Smart Empathy: Why More is Not Always Better When it Comes to Using Tech to Increase Empathy
Smart Empathy:
Why More is Not Always Better When it Comes to Using Tech to Increase Empathy
In 2006, when then Senator Barack Obama proclaimed that “we have an empathy deficit” he believed that empathy was essential for promoting caring behaviors and societal well-being. And there is plenty of evidence to support this idea. Researchers have found that people who are more empathic are more likely to help strangers through volunteering or donating to charity and are also more likely to help the people they love in times of difficulty. However, some types of empathy can leave us distressed and overwhelmed by the suffering of others, so much so that we are left less able to help. How can we encourage the benefits, but not the potential harms of empathy?
As with many human traits, empathy is more complex than it first appears. One definition of empathy involves care and compassion for others. Compassion is focused on others peoples’ needs irrelevant of our own thoughts or feelings. Yet other definitions of empathy involve reflecting the other person in ourselves. This mirroring can be achieved by feeling echoes of other persons’ emotions or imagining another person’s situation from their perspective. The first type—feeling others’ emotions—is called emotion contagion and is not a problem when others are feeling positive but it easily becomes overwhelming when others are in severe distress. The second type - involving perspective-taking – is called cognitive empathy and can also be draining because it requires a lot of mental effort. So much effort in fact that research finds that people often actively avoid perspective-taking if given the choice. But effort in this case may pay off, since working harder can motivate increased care and compassion.
Not all empathy is created equal, and storytellers should think carefully about which they intend to evoke.
Consider, for example, seeing a story about a refugee child on the news. She is far from home and scared for her future. Some viewers may watch this story and use their head to reflect on how difficult being a refugee would be for a young child. As they sit and imagine how the girl feels and what she needs, these viewers are activating their perspective-taking skills. Research has found that this type of perspective-taking is likely to inspire warm feelings of compassion and motivate people to help. Many people choose to act when they learn of such suffering, for example, by calling their political representative or donating their time or money to charity. However, while seeing this story, other viewers may be overwhelmed because they viscerally feel the child’s fear and hopelessness. To avoid the pain of emotional contagion, people may change the channel or leave the room. Once they do so, that strong empathic feeling they had will fade almost as rapidly as it was elicited, leaving little motivation to help.
The transitory nature of this type of emotional empathy warrants a healthy dose of skepticism towards any claim of a quick-fix empathy solution, such as virtual reality (VR). However, there has been a proliferation of such attempts in the tech world since the viral 2015 TED talk in which entrepreneur Chris Milk claimed that VR was “the ultimate empathy machine.” Chris may have been speaking in hyperbole, but since then charities, governments, and non-profit organizations have invested heavily in telling stories of human suffering through immersive VR technology. For example placing people in refugee camps, homeless shelters or suffering from racial discrimination. The power of VR is assumed to lie in its ability to remove the burden of empathizing. VR automatically generates a rush of emotions without the user having to use their own imagination. However, because VR leaves so little to the imagination it is unlikely to lead to improvements in long-lasting perspective-taking skills. We recently confirmed this limitation by combining the results from 43 different research studies. We found that virtual reality only creates emotional empathy responses in viewers, but it does not improve perspective-taking.
That’s not to say that transitory emotions have no use for social good. Fundraising campaigns may find that VR or other highly emotional storytelling is more than sufficient for their purposes, assuming they can capitalize on the rush of emotion with a well-placed donation bucket or web-link. However, those interested in creating longer lasting improvements in empathy may want to consider telling stories in such a way that they challenge people to use their perspective-taking skills.
Here are some actionable insights storytellers and content creators can use to encourage perspective taking in their audiences:
Tell stories about people, places and events (both real and fictional) that are different from readers’ own experiences.
Create complex and well-rounded characters that do not always adhere to social stereotypes or literary tropes and who challenge the audience to adjust their perspective.
Give listeners an opportunity to read between the lines and pick up on subtle indicators of how people are thinking and feeling.
