationship or that they don't respect the parent (if they truly don't respect their parent, they'll ignore them and do what they please).
And I hadn't heard that no early test for intelligence (emotional, physical, or whatever) is particularly good at predicting later intelligence or achievement; kids' intelligence scores aren't reliable until 11 or 12, because neurons, the cerebral cortex, and connections between nerve capsules are still developing, often very rapidly in short periods of time during childhood. Too, children use different clusters of their brain to think. "Smart" kids are the ones who have shifted processing to the same network as adults. The authors make a compelling argument that testing for "gifted" programs should take place later in childhood; testing preschoolers miscategorizes well over half (the authors say 73%) of children.

The ideas are interesting, but I was annoyed at the tendentious, breezy way the authors talked about the included studies. They flit from one to the next, proclaiming a single interpretation as the One Truth and then hustling along to the next topic. The lack of critical thought frustrated me and made me doubt their conclusions.

[K · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was hard to decide on a rating for this book. NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children reminded me of a Malcolm Gladwell book in both good and bad ways. Surprising and fascinating information on the one hand; on the other hand, overstated conclusions with inadequate support. The word "shock" in the title is appropriate -- shock value appeared to be more of a concern than hard evidence.

I'm more forgiving of Malcolm Gladwell because although his information may change the way you look at things, it probably won't change your life. Good science, bad science, it doesn't much matter. But if people are viewing this as a parenting book, that's a bit more of a concern (although truthfully, there's not a lot of parenting advice to be had here).

I guess what bothered me most is that the author's statements rely a great deal on correlational evidence. So yes, a connection has been established between two variables, e.g., praise and performance, sleep deprivation and obesity, etc. But correlation is not causation. Statements like "children who sleep less are fatter than children who sleep more" fail to take into account the possibility of other variables, or the possibility that the causality may actually work in the other direction. The limits of this type of research remain unacknowledged, as correlational studies are cited again and again. In general, I often felt that the authors were oversimplifying things and presenting only one side of the story.

Admittedly, not all the information in the book came across to me as pseudoscientific. But the mixture of stronger and weaker evidence leading to well-supported and not-so-well-supported statements, all expressed in an equally confident manner, made me a bit skeptical.

There's no question that NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children is an entertaining and provocative book, with stand-alone chapters allowing for it to be picked up and put down for brief train rides, bathroom visits, etc. I just think it's important to read it critically. A knowledge of statistics helps. If you don't have that, be aware of the limits of the authors' evidence and enjoy their information without swallowing it whole.

[reading is my hustle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Originally a magazine article focusing on the science of parenting, this engaging (and highly readable) book looks at parenting from the realm of science.

Most important research findings:
Things do not work the same for children as they do in adults (and) positive traits do not ward off negative behavior in kids (a good kid still can be dishonest or engage in relational aggression).

In short:
A child who is dishonest is (also) showing signs of intelligence and social savvy. And, while praise works wonders for adults, it can undermine a child's intrinsic motivation. In other words, it is because adults like praise so much that they have lavished it on their kids (intuiting it would be beneficial).

Yes, you just read the above correctly.

Research also informs us:
Why kids lie, that praise is not the end-all-be-all (really!), sleep is THAT important, why kids from "good homes" are aggressive or mean, and proves that language exposure, sign language, and baby videos are not as effective as certain natural techniques.

[Elizabeth]

Recommended by my daughters elementary school.

[Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

So, you had your 2.2 kids and read all the right books, listened to all the right experts, and now you’re an expert too, right? Think again. After raising four children (only one left to put through college) and sitting down to read an adult book or two, I thought there would be nothing new for me to learn about the joys and tortures of parenthood. And then I read NurtureShock by Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman.
This book will challenge everything you thought you knew about raising children. This is not a book that proposes the “right way” to raise a child, but rather presents the facts about how the current school of thought on child-rearing actually works (or doesn’t). And just as Steven Levitt accomplishes in his book Freakonomics, which challenges commonly held beliefs on economic issues, Bronson and Merryman support their assertions with reams of research and the results of studies conducted world-wide.
Who would have thought that the more you praise a child, the lower their confidence level? Or that an extra hour of sleep may be better for your kid’s IQ than an extra hour of studying? And if your argumentative teen makes you want to pull your hair out, don’t—the alternative is even worse. All this, and more, is waiting for you inside the covers of this intriguing book.
The issues covered in NurtureShock concern children at all stages of development, from infancy to the teen years, so all parents are sure to find these insights interesting. But even non-parents will be fascinated by the science behind the information—think of all the fun you’ll have advising your parenting friends and family on what they are doing wrong! Parents love advice from their childless friends . . . Don’t they?

[Caroline · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review to come after a re-read.

[Joel · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is clearly going for a Freakonomics vibe, in that it reads like a chapter from Freakonomics extended to book length. One of the less interesting chapters, too.

There's a lot of good, meaningful data, but it just isn't presented in a very interesting way. I need more colorful anecdotes in my pop psych books.

[sleeps9hours · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book exploring the newest research on children and adolescents. I love Po.

Chapters and summaries:
1. The inverse power of praise—praise for effort, not ability. Be specific. Teach them their brain is a muscle, if they use it on hard problems they’ll make it stronger. Don’t let them believe that being smart means they shouldn’t have to exert effort. Be willing to talk about failure. Failure shouldn’t be taboo. Mistakes are part of how we learn and test theories. Give intermittent reinforcement—if you get constant rewards you won’t be persistent; you’ll give up as soon as the rewards disappear. Promote grit.

