Are kids more narcisstic now than ever, and why?

[Ace Pace]

You know, this might just explain those idiots who will waste ten minutes of class time asking 100 questions about one damn project/test/etc (and those who get all shocked that there is no review/study guide/whatever). And I'm talking ten minutes per student.

I mean Christ, do they really think their stupid questions are so important they need to waste everybody else's time with it? If they are that damn clueless/lost about what's going on, ask the teacher after class or during office hours!

Man I don't know how much time (and technically tuition money) I have had wasted by those fuckers.

Fuck.Yes. Do they provide classes on teaching retarded questions that I missed out? I swear this is the real reason nothing gets acomplished at some classrooms.

[Eris]

I got told I was special by my parents. They also had no qualms about telling me very sharply when I fucked up, either.

I think it's important to separate parental love from proper uprising ; All parents, everywhere, form the beginning of time, treat their kids as sacred little angels...untill they are old enough to understand some of the finer points of life, like "When you screw up, admit it, and then fix it." or "Nothing in life comes free."

It's not like you have to scorn your kid all the time ; It's all about striking the right balance.

I'm not quite sure that I'd separate the notions of parental love and proper upbringing. This may just be a terminological dispute, but it seems to me if you're just showering praise on a person and defending them from everything, you're loving them like a favoured toy, not a child. To love someone as a parent properly should seems to me to include provisions for sometimes dressing them down, punishing them, and otherwise pointing out when they're being a dumbfuck. The object of good parenting after all is to help your children become competent, capable, and mature adults. Treating them like sacred little angels seems to be contrary to this goal, and thus potentially a source of a corrupt form of parental love.

Love your children unconditionally, but act in their long-term best interests all the same.

[wolveraptor]

“If I ruled the world, it would be a better place,” “I think I am a special person” and “I can live my life any way I want to.”

These questions have little to do with narcicism. Most decent people could answer yes to the first (given that they're morally superior to the likes of Kim Jong Il, Ahmedinejad, and hordes of violent vigilantes). The 2nd might indicate some degree of narcicism, but it's technically true, if by "special" you mean "unique". The 3rd is a completely reasonable assertion. As long as you hurt no one, you should be able to live the life you choose for yourself.

I'd like to know how quantatative this survey really is.

[Darth Wong]

No, "I can live my life any way I want to" is not a reasonable statement. It is absolutely a narcissistic statement. The fact that you don't see that is only proof that you are not as far removed from this problem as you think. Notice that the statement does not have any qualifiers or conditions on it.

[wolveraptor]

No, "I can live my life any way I want to" is not a reasonable statement. It is absolutely a narcissistic statement. The fact that you don't see that is only proof that you are not as far removed from this problem as you think. Notice that the statement does not have any qualifiers or conditions on it.

Yeah, I was born during this "Self-Esteem" movement. Even so, what else could you possibly mean by "I can live my life anyways I want to"? Does the statement really imply that being a serial killer is a lifestyle choice that is reasonable? I think that's stretching it. What I envision as a "lifestyle choice" is not placing great importance on your job (i.e. lacking professional ambition) or being a bachelor all your life. Sure, it might be a weird choice, but it's not inherently harmful, especially if you're not responsible to anyone directly (like children or other dependents).

[Starglider]

I still don't see the problem this 'self esteem' revolution was supposed to fix. It's not as if there was a sudden bout of depression and worthlessness crippling a whole generation of youth (insipid Gen-X propaganda aside). Did people buying into this seriously think we could get an all-around increase in academic ability by refusing to tell kids when and why they're failing?

[Darth Raptor]

I still don't see the problem this 'self esteem' revolution was supposed to fix. It's not as if there was a sudden bout of depression and worthlessness crippling a whole generation of youth (insipid Gen-X propaganda aside). Did people buying into this seriously think we could get an all-around increase in academic ability by refusing to tell kids when and why they're failing?

I think it's because our society over-corrected itself in its move away from corporal punishment. Somehow, "you shouldn't beat your kids" became "all negative reinforcement is bad".

[Beowulf]

Also, I think some shrink saw a correlation between high self esteem and better performance, and took the cause and effect backwards.

[Darth Wong]

No, "I can live my life any way I want to" is not a reasonable statement. It is absolutely a narcissistic statement. The fact that you don't see that is only proof that you are not as far removed from this problem as you think. Notice that the statement does not have any qualifiers or conditions on it.

