Nurtureshock
new thinking about children
by Po Bronson, Ashley Merryman · first published 2009
64% recommend36% neutral
In a world of modern, involved, caring parents, why are so many kids aggressive and cruel? Where is intelligence hidden in the brain, and why does that matter? Why do cross-racial friendships decrease in schools that are more integrated? If 98% of kids think lying is morally wrong, then why do 98% of kids lie? What's the single most important thing that helps infants learn language? NurtureShock is a groundbreaking collaboration between award-winning science journalists Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman. They argue that when it comes to children, we've mistaken good intentions for good idea
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I’d recommend the book NurtureShock (https://www.amazon.com/NurtureShock-New-Thinking-About-Child...) It has great chapters on sleep, race, praise and most interesting of all, how the ways in which our efforts to become perfect parents…
on “Ask HN: Parents of HN, what are your best sources for evidence-based parenting?” ↗You should take a look at the research - there is established evidence for the impact of television on language development. The book NurtureShock gives a nice overview, but if you want to go directly to the research papers it looks like there are plenty of papers like this: http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/128/5/1040.abs... The problem…
on “A Dad’s Plea To Developers Of iPad Apps For Children” ↗…significantly decreases their future probability for enrollment in STEM. However it's just not about girls, it also impacts boys negatively as well. If you have to read one great book about raising kids, make it NurtureShock. One thing I learned from it was how kids learn to value nature vs nurture. When you tell your kid "great job! you are smart" you are basically saying they have natural capability to do great things,…
on “Bob Iger Takes the Gloves Off for Disney’s Streaming Debut” ↗Agreed. This field is has a little hard evidence and a lot of circumstantial study. One of the best things I've read on early child development though has to be NurtureShock. The longest chapter is the reference in the back.
on “Crying for Comfort: Distressed Babies Need to be Held” ↗A few months ago I read Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman's excellent book Nurtureshock: http://www.nurtureshock.com/ If you have or are responsible for children, I highly recommend it as an excellent overview of current research into cognitive development.
on “Why Teenagers Are Growing Up So Slowly Today ” ↗By the way, if you have children I highly recommend reading Bronson and Merryman's book NurtureShock to get a good overview of the current research into cognitive development.
on “Is Consumerism Killing Our Creativity? ” ↗The author of this article has an excellent book titled "NurtureShock" (co-authored with Ashley Merryman), covering this and other relevant subjects. I highly recommend it, even if you don't have kids but especially if you do.
on “Once again, praise kids for effort, not for 'smarts'” ↗In the book Nurtureshock (must read for any parents, IMO), sleep deprivation is considered as #1 cause for all evils. Many schools forces teenagers to wake up as early as 6AM and they typically can't go to bed before 11Pm. This…
on “Decline of play and rise of sensory issues in preschoolers” ↗I don't have all the cites handy, but I highly recommend the book NurtureShock. It's evidence-based parenting. Twin studies and adoption studies show that children's personalities are about 50% genetic and 50% from peers. Adopted children reflect very little of their parents' personalities.
on “How Inuit parents teach kids to control their anger” ↗Probably a typo for "NurtureShock", a recently published book: http://www.amazon.com/btw-you-can-put-anything-here-or-even-...
on “Attention and Intelligence” ↗There's research behind this too. The book NurtureShock has a chapter on telling kids "you're smart" vs. "you worked hard." There was even some HN discussion on it. Basically, when you attribute your kids accomplishments to their being smart, they kind of…
on “A Redditor's insightful message for discouraged students” ↗…chapter of the book also appeared in New York magazine, although I can't find the reference so I don't know which issue. You can always read some excerpts on Google Books or Amazon, it's chapter 1 of NurtureShock.
on “A Redditor's insightful message for discouraged students” ↗I've read many articles recently that make similar claims. Chapter 10 of NurtureShock talks about this. Anecdotally, the idea seems to be growing in popularity idea among my fellow parents. One way to capitalize on this would be to create a mobile app which functions like a pedometer,…
on “Children aren't born smart. They're made smart by conversation” ↗NurtureShock, a book about parenting and child development research, has a chapter discussing how children's television shows kids behaving badly for dramatic reasons, followed by a resolution that "teaches a lesson".…
on “The Normalization of Violence in Commercial Kitchens Through Food Media” ↗I read this years ago in NurtureShock. Studies of adopted kids showed they still shared more personality traits with biological parents than adoptive ones. In fact they measured the two biggest factors as genetics and peer relationships with…
on “Familial Transmission of Personality Is Higher Than Shown in Typical Studies” ↗