Allow viewers the space to build their own understanding of the situation by leaving some ambiguity.
Create enticing stories that encourage people to take the perspectives of others even though it is effortful.
Today we are bombarded with intense, graphic content that rapidly arouses our emotions automatically and does not require perspective-taking. Long gone are the days of imagining the suffering of people in a far-off land. That suffering is brought into our homes on our TV screens, and taken with us on our commute via our smartphones. Given this new world, we are much more likely to experience empathy with our hearts and not our heads, which can result in emotional burnout.
In order to create a more compassionate society overall, we don’t need to empathize more, we need to empathize smarter.
Alison Jane Martingano, M.A., M.Phil.
Teaching Fellow, The New School for Social Research
Sara Konrath, M.S., Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy
Visiting Professor, The New School for Social Research
Collaborator of the Center for Scholars & Storytellers
Now Playing: The Real Risks of Teen Vaping
Now Playing: The Real Risks of Teen Vaping
People are more likely to start using drugs in their teen years and young adulthood (18–25) than at any other age. Some of the physical, emotional, and social changes that teens experience can make them especially vulnerable to engaging in risky behaviors, including drug use.
Scientific research has repeatedly found that using drugs presents serious health risks for teens—risks that can have lifelong consequences. Yet teens often underestimate the health risks involved in using drugs. As one example, let’s look at a form of drug use that has become increasingly popular with teens: vaping (using e-cigarettes).
How many teens vape?
Every year since 1975, the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) has funded a nationwide survey--Monitoring the Future (MTF)—to measure drug and alcohol use among 8th, 10th, and 12th graders. In 2019, more than 42,000 students from almost 400 schools across the United States answered confidential questionnaires for MTF.
MTF found that vaping has increased dramatically among teens in recent years. Teens’ vaping of nicotine—the addictive ingredient in tobacco—rose in 2019, and there was a rapid rise in vaping of marijuana: About a fifth of 12th graders and 10th graders reported vaping marijuana in the past year.
In fact, from 2018 to 2019, the percentage of high school seniors who reported that they had vaped marijuana in the past 30 days increased from 7.5 percent to 14 percent—the second-largest one-year increase in any drug use that MTF has recorded in its 45-year history.
Why do teens vape?
Some vaping devices, like the e-cigarette Juul, have a sleek design—similar to a flash drive—that may look “cool” to some teens. That design can also help teens conceal their use of vaping devices at school.
In the 2019 MTF survey, respondents gave several other reasons for vaping. More than 40 percent said they tried vaping for the flavors. Others said they tried it just to experiment, or to have a good time with friends, or simply because they were bored. However, more than 8 percent said they vaped because they’re “hooked.”
What are the risks of vaping for teens’ health?
Vaping can have serious effects on a teen’s health, now and in the future:
Continued e-cigarette use can lead to nicotine addiction. Although taking drugs at any age can lead to addiction, research shows that the earlier people begin to use drugs, the more likely they are to progress to more serious use.
Similarly, research has shown an association between nicotine vaping and progression to smoking tobacco cigarettes.
When people vape, they inhale several poisonous chemicals.
Storytellers can make a difference in teens’ understanding of the risks of vaping—and of using other drugs as well. For example, the U.S. Surgeon General reports that youth who are exposed to images of smoking in movies are more likely to smoke and those who get the most exposure to onscreen smoking are about twice as likely to begin smoking as those with the least exposure. Yet onscreen depictions of smoking have significantly increased in recent years, in both on-demand shows aimed at viewers age 15 to 24, and broadcast TV shows.
Here are some actionable insights for storytellers:
Portray the consequences of drug use on teen health and well-being.
Avoid showing characters who vape, smoke, or use other drugs as “cool.”
Mention the risks of drug use to the developing teen brain.
Address the risks of vaping marijuana and nicotine: for example, inhaling harmful chemicals, addiction, and progressing from nicotine vaping to smoking tobacco cigarettes.
