I’m nah nunu noo ih” said the sweetest-faced sweetie pie three year old you can imagine. Standing in the therapy room next to his little toddler sized chair, hands on hips, pouty faced, he was there for his first session to work on his nasal substitution pattern.
The Tension Between Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation
The key tension here is the need to help kids develop an intrinsic motivation to do good, and work hard to do a good job with academics or speech work, and the potential for an extrinsic motivator like a reward or verbal praise to interrupt the natural development of that intrinsic motivation.
Understanding Incentives and Performance
In a meta-analysis of 950 industrial and organizational psychology articles, Cerasoli, Nicklin, and Ford (2014) found a few key distinctions in understanding the relationship between incentives, motivation, and performance.
Tying Incentives to Desired Actions
Thinking about these results as they relate to speech therapy, clearly we need to consider both of these scenarios in encouraging the task-specific, highly repetitive types of activities we may need to accomplish in, for example, a standard articulation therapy session.
The Role of Verbal Praise
Verbal praise is another kind of external motivator, and has also been the source of controversy among child behavior experts.
Creating a Positive Therapy Environment
Kids come to therapy because they struggle with some aspect of speech or language that they need help with.
Conclusion
So, how bad are bribes anyway? In my mind, not that bad. External reinforcers are tools that adults can use to help kids learn and grow as individuals. We just need to make sure we’re using them in the most beneficial way for kids.