Nice Kids Are Made, Not Born
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iStock/Thinkstock(STANFORD, Calif.) — Nobody’s a natural born nice guy.
Stanford University researchers say in order for altruism to flourish in a child, it needs to be cultivated. Parents shouldn’t expect that their children will grow up to be nice people without some nurturing, according to Carol Dweck, a Stanford professor of psychology.
Together with partner Rodolfo Cortes, Dweck sought to punch holes in a previous experiment in which 18-month old toddlers supposedly went out of their way to help without adult prompting.
Using one- and two-year-olds, one group, that mirrored the 2006 study, had an adult and child rolling a ball to each other while talking. At some point, the adult knocked over an object in hopes the tyke would pick it up. In group two, the adult and child played ball separately while an object was knocked over.
The result was that three times as many kids picked up the object in the reciprocal play group, suggesting that children need social skills and interaction to develop a sense of altruism.
That’s not to say that some kids can’t be nice without prompting but both Dweck and Cortes say that the chances of raising more empathetic children increase substantially through cooperative learning exercises.
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