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Motivating Cooperative Behavior

by Jane Bluestein, Ph.D.

Win-Lose approaches that can create unnecessary stress
in the parent-child relationship:

Powering: Parent Wins, Child Loses

Strategies:

Humiliation, loss of dignity, violation of self-esteem; criticism, shaming, verbal/emotional violence
Threat to physical safety, physical violence
Conditional approval or love; threat of emotional abandonment
Deprivation of meaningful privilege or activity

Dynamic/Outcomes:

Depends on your reaction, power, anger, and your child’s fear of your reaction
May generate superficial compliance. Reinforces people-pleasing, dependence on approval or at least minimal cooperation to avoid being hurt in some way.
Can inspire rebelliousness and opposition, particularly in a child who isn’t motivated by the need for your approval or one who needs to “save face.”

Boundary Issues: Does not respect your child’s boundaries or need for power; violates child’s boundaries.

Effectiveness: Can be effective in getting short-term cooperation from compliant child. Cost to emotional environment and quality of relationship between parent and child is HIGH.

Permissiveness:
Parent Loses, Child Wins (sort of...)

Strategies:

Allowing your child to behave in ways that can create problems for you or others
Letting your kids have their way to avoid other conflicts
Letting your kids do something they want in order to obligate them to cooperate at a later time; attempting to motivate cooperation through guilt, by being “nice”
Giving up; perception of having less influence or control than is true

Dynamic/Outcome:

Chaos, manipulation, possible erosin of child’s ability to self-manage
Tremendous insecurity when child’s needs for limits and structure are not met
Parent frustration, often ending up in reactive “blow-up” when you reach the end of your rope; encourages kids to really push the limits.

Boundary Issues: General lack of boundaries, unclear boundaries based on differences between parent’s understanding and child’s understanding (“Be good.” “Clean this area.”), ambiguous boundaries, or boundaries with built in loop-holes (using warnings, asking for excuses, etc.)

Effectiveness: Minimal; usually kids know that they don’t have to listen until you start screaming, for example. Lack of limits and predictability makes cost to emotional environment and quality of parent-child relationship HIGH.

Win-Win approach that does not compromise the emotional safety of the home environment:

Win-Win/Cooperation: Parent Wins, Child Wins

Strategies:

May include some activity or outcome that is meaningful to your child. What would your child rather be doing? What privileges are you willing to allow (contingent on cooperation, completion of a task, etc.)? What’s worked for you??
May offer child a chance to choose between two or more activities, the sequence in which they do assignments, or choices about where, when, how, or with whom to do particular activities. (For more information on giving choices, click here.)

Dynamic/Outcome:

NOT based on parent’s reaction, fear of parent’s power, or need for approval
Proactive approach that considers and attempts to accommodate the child’s needs for both limits and power within those limits
Clearly-communicated contingencies, boundaries, guidelines, limits before the child have a chance to mess up.
Child’s needs for limits and control are accommodated as much as possible in an environment in which the parent is still the authority
Reward-oriented; focuses on positive outcomes to child (not avoidance of negative outcome, which involves a very different dynamic!)
Predictable (so long as boundaries are maintained); mutually respectful

Boundary Issues: None. Boundaries are clearly communicated and maintained.

Effectiveness: Best possibility for success of all configurations of authority relationships. Actually builds and supports positive home environment relationships.

Excerpted and adapted from The Win-Win Classroom by Jane Bluestein, Ph.D., © 2008, Corwin Publishing, Thousand Oaks, CA.

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See related handouts:

Descriptions of each Characteristic

5 Characteristics of a Good Boundary in English, Spanish and French.

11 Reasons to Use Boundaries with Your Children in English, Spanish and French.

9 Things to Remember When Setting a Boundary in English, Spanish and French.

6 Reasons to Not Ask your Children for Excuses

Motivating cooperative behavior

Other handouts by Dr. Jane Bluestein

Complete alphabetical listing of all handouts on this site.

Articles and excerpts by Dr. Jane Bluestein

Complete alphabetical listing of all articles on this site.

Complete listing of all articles and handouts in Spanish or French.

Books, Articles, Audio and Video Resources and other Resources by Dr. Jane Bluestein

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