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Jewish World Review June 14, 2000/ 11 Sivan, 5760
http://www.jewishworldreview.com --
A NUMBER OF YEARS AGO, the Princeton Theological Seminary conducted a now famous experiment: Theological students were asked to go to a nearby chapel and give an extemporaneous sermon on the showing of kindness. On their way to the chapel they passed a man who had collapsed in a doorway of a building. Clearly in distress, the man moaned and groaned, asking for help. What percentage of Seminarians actually stopped to help the man? More about that later.
The vast majority of us want to raise children who would stop to help that man in need. And there are many theories about how to do that. But perhaps the best way for parents to get concrete guidance in this area is to listen to those researchers who have spent many years trying to determine what truly fosters helping behavior in young children. One of those researchers, Dr. Ervin Staub of the University of Massachusetts, has a simple message for parents regarding one important factor in fostering compassionate, helping behavior in children; parental love.
"Children need to be treated with affection, respect, and benevolence," he says. "They need to feel secure in the knowledge that their parent (or parent substitute) cares about their well-being and will protect and care for them. Children's perceptions of their world and the people in it are formed by their own experiences of how they are treated by the people closest to them. They will treat others as they themselves have been treated."
Dozens of research studies bear out Dr. Staub's conclusion. There is convincing evidence that children whose parents are openly affectionate with them and respond sensitively to their emotional needs are more likely to develop into individuals whom researchers rate as genuinely sensitive to others -- feelings than are children whose parents are not nurturing and affectionate.
On the other hand, parents who try to discipline children by withdrawing love, threatening physical force, or humiliating or embarrassing them raise youngsters who have great difficulty feeling compassion for others. This finding underscores the widely accepted conclusion among researchers and clinicians that when it comes to disciplining children, the end never justifies the means. If a child makes a remark or engages in an action that is cruel or insensitive to another person, it is completely counterproductive to then be cruel and insensitive to the child as a punishment.
Dr. Mark Barnett of Kansas State University, an expert on the development of empathy in children, agrees and says the consequences of withdrawing love as a punishment for misbehavior can be grave:
"It's devastating for children to think that their parents do not love them, or might withhold that love if they do something wrong. They need to feel secure in the fact that they are cared for and loved despite their mistakes and misbehavior. This makes it possible for children to develop an inner security that their own emotional needs will be taken care of. It's only then that they can learn to be responsive to the emotional needs of others."
In the course of Dr. Staub's research, he recently conducted an experiment that underscored the connection between children's need to feel secure and their desire and ability to help others.
"In this study," he explains, "I did something as simple as have adults either interact with children in a warm and affectionate way or in a totally indifferent way; not hostile or negative, just indifferent. Later on, in an adjoining room, there was loud crash and sounds of distress. The children who had been treated with warmth and affection were more likely to go into the other room to investigate and see if they could help than were the children who were treated with indifference.
"The adults who had interacted with the children in this experiment had been strangers. The children did not know them. But it did not take too much time for the children to feel safe in the environment we had created when the adults treated them with kindness and respect."
Dr. Eva Fogelman, the author of Conscience and Courage, an important, moving book which focuses on Christian rescuers of Jews during World War II, is in agreement with Dr. Staub and Dr. Barnet. She found that "Amany rescuers attributed their strength to their parents love." And she emphasizes the "high correlation between parental nurturing and altruism, quoting sociologist Eli Sagan who contends Alove is not the result but the foundation of conscience."
There were, of course, other factors which fostered the moral courage shown by the rescuers (several of which will be explored in future columns), but there is wide agreement that making children feel loved and protected is crucially connected to the development of both conscience and courage.
By the way, for those interested in the results of the experiment conducted at the Princeton Theological Seminary, here they are: approximately two thirds of the Seminarians, who had lots of time before their lecture was due to commence, stopped to help the moaning man. Of those Seminarians who thought they might be late for their sermon, approximately one out of ten stopped to help. Which gives us all something to think
Parental love and
helping behavior
By Dr. Janice Cohn
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JWR contributor Dr. Janice Cohn, a psychotherapist, is Chief of Consultation and Education at the Department of Psychiatry, Newark Beth Israel Medical Center. The author of Raising Compassionate, Courageous Children in a Violent World , she is also in private practice in New York City and Montclair, New Jersey. Send your comments by clicking here.
05/23/00: Teaching Children Charity
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03/23/00: The game(s) of life
02/16/00: Whatever happened to playing for playing's sake?
02/03/00: Down to Earth Heroes
01/27/00: Parental discipline affects child's compassion