2. The lost hour—make sure kids get enough sleep. Lost sleep contributes to lower IQ, negative emotion, attention problems, and obesity. Get high-schools to move start times back an hour (to 8:30 or later). During puberty, the circadian system does a “phase shift” that keeps adolescents up later. In prepubescents and grownups, when it gets dark outside, the brain produces melatonin, which makes us sleepy. But adolescent brains don’t release melatonin for an extra 90 minutes.
Memories that are emotion laden get processed during REM sleep. The more you learned during the day, the more sleep you need at night. Einstein slept 10 hours a day. The brain does synthesize some memories during the day, but they’re enhanced and concretized during the night—new inferences and associations are drawn, leading to new insights the next day.
Perhaps most fascinating, the emotional context of a memory affects where it gets processed. Negative stimuli get processed by the amygdala; positive or neutral memories get processed by the hippocampus. Sleep deprivation hits the hippocampus harder than the amygdala. The result is that sleep-deprived people fail to recall pleasant memories, yet recall gloomy memories just fine.
Sleep loss increases the hormone ghrelin, which signals hunger, and decreases its metabolic opposite, leptin, which suppresses appetite. Sleep loss also elevates the stress hormone cortisol, which stimulates your body to make fat.

3. Why White parents don’t talk about race—talk about race. Race is a sign of ethnic heritage. Kids are not color blind. They notice race and have a natural preference for their own ingroup. Discusses ways for schools to be more successful at integrating. Currently integrated schools foster LESS positive attitudes about other races and kids within them are LESS likely to have a friend of another race.

4. Why kids lie—tell kids you will be happy if they tell the truth. They are trying to please you when they lie b/c they think you’d rather not hear the truth. Politeness teaches lying. Encouraged to tell white lies, children gradually get comfortable with being disingenuous. They learn that honesty only creates conflict, while dishonesty is an easy way to avoid conflict. And don’t try to trap kids in a lie.
Don’t discourage tattling. 9/10 times a tattler is telling the truth, and for every one time a child tattles there were 14 other times the child was wronged and did not come to the parent for aid.

5. The search for intelligent life in kindergarten—don’t have high-stakes testing in kindergarten to determine giftedness for life. Late bloomers are common. Kids IQ scores aren’t that reliable until they are 11-12 years-old. Alternative methods of determining intelligence aren’t any better, and often overlap (the smart kids are also emotionally intelligent).

6. The sibling effect—sibs don’t vie for parental attention, they fight over stuff. How they are socialized to work it out at a young age is critical. Teach them how to have fun together and enjoy each other. They need skills to initiate play on terms they can both enjoy, find activities they like to do together, and gently decline when they don’t want to play. Books and shows with sibling story lines make things worse. They almost all portray siblings fighting, insulting, and devaluing each other at some point, even if a lesson is learned at the end. Best predictor of sib relationship quality is older sib’s relationship with his best friend. Kids who can play in a reciprocal, mutual style with their best friend have the best rapport with their younger sibs years later. Shared fantasy play represents one of the highest levels of social involvement in young children.

7. The science of teen rebellion—They lie to protect the relationship with their parents. Permissive parents still have kids who lie, sometimes the most. Objection to parental authority peaks at 14-15. The type of parents who are actually the most consistent in enforcing rules are the same parents who are most warm and have the most conversations with their kids. They’ve set a few rules over certain key spheres of influence, and they’ve explained why the rules are there. They expect the child to obey them. Over life’s other spheres, they supported the child’s autonomy, allowing her freedom to make her own decisions. The kids of these parents lied the least.
Kids drink and do drugs b/c they’re bored. Boredom starts in 7th grade and increases all through 12th grade. Intrinsic motivation drops across those same years. The more controlling the parent, the more bored the kid (doing stuff the parent has signed them up for). Some teen brains can’t get pleasure out of doing things that are only mildly or moderately rewarding. They’re like a junkie who needs the big jolt. And when they do experience excitement, their ability to gauge risk and foresee consequences is impaired. Not all teens are wired like this. A risk they won’t take? Embarassment.
Kids don’t mind arguing moderately with parents. They think it brings them closer. Even a tiny concession makes them feel it was resolved satisfactorily (no tattoo, but you can buy some crazy shoes). Let them win some arguments, and get small concessions in others.

8. Can self-control be taught?—yes. Start early. Driver’s Ed and DARE don’t work. Tools for the Mind does. Kids should make a plan and stick with it over a protracted time. They were playing specific roles in a pretend game. Play games that require restraint, like Simon Says. There’s a graphic version where kids are drawing to music and have to start and stop to the music. Incorporating make-believe helps kids stick with a task (stand still-2min, vs. be a guard standing still at your post-11min). If they don’t want to write, pretend you’re a waiter, take orders. Children learn abstract and symbolic thought through play. They talk out loud when learning letters. Letter C, “start at the top and go around”. It’s important for kids to self-monitor if they are getting it right. A teacher will write 4 D’s on the board. Encourage them to say which D is the best. Point out where a mistake is, but make them find it. Buddy read, they can narrate from the pictures. Make a plan for a day/hour. Give prompts to extend play sessions (take babies on a field trip). Tools kids have demonstrably better executive function (computer task). Being disciplined AND smart is exponentially better.

9. Plays well with others—the aggressive kids are also the popular (socially dominant) kids. It is normal, we are primates. Children’s television is also to blame—Arthur, spongebob, clifford, etc all teach bad behavior through modeling the misbehavior of characters, even if there is a lesson at the end. The more educational media kids watched, the more relationally aggressive they were. And their physical aggressiveness was the same as those who watched violent TV (power rangers). Let kids see you argue to the resolution. Don’t start arguing and then leave the room. Children who are “bistrategic controllers”, who use both prosocial and antisocial tactics to get their way, are popular, well-liked by kids and teachers too (who rate them as being agreeable and well-adjusted). The trick is in achieving the right balance of the two.

10. Why Hannah talks and Alyssa doesn’t—parents should be responsive to babies’ verbalizations. Baby DVD’s bad. Babies can’t learn from recorded voices. They need to see the face. They need a caregiver to respond as they are looking at something. Don’t crisscross labeling by saying what you think they are trying to verbalize, just say what they are pointing to.