Yeah, I was born during this "Self-Esteem" movement. Even so, what else could you possibly mean by "I can live my life anyways I want to"? Does the statement really imply that being a serial killer is a lifestyle choice that is reasonable?

Literally, yes. But even to those who would reject such a strict interpretation, it implies that there is nothing wrong with being irresponsible, incompetent, underachieving, and generally useless to society as long as you're happy with yourself and you're not hurting anyone. The statement "I can live my life any way I want to" just screams "emo whiny snot-nosed brat" to me. The fact that it doesn't say that to you is something you should do some introspection on, rather than asking us all to make you think like a man.

[Adrian Laguna]

No, "I can live my life any way I want to" is not a reasonable statement. It is absolutely a narcissistic statement. The fact that you don't see that is only proof that you are not as far removed from this problem as you think. Notice that the statement does not have any qualifiers or conditions on it.

After seeing that question I answered to myself thus: "Yes, but

• ." This makes me think that I may have not answered various survey questions very well, some of said surveys were rather important...

[Darth Wong]

No, "I can live my life any way I want to" is not a reasonable statement. It is absolutely a narcissistic statement. The fact that you don't see that is only proof that you are not as far removed from this problem as you think. Notice that the statement does not have any qualifiers or conditions on it.

After seeing that question I answered to myself thus: "Yes, but

• ." This makes me think that I may have not answered various survey questions very well, some of said surveys were rather important...

If the list of added conditions on a statement is much larger than the statement itself, the correct answer would be "no".

[Adrian Laguna]

Dammit, I wanted to press "preview".

Literally, yes. But even to those who would reject such a strict interpretation, it implies that there is nothing wrong with being irresponsible, incompetent, underachieving, and generally useless to society as long as you're happy with yourself and you're not hurting anyone. The statement "I can live my life any way I want to" just screams "emo whiny snot-nosed brat" to me. The fact that it doesn't say that to you is something you should do some introspection on, rather than asking us all to make you think like a man.

I would think that "being irresponsible, incompetent, underachieving, and generally useless to society" contradicts "not hurting anyone". Considering that the considerable investment that society put into educating people, having no return on said investment is a type of harm.

[Darth Wong]

Dammit, I wanted to press "preview".

Literally, yes. But even to those who would reject such a strict interpretation, it implies that there is nothing wrong with being irresponsible, incompetent, underachieving, and generally useless to society as long as you're happy with yourself and you're not hurting anyone. The statement "I can live my life any way I want to" just screams "emo whiny snot-nosed brat" to me. The fact that it doesn't say that to you is something you should do some introspection on, rather than asking us all to make you think like a man.

I would think that "being irresponsible, incompetent, underachieving, and generally useless to society" contradicts "not hurting anyone". Considering that the considerable investment that society put into educating people, having no return on said investment is a type of harm.

Try telling the emo brats that. For that matter, there were plenty of debates that raged on this board in its early days, where I went head to head with people who insisted that being totally useless to society is not unethical at all.

[Adrian Laguna]

I would think that "being irresponsible, incompetent, underachieving, and generally useless to society" contradicts "not hurting anyone". Considering that the considerable investment that society put into educating people, having no return on said investment is a type of harm.

Try telling the emo brats that. For that matter, there were plenty of debates that raged on this board in its early days, where I went head to head with people who insisted that being totally useless to society is not unethical at all.

Did you try Kant's simple ethical test? You simply ask yourself what would happen if the law of the land was that everyone did [thing under discussion]. For example, if the law was that everyone must murder, then society would collapse. Similarly, if the law was that everyone must be useless to society, it would also lead to total collapse.

[Darth Wong]

I would think that "being irresponsible, incompetent, underachieving, and generally useless to society" contradicts "not hurting anyone". Considering that the considerable investment that society put into educating people, having no return on said investment is a type of harm.

Try telling the emo brats that. For that matter, there were plenty of debates that raged on this board in its early days, where I went head to head with people who insisted that being totally useless to society is not unethical at all.

Did you try Kant's simple ethical test? You simply ask yourself what would happen if the law of the land was that everyone did [thing under discussion]. For example, if the law was that everyone must murder, then society would collapse. Similarly, if the law was that everyone must be useless to society, it would also lead to total collapse.