Avoid any imagery depicting a drug that is ready for use (i.e., a lit cigarette), as this can be a trigger for those who are addicted to drugs.
Acknowledge that most teens don’t use drugs. While the most common form of drug use among teens, vaping, has increased dramatically of late, teens’ use of other drugs has either stayed relatively stable (marijuana) or declined (alcohol, cigarettes, inhalants, etc.) in recent years. Storytellers can help deflate the myth that most teens use drugs; this, in turn, can reduce teens’ perception that “everyone else is doing it.”
Barrett Whitener, M.F.A., M.A.
Senior Health Communications Manager, IQ Solutions, Inc., Rockville, MD, For the National Institute on Drug Abuse
Related Resources
You’ve got a friend in me - The Benefits of Parasocial Relationships
You’ve got a friend in me - The Benefits of Parasocial Relationships
Have you ever wondered why Dora, from Dora the Explorer, takes a deliberately long pause after directing a question to young viewers? This type of interaction invites participation and maintains children’s attention. This seemingly social exchange that occurs through the screen can facilitate relationship-building akin to a face-to-face interaction, such that over time children will form relationships with their favourite media characters. These one-sided, emotionally charged relationships between a person and a media character are called parasocial relationships.
What makes a parasocial relationship?
Parasocial relationships in early childhood (0-8 years old) typically involve three factors: 1) attachment and friendship, 2) human-like needs (personification), and 3) social realism.
Attachment to media characters occurs when children seek proximity to them for comfort and security, as with attachment to a real person. Perceived friendship also strengthens this bond. For instance, preschoolers were more likely to transfer a problem solving solution to a similar, real-life scenario if they had greater trust in the character demonstrating the problem. In addition, school-age children prefer and are more strongly attached to characters of their same gender.
Personification refers to children attributing person-like qualities to media characters, including humanlike needs such as hunger. Children’s nurturing behaviors (e.g., putting to bed) towards a physical character toy are positively related to learning from that same character via video.
Social realism is the likelihood a media character could exist in the real world. The more realistic a child’s favorite character appears and acts, the greater the strength of the parasocial relationship.
Can children learn from media characters?
The answer to this question varies and can be largely dependent on the age of the child. For example, young children have trouble applying what they learn from two-dimensional (2D) sources, such as television, to the physical world, which is termed the transfer deficit. This effect can be mitigated when the 2D content is socially relevant to children (e.g., familiarity). For example, toddlers were more likely to learn an early math skill from watching a video of a familiar character, Elmo, than an unfamiliar character from Taiwan, DoDo. Additionally, children did even better on this task if they exhibited nurturing behaviors toward a physical toy of the familiar character (e.g., feeding it, rocking it like a baby).
However, it should be noted that familiarity alone isn’t always enough to promote learning through media. In another study, 18-month-olds were given a toy for three months that was either personalized to them or not personalized at all. The personalized toy said the child’s name and shared similar interests (e.g., same favorite food), whereas the impersonalized toy called the children ‘Pal’, had the opposite gender, and had randomly selected interests. After three months, children in both groups (i.e., those with personalized vs. impersonalized) watched a video demonstration of their toy’s character complete a math task and were then given the opportunity to try the task themselves. Their performance was compared to children who didn’t have the toy for three months and didn’t watch the video demonstration (control group). The children who played with the personalized toy (but not the impersonal toy), outperformed the control group on the math task. Again, more nurturing behaviors during toy play were related to improved performance. The authors concluded that the emotional bond children had with the personalized character was the reason for their improvement, rather than simply being familiar with the character.
Here are some actionable insights into how you might foster these parasocial relationships through media:
Attachment – create characters that make children feel safe and comfortable. In addition, show diverse characters so children are able to relate to them and build stronger attachments and relationships with them.
Personification – create characters that children can perceive as friends with thoughts and emotions, wants and needs.