Conclusion: The myth of the supertrait—there isn’t one. For gratitude to exist we need to know that good actions are intentional, costly, and beneficial. Do weekly, rather than daily, gratitude exercises (journaling, etc) otherwise risk gratitude fatigue. No inverse relationship between gratitude and negative emotions. Journal was helpful to kids who were low in positive affect. But made kids already high in hope and excitement less happy, hopeful, and grateful. Maybe interfered with their sense of autonomy and independence.

[switterbug (Betsey) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Parenting books are ubiquitous. How to sift through and determine which are worthy? I have a teenage daughter and have read quite a few. Even when I thought I was impressed, there was always something nagging at me about them. I determined that many of the books had an outside or hidden agenda, which was to socialize parents according to a specific sheep-herding mentality. Often, a social consciousness or a reaction to a negative social consciousness about raising children informed these "manuals." In other words, the science behind the thinking was weak--they were often politically charged or reactionary.

The blurbs about this book intrigued me, but I was also skeptical--until I read the first chapter on the inverse power of praise. Parents and guardians--just get ye to a bookstore and read the first chapter. I think you will be galvanized by its immediacy and logic (as well as back-up data) and it will inspire you to continue. It all clicked when I read about our praise-junkie tendencies, and how it has a paradoxical effect. The authors never condescend to us; they maintain that all of us want to make the best and most informed decisions. For instance, most of us start telling our babies, from the cradle "You are so smart" as almost a mantra of parenting. The authors do not criticize positive praise--they are revealing the data for specific types of praise. Telling a kid he or she is smart rather than specifically praising them for their efforts will eventually backfire. The child will have a tendency to not put out a lot of effort when they are challenged because they are stymied by the feeling that they have to stay smart, or that they must be NOT smart if they can't solve a problem or puzzle. Telling a kid (s)he is smart is praising an innate feature that is out of the child's control. Praising them for each genuine effort (whether they solved a problem or not) will have a better outcome. I cannot convey to readers the way that these authors channel and support this information--the statistical data and the entire beautiful logic of it--you must read it for yourselves.

The chapter on race relations also woke me out of a deep slumber of complacency. Too often, parents try to teach their kids equality just by placing them in diverse environments or showing them videos of multicultural friendships and cooperation. The book explicated a longitudinal study done by Dr. Bigler in Austin, Texas that revealed the lack of actual parent/child discussion on racial equality. That is the key ingredient to integration. Silence is not golden--(silence is black and white, and never the twain shall meet)--it is the wrong kind of colorblind. Just read this chapter and it will open your eyes.

Each section is such a wake-up call to parenting that I found myself reflecting on the blind spots in my own methods--not in an immolating way, but rather in an "aha!" manner. It isn't guesswork or just someone's opinion. The longitudinal studies, ongoing tests, data compilation, and control studies are explicit. But, more than that, you will feel a light bulb go off--it is seriously the most intrepid book I have ever read on parenting. No exaggeration. I can apply the book's information to my own parenting experiences and trials and realize how on the mark these studies are.

There is a chapter on sleep--its bearing and consequences on child performance, on obesity, and on mood. This section alone is worth the price of the book. I learned which parts of the sleep cycle are integral to the storage of which information. They describe the parts of the brain being affected when information is received and when sleep is disrupted. But, more importantly, the authors lay out the pitfalls of losing just 15 minutes or an hour of sleep--so many teenage problems are associated with this that some trailblazing schools are finally arranging the hours of education based on these studies. But more schools need this call to action. And we need to encourage a positive sleep pattern with our children. I know this sounds de rigueur and obvious. But this chapter on sleep is way more comprehensive than anything I have read before, and profound. Almost everything in the quality of your children's lives depends on it.

One of my favorite sections was the one that is like a riptide into everything you thought you knew about your child's language acquisition. Baby Einstein? Fuhgettaboutit. And don't try teaching your children a foreign language by popping in a Spanish DVD and parking them in front of the TV. Not going to happen. As a matter of fact, it will have a deleterious effect. A child needs a "live" person to learn. Additionally, it is the call and response between parent and baby that is the key to increasing their vocabulary and comprehension. Baby Einstein videos are like disembodied voices that do absolutely zip for their education. Sesame Street in Spanish is just as ineffective. Please read the chapter--the whole controversy is revealed when the studies proved that these baby videos are empty and hollow forms of education.

Perhaps my personal favorite is the chapter on teen rebellion. I recognize the arguing and lying of children in a whole new way now. How and why children cultivate what we think of as egregious behaviors usually stems from a psychologically astute and desirable place in their hearts and growth. It is the same with arguing. We need to shed our preconceptions and outmoded concerns about teen compliance, obedience, and integrity and understand the necessary steps in their development. There is a paradox about child/teen lying--it is expected, but it still must be dealt with.

And there is more--sibling rivalry, IQ testing, testing for elite schools at an early age, self-control, and playing well with others are covered immaculately.

Yes, it will blow the lid off, turn upside down just about everything previously advocated in parenting books. But not in a confounding way. That is an important ingredient to consider. This book, the way I perceive it, is not intended to upset or horrify you or derail your parenting experience. (Although, by its very nature it does derail previous long-held concepts, but in a compassionate way.) As a matter of fact, it provided clarity into numerous bogus concepts and the pious conditioning that we have been hanging onto for years. Additionally, it offers specific practices and interventions that can be measured rather swiftly in your own home with these changes to your personal parenting skills. As much as this book "shocks," it is not intimidating or finger-pointing at parents (although it does point a finger into disingenuous studies). The accessible and engaging flow of narrative is dotted with levity, lightness, and always benevolence. I read this book in just a few sittings and I retained the information well. It is easy to go back and reference what you read, as the chapters are laid out in an explicit, user-friendly manner.

Slide your other parenting books to the side of the shelf and place this one squarely in the middle. I acknowledge this book as a parenting imperative. Read it and leap.

