Ignatius J. Toner

Age and overt verbalization in delay-maintenance behavior in children

Abstract The influence of overt self-verbalization on the maintenance of self-imposed delay of gratification was investigated in a task in which the childs possession of accumulating candy rewards was made contingent upon the child stopping further accumulation. Preschool girls who verbalized about the goodness of waiting and preschool girls who uttered an irrelevant verbalization waited longer before terminating their delay than did preschool girls who verbalized about the delayed reward or were silent. Second- and third-grade girls who verbalized about the goodness of waiting or who were silent waited longer than girls of the same age who verbalized about the delayed reward.

Role Involvement and Delay Maintenance Behavior in Preschool Children

Abstract The influence of the content of statements regarding delay and the level of role involvement (free choice of verbalization condition, assignment to verbalization condition, or passive listening to statement) on self-control in 98 preschool boys and girls was investigated in a task in which the childs possession of accumulating candy rewards was made contingent upon the childs stopping further accumulation. Children who chose to verbalize the task-centered utterance waited longer before taking the rewards than did the children in the three conditions involving reward-centered statements. Children who were told to use the task-centered statement or who passively heard it waited longer than did children who were told to use the reward-centered statement or who passively heard it. Children who chose the reward-centered statement waited less than children in the other two reward-centered conditions. Children given no direction regarding what to do during the waiting period delayed less than children...

The effect of serving as a model of self-control on subsequent resistance to deviation in children.

Abstract The effect of having a child serve as a rule-following model for other children on the models own subsequent rule-following was investigated in a resistance to deviation situation. First- and second-grade boys (age range 73 to 94 months) who were told they would serve as self-controlling models for others and who actually served in this capacity touched prohibited toys less than did boys who were not told they would serve as models. Boys told they were to serve as models but who were prevented from performing deviated at a level between the models and boys given no responsibility. Having children serve as rule-following models for others is suggested as an effective, non-punitive technique to increase their self-control.

Punitive and non-punitive discipline and subsequent rule-following in young children

Responding to the needs of parents and child care workers for reliable guidelines, social learning theorists have offered a new perspective on the effectiveness of various disciplinary techniques in encouraging rule-following in young children. While punishment may be of limited value in consistently influencing rule-related behavior, non-punitive techniques have been found to have greater impact on children who have begun to master their native language.

American-sign-language statements and delay of gratification in hearing-impaired and nonhandicapped children.

Hearing-impaired children were individually administered a task in which possession of accumulating candy rewards was made contingent upon the childs decision to stop any further accumulation of the candy. Hearing-impaired children, who under instruction periodically made American Sign Language (ASL) statements about the goodness of the reward, waited significantly longer before terminating the waiting period than did hearing-impaired children instructed to sign statements about the act of waiting and somewhat longer than did hearing-impaired children instructed to sign a neutral statement. Since the pattern of delay was unlike that reported in earlier investigations when nonhandicapped children verbalized similar statements and since variation in mode of communication did not influence delay in nonhandicapped children in the present investigation, the results were interpreted in terms of differences in cognitive controlling mechanisms between nonhandicapped and hearing-impaired children.

Self-Imposed Delay of Gratification in Children: The Development of Self-Regulatory Behavior in Stressful Situations

Publisher Summary This chapter presents an overview of self-imposed delay of gratification in children. Self-imposed delay of gratification is at once a simple and multidetermined phenomenon behavior. The ability or willingness to postpone immediate rewards for the sake of greater delayed rewards is best understood as having two phases, which corresponds to a cognitive and a behavioral aspect. The cognitive component is most clearly shown in the statement of preference between immediate and delayed rewards. This statement is determined by a variety of considerations—both situational and personal. The second phase is patience or delay maintenance behavior. Once a decision to wait has been made, the individual is now faced with the prospect of following through on a course of action dictated by the delay choice. This phase of self-imposed delay of gratification is also influenced by a number of situational and personal factors. As in the case of delay decisions, these influential factors do not work independently but rather these factors interact. Thus, the prediction of a particular childs decision to delay or not and the prediction of whether that child will actually wait if the decision to delay is in fact made are most difficult predictions indeed.