Social realism – the extent of a character’s social realism becomes increasingly important with a child’s age. Imaginative play and treating characters as real during play begins in toddlerhood and peaks when children are about 4 years old. As children get older, their ability to distinguish between fantasy and reality improves, so it’s important to consider social realism during this developmental transition and beyond.
Personalization – children learn better when the information presented on-screen is socially relevant to them. For example, providing the option to program a child’s name and interests to a toy/app can be beneficial to learning from that character.
Take advantage of the multimedia landscape – provide a variety of platforms in which children can engage and interact with their favorite media characters (i.e., toys, apps, websites, shows, etc.).
Encourage parent participation – design content that invites the parent to participate, such as an eBook that encourages dialogic questioning. Parents can facilitate the parasocial relationship by encouraging their child to interact with the character on and offscreen (toy).
Social Contingency – newer media affords the design of intelligent characters that can provide timely, personalized responses to a child’s input, making the interaction more like a face to face conversation. For instance, preschoolers were more likely to respond to an onscreen character when the character seemed to wait for their response or repeated unanswered questions in comparison to when the character waited for a typical 2-second delay.
Brittany Huber, PhD
Collaborator of the Center for Scholars & Storytellers
Media and Relational Aggression Among Youth
Media and Relational Aggression Among Youth
Does violence in movies and TV increase aggression in children? What about "emotional" violence — taunting, name-calling, cyberbullying, and other forms of social exclusion — the purpose of which is to harm another? Are so-called "mean girls" in TV and movies cool?
As I greeted my fourth-grader off the bus the other day, we began our regular after-school chat between mouthfuls of his afternoon snack.
“What happened at school today?” I ask. “Madison got in trouble with the teacher for being mean to Emily,” he says.
“Oh. What was Madison doing?”
“Well, we were playing this game at recess, but Madison kept changing the rules so that Emily would always lose, or would not know how to play. Emily started to cry and then the teachers came and sent Madison inside.”
It sounds like my son has a mean girl in his class. These types of “mean girl” behaviors — social exclusion, and name-calling — are known as relational aggression. I’ve spent the last decade researching this type of behavior among young people and despite the reputation for relational aggression and its gender bias as something that “mean girls do,” research shows that boys can be just as mean with their friends as girls.
So where do children learn these kinds of relationally aggressive behaviors?
As one might expect, children learn from behaviors modeled to them (e.g. at home or at school). But this also includes TV violence and violence in movies — and, less overt, dramatization of the threat of violence and its power over girls and boys. And the threat of violence is implicit in social exclusion behavior because its purpose is to "remove" a person from the group and even drive that person to harm themselves. Indeed, my research demonstrates that exposure to televised relational aggression is related to children’s use of relational aggression at school.
Unfortunately, relational aggression is quite prevalent in children’s films and television. A study I conducted with Dr. Barbara Wilson, found that 92% of 150 shows that are popular among elementary school children included some form of relational aggression.
Moreover, the ways in which this kind of violence was portrayed in movies and TV increased the chances that children would imitate it. For example, relational aggression was often enacted by attractive perpetrators, who were rarely punished for the actions, and a majority of the relationally aggressive interactions were meant to be funny, which further minimized any potential consequences to the victims.
This is particularly problematic because follow-up studies have shown that relationally aggressive characters tend to be well-liked by children viewers because they are attractive and funny. When children like characters who do antisocial things, they are more likely to excuse the aggression, and as a result, more likely to report they would imitate the behaviors in the future.
Clearly, there is room for improvement when it comes to how we feature relationally aggressive conflicts in children’s media representations.
Here are some actionable insights for storytellers:
When using a relationally aggressive plot point, show the consequences to the victim. Perhaps the victim can verbalize hurt feelings, or the consequences of a false rumor can be shown.
The perpetrator of the relational aggression should be punished in some way. An added bonus: there is research to show that viewers like seeing a disliked perpetrator getting what they deserve.
Avoid rewarding relationally aggressive behavior. For example, a verbal ‘put-down’ should not be used to get a laugh. These kinds of actions are easily imitated by young children, but they are not yet able to understand how and when such a joke should be used.