[M. H. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whenever I read a non-fiction book that I give 5 stars I like to read through the reviews of those who give the book 1 or 2 stars to discover why they didn't like it. In this instance I'm dumbfounded by what they say because I just keep thinking, "did you not read the paragraph where they addressed that very issue?"

For instance in one review a complaint is made about the chapter on children needing more sleep. A solution mentioned in the book is that high schools start an hour later. Many school districts do not want to do this as it would mean having more buses. This reviewer remarked, "why don't they just go to bed an hour earlier?" Well the answer to that is on page 36, "In prepubescents and grownups, when it gets dark outside, the brain produces melatonin, which makes us sleepy. But adolescent brains don't release melatonin for another 90 minutes. So even if teenagers are in bed at ten p.m. (which they aren't), they lie awake, staring at the ceiling." (emphasis added) Or in other words going to bed earlier wouldn't get the teenagers the additional sleep they need - instead their wake time needs to be later.

A number of other reviews also complained that the authors say you'll ruin your children. The only (mild) instance I read of that is in the language acquisition chapter (10). The scientists involved have realized that when adults respond--either verbally or with physical affection--to a new (more advanced) sound in babies' babbling the child will notice and try to attract further attention by making the new sound more often. The warning was that adults learning about this might respond to any and all babbling in an effort to encourage the child and this would result in the baby making more sounds but not necessarily more examples of the advanced sound. There were several additional warnings in the chapter about overdoing efforts to improve a child's language acquisition. Basically, a child will acquire language as you interact with them. There were two other warnings in that chapter along the same lines--too much of a good thing is a bad thing--which boiled down to:

- Respond instead of initiating. Instead of "Hey, see this phone" respond when child reaches for, points at, toy phone by remarking, "Phone. Do you want the phone?" Or if a child is engrossed in staring at the shadows the leaves are making, "Do you see the shadow of the leaves?"

- Let the language learning ebb and flow. Essentially you don't have to be interacting with your child or responding to them all the time. Let the child have quiet time to practice sounds. Realize it's normal to be distracted while making dinner, thus not responding as frequently as when changing a diaper or playing with the child.

To be fair, there was one review that posited, "[the authors:] presented no evidence that there was any great benefit to having a child learn language a few months sooner," and there isn't any; aside from the realities of better communication with a child and relieving of the stress that your child might be backward. I suppose just gives the recommendation to let the learning ebb and flow more credence.

I could go through each claim that the reviews I read made but I'll spare you.

The other overall complaints about the book are that the authors went looking for experiments that backed their claims and thus don't present opposing viewpoints or only present the science; and that the book is dry.

Concerning the first, the opposing viewpoints are presented as the ones currently inherent in our culture (such as children are naturally race blind); also the authors point out when the cited experiments either don't have corroborating evidence or a sufficient body of data. For those who say, "just give me the science without your opinions" I wonder that they don't read scientific journals, even just the articles that the authors are basing their opinions off.

For the last, if someone thinks the writing is dry that's how they feel. Though I was thoroughly engrossed.

[Ericka Clou · Rating 5 out of 5]

2024, 5 stars: This book got stuck in my head and has strongly influenced my parenting in the last decade and I've frequently referenced the studies to other parents. So far, so good?

2013, 3 stars: This book is supposed to be about the application of science in child-rearing. It's basically about how science can disprove common sense all the time, and how it important it is to do control studies to test our beliefs. That part I like. The actual studies this book covered however, with the exception of one, weren't actually all that interesting.

The first study was the most interesting and important. It studied how praising children is not necessarily beneficial to their learning, development, and achievement. It also explained why. This one was major. I also found the chapter on helping siblings get along interesting and possibly helpful in the future.

The following studies interested me less: how hurtful even a small lack of sleep can be to children(duh); how ignoring race doesn't make children less racist- discussing it does; kids lie way more than parents realize and it's part of their development; testing kids in kindergarten is a poor measure of their future success (duh); why teens arguing with parents is a sign of respect; how to teach children self-control (interesting, but this seemed pretty difficult to implement on your own); why high emotional intelligence is not correlated with good behavior; and how to get babies talking sooner.

One thing that bothered me in particular is that each study dealt with a particular time period in the child's development but the book wasn't organized chronologically. It was strange reading about babies verbalizing after reading about teens in high school.

2015 reread summary:
How to praise correctly: 1) Don't praise natural intelligence, 2) praise effort, 3) teach that intelligence can be developed. Help them develop intrinsic enjoyment.

How to prevent kids from lying: 1) Give immunity for telling the truth and tell them the truth will make you happy, 2) don't teach them to lie, 3) don't discourage tattling.

Siblings: Get them to enjoy playing together.

Teenagers fight because they care what the parent says. Parents have to listen and collaborate because otherwise, teenagers might just lie.

Self-control: Teach them involved, detailed, hour-long play.

Encourage babies to talk by responding to their vocalizations promptly.

[Rachel John · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really loved this book. I won it as a giveaway. I tend to avoid non-fiction because its so hard to get through, but this should be required reading for all parents, teachers and anyone interested in child psychology. Each chapter covers a different study of children which often caused unexpected results. In many instances, parents, teachers, government or scientists are putting a lot of well-meaning time, money, effort, and emotional deposits into ideas or programs which studies show do not produce the expected results. The authors tell you in detail why this happened, and what studies were done to discover why. The detail on the studies is almost tedious, yet neccessary. They tell you how each study was done, for how long, if there was a similar study done elsewhere, follow up studies, how many children were involved, how cooperative the parents and teachers were, where the study took place, socioeconomic backgrounds, race, etc etc etc.

The chapters almost always start with an intersting anecdote that seems unrelated to the topic, but explains things perfectly as you read through the chapter. Some of the topics covered are, lying, praise, self-esteem, teen rebellion, sibling relationships, how kids view race and much more.