Of course, but you're missing the point. The point is that the teeny-boppers can't see this until you spell it out for them in crayon. Most libertarians, even as adults, fail to see how they owe society anything. In fact, the phrase "I don't owe society anything" is quite common. Just look at Randroids.

[Hawkwings]

Ahh, the self-centered tards that fill the hallways at school. I had it well beaten into me that I wasn't very special, wasn't some great messiah that would change the world forever just by existing.

Seems to me like that's the american attitude though. "I'm better than you, I don't owe you nuthin', and whatever I say goes!" I mean, that's pretty much the American stereotype right there. Most people are impressioned with this, and believe it. And when everybody believes it and acts upon it, there goes society.

[wolveraptor]

Literally, yes. But even to those who would reject such a strict interpretation, it implies that there is nothing wrong with being irresponsible, incompetent, underachieving, and generally useless to society as long as you're happy with yourself and you're not hurting anyone. The statement "I can live my life any way I want to" just screams "emo whiny snot-nosed brat" to me. The fact that it doesn't say that to you is something you should do some introspection on, rather than asking us all to make you think like a man.

I think I see your point. While I don't think that statement justifies being a mass-murderer or anything extreme like that, it does seem to justify being a welfare bum with no intention of ever holding down a job, as long as you don't directly hurt anyone. You'd have to amend that statement as such: "I can live any way I want to, as long as I don't hurt anyone or become an unnecessary burden to society." Like you were saying, the qualification is longer than the statement itself.

[NeoGoomba]

Only praise kids when they've actually done something praiseworthy. Let teachers tell kids when they're doing something wrong. Let teachers flunk kids who are useless. Did you know that modern elementary-school report cards can't contain negative comments? Instead of saying "Johnny does not work well with others", you have to say something like "Johnny prefers to work independently". Instead of saying "Johnny is falling behind in math", you have to say "Johnny is able to do math with some assistance".

In the school district my younger brother attends, there are no longer any failing grades. You never see "F" on report cards anymore. You get "incomplete".

In this system you also get "defective students", but thats more a surprise in the later years when 10% of a class fails to graduate, as happened with my own graduating class.

[Seggybop]

No, "I can live my life any way I want to" is not a reasonable statement. It is absolutely a narcissistic statement. The fact that you don't see that is only proof that you are not as far removed from this problem as you think. Notice that the statement does not have any qualifiers or conditions on it.

This question still seems misleading to me. If it was worded as "I can live my life in any way" rather than "any way I want to" then a response of "yes" would absolutely be narcissistic. However, worded as it is, it could go either way. For example, I would have answered affirmatively to the question, but the way I want to live is by being a responsible human that contributes to society. Unless that's an excessively self-appreciative statement, such a response would have been improperly construed as narcissism++. Most of the people who are overly narcissistic are going to respond yes, but plenty who aren't are as well, skewing the result.

However, I don't know enough about statistics to know if this is something they were predicting and could accout for or if it corrupts the data.

[R. U. Serious]

http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/

How Not to Talk to Your Kids
The Inverse Power of Praise.

It's a rather long article, so I will only quote a few paragraphs:

When parents praise their children’s intelligence, they believe they are providing the solution to this problem. According to a survey conducted by Columbia University, 85 percent of American parents think it’s important to tell their kids that they’re smart. In and around the New York area, according to my own (admittedly nonscientific) poll, the number is more like 100 percent. Everyone does it, habitually. The constant praise is meant to be an angel on the shoulder, ensuring that children do not sell their talents short.

But a growing body of research—and a new study from the trenches of the New York public-school system—strongly suggests it might be the other way around. Giving kids the label of “smart” does not prevent them from underperforming. It might actually be causing it.

For the past ten years, psychologist Carol Dweck and her team at Columbia (she’s now at Stanford) studied the effect of praise on students in a dozen New York schools. Her seminal work—a series of experiments on 400 fifth-graders—paints the picture most clearly.

Dweck sent four female research assistants into New York fifth-grade classrooms. The researchers would take a single child out of the classroom for a nonverbal IQ test consisting of a series of puzzles—puzzles easy enough that all the children would do fairly well. Once the child finished the test, the researchers told each student his score, then gave him a single line of praise. Randomly divided into groups, some were praised for their intelligence. They were told, “You must be smart at this.” Other students were praised for their effort: “You must have worked really hard.”