If storytellers could take some of these steps to avoid portraying relational aggression in an appealing light, it could go a long way in shaping how the millions of impressionable young viewers perceive relational aggression and their subsequent behavior.
Nicole Martins, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Media at Indiana University
Collaborator of the Center for Scholars & Storytellers
What scared you as a child?
Have you ever been afraid in front of the screen as a child?
We asked this question to 631 university students in eight different countries around the world. We found that universally, the vast majority of them could recall in great detail a childhood experience that scared them so deeply that it was burned in their memory – including the sight, sound, and emotions it aroused. Many of them related stories of how, till today, they will be wary of swimming in the ocean, sleep with a light on, and are petrified of clowns...
So what is it about TV and films that scare children? In this study we discovered the seven elements of fear: The threatening appearance of a character (remember the wicked witch in The Wizard of Oz?)
A character behaving threateningly (like the profoundly evil character in A Nightmare on Elm Street)
A character children identify with being under threat and helpless (so many stories of participants recalling being traumatized by poor Bambi alone in the cold, dark forest after his mother was shot by the hunter...)
Stories that make children aware, for the first time, of threatening scenarios within their experience, or the possibility of these (“who would want to hurt the USA?” thought a shocked child after viewing the 9/11 news coverage)
Stories in which safe places are deliberately breached (Chucky the doll cuddled in bed turns to be sadistic)
Music and sound that signify danger (remember the dum dum, dum dum dum in Jaws?)
Scenes depicting injury and homicide (a T.Rex chewing on a bleeding human in Jurassic Park)
About 70% of the programs inducing fear that children were exposed to were not age-appropriate (e.g., thrillers, science fiction, violent action-adventures). But many programs that most parents and professionals would not consider problematic, induce fear reactions as well – from Disney animated movies to even educational programs. For example, little Dumbo’s trunk reaching out to his caged mother was painful to watch for many children. Similarly, scenes from the classic Wizard of Ozthat included the Witch and the monkeys elicited strong fear experiences.
Many of our participants shared impacts of a traumatic experience that haunts them in adulthood as well. Even as grown-ups, they check under their bed before going to sleep, they struggle emotionally with images of bodily harm that are stuck in their minds, they experience reoccurring nightmares, and they even confessed to discussing these issues currently with their therapist...
How does a child cope with such negative experiences? Just like older viewers, they avoid programs that scare them, they look for support of those around them, and they creatively develop mental strategies such as thinking about something happy before falling asleep.
What, then, should creators of content for children consider in trying to avoid traumatizing children?
Avoid severe fear experiences such as inflicting bodily harm or undermining children’s trusts in cuddling toys, and the safety of their home and family – they do not promote a positive relationship with oneself, others, and the environment.
Do not avoid dramatic tension altogether – children need to build resilience to threat and anxiety, but at the level that is appropriate for their level of development.
Encourage a thrill experience, rather than a fear one, an experience where the child feels safe being scared by offering predictable happy endings, employ humor to break the tension, avoid presenting bodily harm. Movies such as Toy Story,The Lion King or Harry Potter could be a thrill experience but just if the child is ready for it – and for most children that is after 7 – 8 years.
Parents, on their part, should –
Avoid exposing children to age-inappropriate content. They are not ready emotionally to watch thrillers as preschoolers!
Develop media literacy competencies in children: e.g., explain to them that the hero/ine of the series will be back next episode, that the music is meant to make you feel scared for fun, etc.
Be there with them when they experience tension and exhibit anxiety – reassure them of your support and protection, explain to them the difference between fantasy and reality, offer a favorite stuffed animal or blanket.
Stay away from potentially scary content before bedtime.
Do not leave any lingering fear to settle and become a phobia – help them process it, seek help if needed.
Want to learn more about…
fear experiences and also learn what 510 children from 5 countries told us about their nightmares from screen - Click here to check our book.