The authors found that there are two biases that had to be overcome before these studies could be done properly, understood clearly and implemented in the lives of children:

1. Things work in children the same way they work in adults (The Fallacy of Similar Effect)
(It shouldn't be hard to see this is false, and yet the studies get overlooked in favor of what is best for adults - such as when school starts, zero-tolerance policies, discipline and praise, diversity training and the list goes on.)

2. Positive traits in children oppose or ward off negative behavior (The Fallacy of the Good/Bad Dichotomy)
A few examples would be assuming children with good self-esteem are less agressive than kids with bad self-esteem - its the opposite, assuming that children who clearly understand what lies are and why they are bad lie less. (They lie more convincingly and more often.) Cause and effect are tricky things.

It is a really long read (as is this review - I apologize) but is jam packed with so many goodies that I'll be referring back to it for a long time. I'm afraid to lend it out. I wish I had a few more copies!

[Lucy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think it'd be safe to say that I tend to believe things written in parenting books I read when they "ring true." In other words, I like reading books that confirm what I already believe, whether or not I already know it.

Nurtureshock is not that kind of book. In almost every chapter, there is a finding that doesn't make sense until the authors break down the data that shows that it does. It's a troubling book because it makes a very good case against "instinctive" parenting. Instead, what Po Bronson and Ashely Merryman state is that some of our best intentions produce the worst results in our kids due to our wishful thinking, bias, fads, our own personal history and old psychology.

For instance, showing your kids episodes of Arthur and Clifford can increase cruel behavior and aggression. Praising your child for being smart may be harmful to his academic performance (even if he is really smart). Assuming children are "color-blind" and not talking about race may cause children to become racist. DVDs like Baby Einstein and other videos that claim to speed up language development or produce multi-lingualism can actually delay normal speech skills. Other chapters cover why less sleep is a significant contributor to childhood obesity and ADHD, why kids lie, why gifted and talented programs are flawed, why siblings really fight, why teen rebellion is a sign of respect (gah!) and why I wish there was a Tools preschool program in my area.

I enjoyed reading this because it was eye-opening, relevant and also because whatever parenting myth was being challenged, the data supporting any new claim was thoroughly explained. It helps that Bronson and Merryman didn't back away from using all of the scientific jargon that usually causes my eyes to glaze over. Most of the time, the opposite happened and the empirical evidence presented was surprisingly accessible while the flow between narrative and research was smooth and convincing.

It isn't often that I claim that something or someone changed the way I think. But Nurtureshock did just that. The "shock" in the title is no lie. This shocked me. In a really good and, I hope, empowering way.

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't normally read parenting books. I'm sort of a common sense parent who is suspicious of child-rearing "theories" and more likely to turn to my own mother or my child's teachers for advice than a book. However, my book club selected NurtureShock last month and I wanted to be a good sport. Color me surprised, but I loved this book. I found it insightful, thoughtful and truly valuable. After reading the first chapter I decided that I should probably take notes, and I have actually referred back to those notes several times since finishing the book. I sat my husband down and talked with him about some of the issues the book had raised. It made me think differently about the way I'm parenting my child, and I have since made a conscious effort to do a few things differently.

The chapter that made the biggest impact on me was the first one, "The Inverse Power of Praise." It basically claims that heaping tons of praise on your child (the whole "self esteem movement" that has seen the rise of participation trophies and helicopter parents gushing "You're so smart!" every time junior bats an eye) is actually totally counterproductive to raising an independent and confident child. My takeaway was that it's wise to praise children for their EFFORT, not their intelligence. Acknowledge shortcomings, don't ignore them. Children who are overpraised tend to give up in the face of a challenge rather than rise to it, to avoid any potential failure.

There were many other topics in this book that I found compelling. The chapter on gifted programs was of particular interest to me, and I also got a lot of useful information from the chapter on race. Overall, I thought NurtureShock was a well-written and thoughtful book which approaches parenting in a new and interesting way. I would highly recommend it to fellow parents.

[Adam Crossley · Rating 4 out of 5]

"When they get going, it's like a freight train. It's paralyzing." This from a frustrated mother in regards to her children fighting.

Why do children fight, lie, rebel, get along or learn self control? In Nuture Shock these topics are expounded upon, with each chapter having a specific focus.

Some of the chapter succeed admirably. The chapter titled "The Sibling Effect" is a fascinating explanation of how having a brother or sister can be make children better at playing with others but only if they learn how to play nice. That is, in particular, teaching the older not bully and boss around the younger. Seems simple, but like many things, simple is not always intuitive.

The chapter linking self-control to creative play and staying in character was a joy to read. It is encapsulated in this anecdote; if you ask children to pretend they are soldiers on guard they can stand quietly still for much longer than if you just challenge them stand quietly still without the role to play. The chapter expands this idea in ways that are based on careful studies and have profound implications for early childhood education.

The book is written in magazine style and some of the authors personal stories are a bit hokey. However, these personal stories are short and often just a side point to the research.

Overall I give this book 4 stars because is was easy to read and had several "a ha" moments. It was real close to a 5 star but a few chapters were the tiniest bit longwinded.

I'd recommend this book to an expectant parent (I am one) and also anyone in early childhood education. Most likely they will find something of value in here. I did!

[Winddancer · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book made me reconsider reasons why my son or students do certain things, such as lying, cheating, and reckless behavior. But to be quite honest, it didn't wow me like I had hoped it would. I found the reporting of the research lackluster at best, and from the limited information about the studies cited, I came up with more questions than answers. For example, one study cited the importance of sleep in boosting SAT scores by about 100 points. Data was collected on the same group of students for one year, during which time these students were supposed to have gotten more sleep per night. As an SAT tutor, I average 100-200 point increases in most of my students inside three months. So many variables NOT reported in the book could have influenced the increase in test scores, from receiving SAT specific tutoring to simply exposing students to the content (of Math and Writing in particular) of each test segment. Perhaps my criticism is too demanding; after examining research for my masters' degree I can't help but transfer that skill set to other research-based readings. However, while I think this book does offer some valuable insights, I still need more information about how the studies were conducted in order to accept the authors' conclusions.

