NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children (edition 2011)

I really loved this book. I won it as a giveaway. I tend to avoid non-fiction because its so hard to get through, but this should be required reading for all parents, teachers and anyone interested in child psychology. Each chapter covers a different study of children which often caused unexpected results. In many instances, parents, teachers, government or scientists are putting a lot of well-meaning time, money, effort, and emotional deposits into ideas or programs which studies show do not produce the expected results. The authors tell you in detail why this happened, and what studies were done to discover why. The detail on the studies is almost tedious, yet neccessary. They tell you how each study was done, for how long, if there was a similar study done elsewhere, follow up studies, how many children were involved, how cooperative the parents and teachers were, where the study took place, socioeconomic backgrounds, race, etc etc etc.

The chapters almost always start with an intersting anecdote that seems unrelated to the topic, but explains things perfectly as you read through the chapter. Some of the topics covered are, lying, praise, self-esteem, teen rebellion, sibling relationships, how kids view race and much more.


The authors found that there are two biases that had to be overcome before these studies could be done properly, understood clearly and implemented in the lives of children:

1. Things work in children the same way they work in adults (The Fallacy of Similar Effect)
(It shouldn't be hard to see this is false, and yet the studies get overlooked in favor of what is best for adults - such as when school starts, zero-tolerance policies, discipline and praise, diversity training and the list goes on.)

2. Positive traits in children oppose or ward off negative behavior (The Fallacy of the Good/Bad Dichotomy)
A few examples would be assuming children with good self-esteem are less agressive than kids with bad self-esteem - its the opposite, assuming that children who clearly understand what lies are and why they are bad lie less. (They lie more convincingly and more often.) Cause and effect are tricky things.

It is a really long read (as is this review - I apologize) but is jam packed with so many goodies that I'll be referring back to it for a long time. I'm afraid to lend it out. I wish I had a few more copies!

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If you are a parent or work with children, then you will enjoy this book. The authors reveal how many well-intentioned parenting strategies are not working. Nurture Shock covers a wide variety of parenting topics including how the self-esteem movement has backfired, how children learn about race, language acquisition and education strategies. Very interesting and some of the results are very surprising. My one complaint is that Bronson narrates this book and can be a bit condescending or monotone in his narration.
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Good stuff that will be more useful and interesting in the years to come.
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The most interesting part to me was the study done on teaching pre-school children using the Tools method which was so successful the study was abandoned in several schools after a year so the ALL students could benefit from this method of teaching. Not only parents should read this book--but also educators. ( )

A bit depressing about all the ways I may have failed my children while following the current trends when they were young. Luckily they raised themselves enough to be some great adults. Hopefully by the time their kids arrive society will have incorporated some of these ideas (later start for high school) and be a better place. ( )