Maya Götz, Ph.D.,
Head of the International Central Institute for Youth and Educational Television (IZI) and Head of the PRIX JEUNESSE Foundation.
Dafna Lemish, Ph.D.,
Professor and Associate Dean, The School of Communication and Information, Rutgers the State University of New Jersey.
Creating an App that is both entertaining and educational!
Young Children Can Learn Social-Emotional Skills from an App!
I consider myself a pretty good parent. I don’t let my kids eat dirt. They know how to call 911. And due to the nature of my job as a media researcher, I think I’m pretty well-attuned to what my kids should and shouldn’t do with media. But that doesn’t seem to keep my kids from finding and playing with app games that I’ve never heard of.
In discussions with researchers around the country and with those here at Texas Tech University, it became apparent that far too little research looks at the value of “educational” apps that our kids sometimes get their hands on. If we, as media researchers, can’t identify a worthwhile app for our kids, how are parents supposed to do so? So, we did what researchers do—we designed a study to test the educational value of a popular children’s app.
Together with researchers at Texas Tech University, University of South Dakota, and Vanderbilt University, and in cooperation with Fred Rogers Productions, we invited 121 children ages 3-6 to play with the “Daniel Tiger’s Grr-ific Feelings” app (or with a ‘control’ app) for about two weeks.
In the study, published in the Journal of Media Psychology, we found that children who played with the “Daniel Tiger’s Grr-ific Feelings” app were significantly better at managing negative emotions, such as feeling mad, sad, and disappointed (a skill that scholars call “emotion regulation”) than those who didn’t play with the app. For example, kids who played with the Daniel Tiger app were more likely to take a deep breath and count to four when they felt mad, just as Daniel Tiger instructs. This was also true for kids who played with the app and watched episodes of “Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood.”
Alone, these results are pretty astounding—kids can learn to manage their emotions by playing with an app! But our research team was even more amazed by what we found next. We met with families about a month after the conclusion of the study and found that the skills kids had learned had persisted. Finding short-term effects of media use is pretty common in media research, but such long-term effects are much more rare. In other words, there is something about playing with the Daniel Tiger app that teaches emotional skills to children that sticks with them long-term.
As a parent myself, the implications for this study are clear—it’s okay to let my kids play with the “Daniel Tiger’s Grr-ific Feelings” app. Among the thousands of apps that claim to be “educational,” we now have an option that research shows is truly educational.
I encourage content creators to take a close look at the ways in which the intended lesson was incorporated into the app and its features. While this study did not look at specific components of the app or its content, we know from past research that educational content for kids tends to have better results when it includes features such as:
The inclusion of relatable (and known) characters: Daniel Tiger is the age of the kids for whom the app is intended.
Memorable songs: Once you hear Daniel Tiger jingles, they’re hard to get out of your head—just ask any parent of a child who spends time with Daniel Tiger content.
Simple & repetitive: Kids both crave and learn well from repetition!
Tightly-designed games: Kids learn better when the task or plot is highly intertwined with the lesson being taught.
I work hard at being a good researcher. I work even harder at being a good parent. Being a parent is tough, and in today’s world, I’ll use anything that helps me teach my kids the skills they’ll need as they grow up. And if an app my kids want to play with will do just that, I’ll take it.
Eric Rasmussen, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Media and Communication at Texas Tech University
Collaborator of the Center for Scholars & Storytellers
Citation: Rasmussen, E. E., Strouse, G. A., Colwell, M. J., Russo Johnson, C., Holiday, S., Brady, K., … & Norman, M. S. (2018). Promoting preschoolers’ emotional competence through prosocial TV and mobile app use. Media Psychology, 1-22.
Led by Dr. Eric Rasmussen, this research, was conducted at Texas Tech University, Vanderbilt University, and University of South Dakota, and the research team included CCS’ co-director Dr. Colleen Russo Johnson as well as CSS collaborators Dr. Gabrielle Strouse and Dr. Georgene Troseth.