[Natalie]

This book is a well-researched freakonomics of parenting, upending the prevailing myths of childrearing. I'm only two chapters in and am hooked. It's good for starting conversations and makes me rethink my childhood and little things I could now to improve my life.

[Nicholas Karpuk · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's kind of disconcerting to read a book that feels like it's talking directly to my childhood issues.

The first two chapters of "Nurture Shock" touch directly on issues I dealt with a lot as a kid. The first is all about how constantly commenting on a child's intelligence, even praising it, can often sabotage that child's ability to put forth effort. Essentially, if they're told that it's all about intelligence, then failure means they're not smart enough.

The second deals with just how badly sleep actually messes up children, and how extremely off-kilter the sleep cycle of a teenager is. When I was going through high school I sometimes slept only every other night. The book goes through just how badly lack of sleep effects you, highlighting how it actually robs you of positive memories more than negative memories. Yep, lack of sleep actually makes your brain a less pleasant place.

This book is full of things that stick sideways in how most people think a nurturing parent should operate. Overall it lays out not only good advice for parents, but good advice for any thinking human being.

It gels together with a lot of the educational books I've read lately in that it comes to the conclusion that children are a lot more complicated, and that it takes not just quantity, but quality for a kid to be stable and happy.

There's so much useful data floating around that I'll probably keep this book handy in case I need to come back to it. It's information on cognitive skills is a great read from start to finish.

The only issue I can really find is that it occasionally points out a great program like Tools of the Mind or KIPP, but doesn't really provide any suggestions on how the average nurturing parent reading the book can bring such useful learning tools into their own lives. But it gives the reader enough information to learn more, which is ultimately what any responsible parent should be doing anyway.

[Wick Welker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Data driven advice about child and teenage behavior.

I really enjoyed NurtureShock. Great combination of science, anecdote and engaging narrative. The aim of this book is to give an updated review of recent trials and studies about child behavior to reframe conventional wisdom for parents. The following are some great pearls that I got from this read.

Praise is a double-edged sword. Turns out, adults REALLY love praise and constantly seek it out in work and family life. However, for children, praise can have an inverse effect. Children that are praised will scrutinize the praise for a hidden agenda from their parents. They use the praise as a gold standard of behavior for achievement. Kids that fall behind drown in praise and it can greatly affect their self image and personal development. Praise must be specific, not general or excessive.

Kids are sleep deprived. This is a fact. We don’t let them sleep. We start schools waaaaay to early and they can literally be functioning two grade levels behind when they don’t get enough sleep. Obesity, not sedentary lifestyle, causes obesity in children as a result of deranged hormonal control.

When it comes to race, many parents raise their children with a color-blind strategy. Parents worry that teaching that a positive racial comment is teaching children about racial constructs. This is not the way to go. Children are exquisitely sensitive at teasing out in-groups and out-groups. In fact, the authors argue that racial segregation is even worse when children attend diverse school populations. Integration is not a panacea. Kids easily develop group preferences, and given the racist fabric of our society, this will be exacerbated with color-blind rearing. Children must specifically and explicitly be taught about racism as early as age 3.

All children lie.In fact, lying is a developmental milestone. Kids are otherwise motivated to lie because of fear of retribution. Children do not understand lying the same way adults do. For example, a child believes that cursing is the same thing as lying because the same punishment can be affixed. It isn’t quite until the age of 11 that they understand lying hurts others and isn’t only about their punishment. Kids need to be taught the worth of honesty and not just the punishment of lying. Kids also confuse white lies with outright deception. Thus when they see their parents give a social white lie, they believe their parents also engage in deception and so it’s really not that bad. Kids are even praised for being “polite” by giving white lies in a social situation. Is it any wonder they are confused?

Tests to determine giftedness are terrible at determining giftedness. The test happens early in age and kids are never tested again. This results in “gifted” children falling behind and having to undergo “gifted remediation” and “non-gifted” children never being able to later test in. Education often does not account for the plasticity of the child’s brain. Intelligence is believed to be static and innate at a young age.

Arguing can be good. It’s often parents that over-dramatize fights with their teenagers. Rules should be created in an egalitarian way with flexibility baked into the rules. Traditional educational media can apparently make aggression worse because these shows show a lot of conflict with small resolutions at the end that children can’t always connect. It’s a similar effect when parents fight in front of their children and then take the argument off-stage where they achieve resolution without their children witnessing the key moment of reconciliation. Teenagers mostly socialize themselves. They spend the majority of time with one another and they will use bullying and other tools to maintain social capital.

Baby Einstein DVDs don’t work because babies need to see mouths moving. Language must be from a live person. Language is learned better with direct verbs and tactile encouragement along with movement and motion of objects. Parents make the mistake of trying to guess what their baby is saying and imprinting the wrong object with an unmatched baby sound. For example, if your baby is saying “Bah, bah, bah” while holding a spoon, don’t come bring them their bottle thinking that they are trying to describe a bottle and not the spoon. This will greatly confuse them. A variety of speakers helps vocabulary. Reframing sentences over and over again helps learning. The word in the last sentence is the most remembered.

This was a great read, highly recommended.

[Lars Guthrie · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘Nuture Shock’ is a wonderful collection of essays on child development that carries more weight than you might think. On an initial glance, it appears to be another example of what Adam Hanft, in a review of Steven Johnson’s ‘Where Good Ideas Come From’ (http://bnreview.barnesandnoble.com/t5...), called ‘pattern porn’.

Hanft defines the genre as ‘non-fiction characterized by a seductive thesis that is supported by an ingenious arrangement of scientific support—manipulatively cherry-picked, in the eyes of some critics—and lush anecdotal juxtapositions that are voyeuristically irresistible.’

