Framing chores as learning opportunities encourages child autonomy, study shows

Parents are much less likely to intervene when their young children are getting dressed or performing other simple chores if those tasks are framed as learning opportunities, according to a new study by Yale researchers.

Media reports and academic literature suggest that overparenting -; a style of parenting in which adults persistently take over tasks or solve problems that would be developmentally appropriate for children to resolve on their own -; is becoming increasingly prevalent. Studies have demonstrated that overparenting diminishes children's motivation to complete tasks independently.

The study, published on November 21 in the journal Child Development, found that framing the task of getting dressed as a chance for preschool-aged children to learn reduced parental intervention by about 50%. 

When an adult steps in and completes a task for a young child, it can deprive the child of an opportunity to learn how to complete the task by themselves, which potentially harms their ability to develop self-efficacy, autonomy, and other important life skills. Our findings suggest that framing everyday tasks as learning opportunities can significantly reduce overparenting, and in turn boost children's independence, persistence, and resilience."

Reut Shachnai, lead author, graduate student in Yale's Department of Psychology

The study consists of three parts. In the first, the researchers surveyed 77 parents of 4-to-5-year-olds (62% mothers, 38% fathers) to gain a better understanding of their perceptions of children's learning and their overparenting behaviors, and whether parents' perceptions of learning and overparenting behaviors differ between academic and non-academic tasks. Parents reported taking over less on tasks they perceived as greater learning opportunities -; more likely academic tasks, such as solving puzzles or tracing letters, rather than nonacademic chores such as getting dressed.

Next, the researchers conducted an experiment at a children's museum in Philadelphia to test whether framing getting dressed as an educational opportunity reduced overparenting. To ensure the test was novel and challenging, they had 4-to-5-year-olds dress up in hockey gear -; two shin guards and a chest guard. Before initiating the experiment, they established that the children could successfully complete the task on their own, meaning any intervention by parents could be considered an instance of overparenting.

The researchers randomly assigned 30 parent-child pairs either to a "big learning opportunity" condition, in which the parents were informed that children can learn key lifelong skills from putting on clothes, or to a control group where parents were told that dress-up activities helped children engage with the museum.

The experiment showed that framing the task as a learning opportunity decreased the number of actions parents performed for their child as they put on the hockey pads by about half, from an average of 8.6 actions in the control condition to 4.4 actions in the learning opportunity condition. Additionally, parents offered their children more encouragement and positive feedback when the task was framed as a learning opportunity.

A subsequent experiment tested whether parents' perceptions of the magnitude of the learning opportunity affected how much they intervened during a task. Eighty parent-child pairs were randomly divided into two groups: One in which they were told that putting on clothes is an opportunity to learn important, lifelong skills, and another where parents were informed that putting on these clothes allows children to learn about hockey gear.

The experiment produced no evidence that parents intervene less when a task is couched as an important learning opportunity versus a minor one, as the number of interventions were similarly low in both groups. The researchers concluded that parents take over less whenever they view a task as a learning opportunity, no matter how big or small.

"It's very common for parents, who are often pressed for time, to complete everyday tasks for their children, but there's evidence that this behavior demotivates kids from doing things for themselves," said Julia Leonard, assistant professor of psychology in Yale's Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the study's senior author. "Based on our work, we can recommend the following to parents, teachers, and mentors alike: The next time you find yourself tempted to complete a task for a child, take a moment to appreciate all that they can learn from trying to complete the task on their own."

Mika Asaba, a postdoctoral fellow in Yale's Department of Psychology, and Lingyan Hu, a graduate student at the University of Pennsylvania, are coauthors of the study.