(Photo courtesy of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood ©2012, The Fred Rogers Company)
From Beer to Big Bird to Blue’s Clues: Research has Impact
What do selling beer and selling the alphabet have in common? They are forever tied together by the simple genius of Joan Ganz Cooney. Given the challenge to try to make something good out of television that could positively impact young lives, she first made one clear insight- kids loved to watch commercials. “Children all over the country were learning beer commercials so they were learning something, but could it teach something of potential use to children?” asked Cooney. Clearly, the songs, jingles, and production of the commercials kids were seeing were attracting a young audience, but Cooney didn’t stop there. She did what would lay the foundation for perhaps the most important kids show of all time. She did research.
In the summer of 1967 Cooney took a leave of absence from her job at WNDT and, funded by Carnegie Corporation, traveled the U.S. and Canada interviewing experts in child development, education, and television. At the end she had a document to work from: “The Potential Uses of Television in Preschool Education” and from that sprouted not only the show, “Sesame Street” but also the Children’s Television Workshop, a model for working and creating.
Research had impact.
Her research and work continues to impact children not only in America but worldwide. Doing research and really understanding her audience and their needs also ended up being great for business because the show really worked for kids. They were selling the alphabet and kids were buying in.
Fast forward a few decades to “Blue’s Clues,” another show that revolutionized television for kids. And like Sesame Street, the creators of Blue Clues also spent time before the creation of the show thinking about child development and how it plays into making content for kids. They did research.
Todd Kessler, Angela Santomero, and Traci Paige Johnson—the trio that developed Blue’s Clues—wanted the show to be entertaining as well as educational. Santomero held a master’s degree in child developmental psychology from Columbia University but the novice team also enlisted the help of educators and consultants to craft a format that reflected the latest research in early childhood development.
Integrating this research into every episode, the show emphasized problem solving skills and audience participation in a way no other children’s program has before. While “Sesame Street” used bite sized content to connect with the audience, “Blues’s Clues” used a narrative, and empowered preschoolers to help the host, Steve, figure out clues. Not surprising, Blues Clues was also a runaway success, both with kids and from a business view. .
So the next time you watch one of those catchy beer jingles online or on TV, we hope you think of Joan Ganz Cooney and her desire to “sell the alphabet to preschoolers” or think of the amazing creators of Blues Clues who changed the model for getting preschoolers to interact with the screen. Because for both, research had impact.
Kim Wilson
Media Advisor & Consultant of the Center for Scholars & Storytellers
What’s the Best Way to Tell a Story that Teaches Kids to Tell the Truth?
‘It wasn’t about politics. It was the underlying values’
Joe Biden about John McCain
In 2018, it feels like the values of integrity and honesty are further away from our national character than ever before. We try to teach our children to be honest, but it’s challenging when they see grown-ups lying everyday.
The good news is stories can help inspire honest upstanding behavior. But do the stories we tell our kids to teach them not to lie work? Surprisingly counter-intuitive research demonstrates that for young kids, we may not be getting across the right message.
Researchers from the University of Toronto read children, ages 3 to 7, three stories: George Washington and the Cherry Tree, Pinocchio or The Boy Who Cried Wolf. Only one of these stopped kids from telling a lie.
The story about George Washington telling the truth to his father about chopping down the tree, and the pride he felt that when his father praised his honesty, was the only effective story. Why did the researchers believe this worked? Because this story, unlike the others which feature high stakes and scary outcomes, featured positive consequences. In other words, instead of being scared, the kids focused on the lesson at hand. Learning not to lie.
And while the researchers didn’t point to realism, decades of research demonstrates that for young kids, realistic, relatable stories are more effective (cough, can you say Mr Rogers Neighborhood?). So perhaps the fact that nearly any child can relate to wanting their father to be proud of them, rather than an obscure story about a wolf eating them, was a reason they actually got the point of the fable.
How can you make sure younger kids will get the message you intend to get across? See below for some basics.
Yalda T. Uhls, Ph.D.
Founder and Executive Director of the Center for Scholars & Storytellers