You’ve seen them on the display racks—those books attractively encased in stripped-down graphics and catchy titles: ‘Blink,’ ‘Drive,’ ‘How We Decide,’ and…‘NurtureShock.’

But ‘NurtureShock,’ despite its package, shuns the seductive thesis. Instead, Bronson and Merryman’s main goal is that readers avoid thinking in black and white. If we start with the assumption that there is one right way to bring up children, they warn, we are falling for the ‘Fallacy of the Good/Bad Dichotomy’—the ‘tendency to categorize things as either good for children or bad for children.’

Thinking that antibiotics can only be good because they kill bad bacteria might lead to overuse and problems with resistant bacteria. In the same way, looking at lying solely as a negative trait in children is not entirely helpful.

We learn how to lie. It’s part of development—a necessary part. Lying requires intelligence and social sense. There’s probably a connection between lying and ‘theory of mind’—the ability to think about what others are thinking about.

But ‘NurtureShock’ is not a screed for allowing kids to lie, cheat, steal and engage in self-destructive behavior. The authors assure us they are ‘still telling kids to “play nice” and say thank you.’ What they want is objectivity—to steer us toward a balanced approach in developing cognition and citizenship, based on research.

They believe that ‘good stuff and bad stuff are not opposite ends of the spectrum,’ but ‘are what’s termed orthogonal—mutually independent.’ When we look at children, the ‘many factors in their lives—such as sibling interaction, peer pressure, marital conflict, or even gratitude—can be both a good influence and a bad influence.’

The other assumption Bronson and Merryman urge us to avoid is the ‘Fallacy of Similar Effect’—the idea ‘that things work in children in the same way that they work in adults.’

If we’re really going to base the rearing of children on evidence, we have to really be careful about confirmation bias—thinking that we already know what studies will show. To examine the way kids learn we have to free ourselves of preconceptions based on our adult experience.

In many cases, the best and simplest solution is not quite as simple as it looks. For example, Bronson and Merryman point out that the experts mostly agree that trying to force-feed language skills to babies through videos such as the infamous ‘Baby Einstein’ DVDs just doesn’t work.

Why? Babies need to look at adults talking to learn to segment, to tell where one word stops and another begins. Lip reading is part of speech learning.

Don’t stop there, though, because learning to talk is not a passive activity. Caregivers need to encourage language production by the child, not just ‘push massive amounts of language into the baby’s ear.’ They need to be more than live versions of Baby Einstein. ‘If…you think a baby isn’t contributing to the conversation,’ Bronson and Merryman note, ‘you’ve missed something really important.’

One sign of good non-fiction is that it makes you want to find out more. I wish Bronson and Merryman had gone beyond babies in their discussion of language development. I work with elementary school and high school kids who have weak expressive language.

Like the babies in ‘NurtureShock’ whose language development is lagging, I believe this is because they do not have enough conversation where they are expected to make sounds—in this case sounds consisting of specific and clear vocabulary. Too much of adult communication with children is one-sided, and in other venues—school, books, and digital devices—there is lots of input but little output.

Bronson and Merryman’s look at language development—‘Why Hannah Talks and Alyssa Doesn’t’—is just one of ten essays in ‘NurtureShock.’ The essays, while tied together by their focus on research into child development, are each valid as stand-alone pieces. Indeed, three of the chapters in the book were published that way, in ‘New York’ magazine. It’s really an anthology, rather than a thesis with one central theme.

The first chapter—‘The Inverse Power of Praise’—garnered quite a bit of attention when it appeared in 2007. It gets to the other connection between all of these essays: avoiding the ‘fallacies’ previously mentioned. Besides the fact that viewing praise as not necessarily a good thing is counterintuitive, praise is effective with adults. So common sense tells us to praise our kids. Research by Carol Dweck (http://mindsetonline.com/) and others have shown a danger in doing so.

Bronson and Merryman are searching for what we don’t readily see, what common sense doesn’t tell us, but scientists do.

Children are getting an hour less sleep than they did thirty years ago, and that lack of sleep is reflected in performance.

Avoiding the issue of race because we want kids to understand we’re all equal results in the opposite outcome.

By demanding that kids look us in the eye and speak the truth, we train proficient liars.

Channeling kids into gifted programs based on testing when they're five shuts out gifted students who don’t test well at that young age. I.Q. changes.

Siblings fight not in competition for attention, but for booty. Our Freudian legacy—that brothers and sisters are ‘locked into an eternal struggle for their parents’ affection’ is misguided. ‘It turns out that Shakespeare was right, and Freud was wrong,’ say Bronson and Merryman. ‘Sibling rivalry may be less an Oedipal tale…and more King Lear.’

Social skills are not just about being nice. Aggression and manipulation are cards that play well for the popular kids.

We’re right in observing that teenagers think differently than their parents—way differently. But pictures of moody and negative youths need to be tweaked. The authors quote Temple University psychologist Laurence Steinberg: ‘The popular image of the individual sulking in the wake of a family argument may be a more accurate portrayal of the emotional state of the parent, than the teenager.’ It seems that teens get something positive from such a battle, and then are often better at letting it go.

The chapter titled ‘Can Self-Control Be Taught?’ especially resonated with me. Bronson and Merryman’s answer is yes, and they illustrate their case with the work done by Elena Bodrova and Deborah Leong in their ‘Tools of the Mind’ program, based on the ideas of Lev Vygotsky. Bodrova and Leong’s book is at the top of my list of the best books about child psychology (http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...).

‘NurtureShock’ now enters that list. Bronson and Merryman have assembled ten provocative essays that present up-to-date research and will prompt experts and non-experts alike to think more deeply about children and learning. Highly recommended.

[Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

"They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you."

