Attitudes toward Parental Use of Promised Rewards to Control Adolescent Behavior

For each of four different situations, subjects rated 16 techniques in terms of (1) their likelihood of using each technique to gain another person's compliance and (2) the likelihood that use of the technique would succeed in getting the other person to comply. These two ratings were compared for each of the 64 situation-technique pairs. One of these pairs, the use of promised rewards in a childrearing situation, is shown to be unique, in that a very large proportion of the subjects indicated they would not use the technique even though they thought it would be successful. The importance of this particular technique for childrearing is discussed.