-Philip Larkin, from This Be The Verse

A few years back, I caught an informercial for a product called "Your Baby Can Read.” Supposedly, the program can teach babies to read before they’re even able to talk, despite the fact that scientific evidence strongly suggests that babies can’t learn language from television. The product seems to have been pulled by the producer, but that hasn’t stopped me from using the hilarious infomercial when teaching psychology. It’s just another example of the flawed idea that children need to be doing everything faster and earlier, with no regard to whether reading Harry Potter is developmentally appropriate at age two.

I was not an early reader. I wasn’t a particularly late reader either, but I certainly wasn’t reading before kindergarten, or even much in kindergarten. My parents read to me, and sometimes I memorized books so that I could parrot them back to my parents, but that was pretty much it. Around first grade I had some sort of a-ha moment, and, after that, I read voraciously. Still do. This was a pretty normal developmental trajectory. Now, with increased pressure on parents to put their kids on the Harvard track by preschool, my reading would probably be a huge cause for concern.

Developmental Psychology is one of the most relevant classes that most people skip in college. College students spent so much of of their time trying to figure out how to not accidentally create a human fetus that they seem to forget that this might be something they’ll want to do on purpose later in life. One great opportunity offered by Developmental Psychology classes is understanding exactly what your own parents did wrong while raising you; this is not because it comes in handy during Thanksgiving arguments, but because it helps to humanize your parents. They were just doing the best they could, but they didn’t know what they were doing. No one does.

More importantly, though, Developmental Psychology clarifies some of the bizarre processes by which children learn and grow. It can help future parents realize that it’s better to provide clear rules instead of trying to be your kid’s friend, although it’s best to keep these rules reasonable and open to negotiation. It can help people understand what so-called normal development really looks like, so that they’ll be able to tell when there’s actually a problem. Hopefully, it can help quell the crazy over-scheduling of kids, which I have to believe wouldn’t be happening if parents understood how important sleep actually is.

Anyway, this book is not as good as a Developmental Psychology class, and there were a few points where I didn’t feel like they explained the research literature as well as I would have liked, but it’s still a good resource for anyone who has to deal with kids. Of course, my boyfriend was very happy to hear that I was only reading this for teaching purposes. Not surprising, really. Parenting sounds terrifying.

[Amanda · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I am going to have to leave the "Goodreads Purists" group. I did not read this book in its entirety. In fact I didn't even skim the entire thing. But this is how I have been "reading" books lately. I read parts, maybe skim other parts, get the gist of it, and then move on. It is sad that it has come to this but alas. I am short on time and short on concentration. I basically want exposure to a variety of books and it's hard for me to stick with one thing -- as of late, anyway.

This book was too light for my liking. It seemed to be more based on anecdotes/stories/cases than actual research. It seemed to draw broad conclusions from a single study. It just read too easily, if there is such a thing.

[John Uit de Flesch · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book based on scientific studies. Ironically, I chose to read it for the first chapter. I thought it was promoting praise for kids, and I know I can be demanding and negative so I thought it should read it. Then...it warns about too much praise. Certain chapters were more interesting than others. Praise, Lying, sleep habits, teen rebellion, language acquisition for toddlers, and child prodigies were all discussed. A few notes I took are below:

The brain burns a lot of glucose when exercising self control.

Motivation is crucial. motivation is experienced in the brain as the release of dopamine. the motivated brain literally operates better signaling faster.

Sincerity of praise is also crucial. only young children under the age of seven take praise at face value older children are just as suspicious of it as adults.

In one study Cummings found that children’s emotional well-being and security are more affected by the relationship between the parents then by the direct relationship between the parent and child.

Kids can see through false praise. Kids can see through fake resolution between Mom and Dad after an argument.

Kids need to see the forgiveness and reconciliation between parents after an argument. It emotionally relieves the tension, and sets the hope and example of healing after harm.

[Kami · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't really like this book overall, I mean some of the things were interesting, but it felt like the book was geared to parents at a certain socio-economic level, which I'm not at. I guess I mostly just felt that way because of the chapter on childhood intelligence, I definitely am not a parent that can afford to have my 3 yr. old's IQ tested for some ritzy preschool. Give me a break. And the chapter on worrying whether your child learns five words sooner or later is ridiculous--he had just gone through an entire chapter before that on how intelligence is so flexible and how it's silly to classify according to a kid's ability at that young of an age. Also the whole discussion on a "progressive" parent. It just made me want to laugh. I'm glad I have my Latino "traditional" husband.

The author writes, "Today, with three years of investigation behind us, Ashley and I now see that what we imagined were our "instincts" were instead just intelligent, informed reactions. Things we had figured out. Along the way, we also discovered that those reactions were polluted by a hodgepodge of wishful thinking, moralistic biases, contagious fads, personal history, and old (disproven) psychology--all at the expense of common sense." pg. 6.

Well, I think this book continues to promote contagious fads, wishful thinking, and is still based on moralistic biases and personal history--at the expense of common sense. Don't get me wrong, I agree with some things whole-heartedly, like kids need more sleep, zero-tolerance policies are overkill, and that praise is used way too much. But in other things he completely undermines himself. For instance in discussing the negative influence of educational television, he then quotes Spongebob. Not even the dumbest kindergartener thinks Spongebob is educational. Why not quote an actual "educational" show? Or in reporting about spanking he says how spanking has been shown not to be as horrible as we thought, but yet it still is the worst thing possible. At least that's the mixed message I came away with. And as far as the Tools program? Ummm...the word contagious fad comes to mind really quick. Not saying it's not beneficial, it just reminds me an awful lot of the sudden popularity of Baby Einstein videos too.

My father used to quote to my siblings and I (all nine of us), "Studies have shown that with each additional child, the IQ of the siblings drop." An absolutely ridiculous statement if you think about it. That claim is based solely on socio-economic factors, nothing at all with the number of children. Another of my father's favorite sayings was, "Statistics will say anything when tortured long enough." The writing in this book reminded me of both of those statements. It wasn't a pleasant association.