Why just a single line of praise? “We wanted to see how sensitive children were,” Dweck explained. “We had a hunch that one line might be enough to see an effect.”

Then the students were given a choice of test for the second round. One choice was a test that would be more difficult than the first, but the researchers told the kids that they’d learn a lot from attempting the puzzles. The other choice, Dweck’s team explained, was an easy test, just like the first. Of those praised for their effort, 90 percent chose the harder set of puzzles. Of those praised for their intelligence, a majority chose the easy test. The “smart” kids took the cop-out.

Why did this happen? “When we praise children for their intelligence,” Dweck wrote in her study summary, “we tell them that this is the name of the game: Look smart, don’t risk making mistakes.” And that’s what the fifth-graders had done: They’d chosen to look smart and avoid the risk of being embarrassed.

In a subsequent round, none of the fifth-graders had a choice. The test was difficult, designed for kids two years ahead of their grade level. Predictably, everyone failed. But again, the two groups of children, divided at random at the study’s start, responded differently. Those praised for their effort on the first test assumed they simply hadn’t focused hard enough on this test. “They got very involved, willing to try every solution to the puzzles,” Dweck recalled. “Many of them remarked, unprovoked, ‘This is my favorite test.’ ” Not so for those praised for their smarts. They assumed their failure was evidence that they weren’t really smart at all. “Just watching them, you could see the strain. They were sweating and miserable.”

Having artificially induced a round of failure, Dweck’s researchers then gave all the fifth-graders a final round of tests that were engineered to be as easy as the first round. Those who had been praised for their effort significantly improved on their first score—by about 30 percent. Those who’d been told they were smart did worse than they had at the very beginning—by about 20 percent.

[...]


Since the 1969 publication of The Psychology of Self-Esteem, in which Nathaniel Branden opined that self-esteem was the single most important facet of a person, the belief that one must do whatever he can to achieve positive self-esteem has become a movement with broad societal effects. Anything potentially damaging to kids’ self-esteem was axed. Competitions were frowned upon. Soccer coaches stopped counting goals and handed out trophies to everyone. Teachers threw out their red pencils. Criticism was replaced with ubiquitous, even undeserved, praise.

Dweck and Blackwell’s work is part of a larger academic challenge to one of the self-esteem movement’s key tenets: that praise, self-esteem, and performance rise and fall together. From 1970 to 2000, there were over 15,000 scholarly articles written on self-esteem and its relationship to everything—from sex to career advancement. But results were often contradictory or inconclusive. So in 2003 the Association for Psychological Science asked Dr. Roy Baumeister, then a leading proponent of self-esteem, to review this literature. His team concluded that self-esteem was polluted with flawed science. Only 200 of those 15,000 studies met their rigorous standards.

After reviewing those 200 studies, Baumeister concluded that having high self-esteem didn’t improve grades or career achievement. It didn’t even reduce alcohol usage. And it especially did not lower violence of any sort. (Highly aggressive, violent people happen to think very highly of themselves, debunking the theory that people are aggressive to make up for low self-esteem.) At the time, Baumeister was quoted as saying that his findings were “the biggest disappointment of my career.”

Now he’s on Dweck’s side of the argument, and his work is going in a similar direction: He will soon publish an article showing that for college students on the verge of failing in class, esteem-building praise causes their grades to sink further. Baumeister has come to believe the continued appeal of self-esteem is largely tied to parents’ pride in their children’s achievements: It’s so strong that “when they praise their kids, it’s not that far from praising themselves.”

I'd really recommend reading the whole article, it's very informative.

[Stark]

That's very interesting, and it agrees with something I've noticed: nobody who is *actually* intelligent or skilled seems to care about crap like intelligence tests or people saying 'wow you're smart'. It's ironic that people apparently have to be told that effort and study and experience are more important than 'being smart', though. However, the media often portrays those of high intelligence as all-round success stories who can assimilate anything in seconds, which is absurd. The smartest guy I know still struggles with totally new complex concepts, and he's not interested in people saying how 'smart' he is - he's interested in learning and skills.

[Twoyboy]

In high school (about year 10 I think) I had a huge arguement with a teacher over this topic. We had Andrew Vlahov (pretty good Aussie basketballer) come and talk to our class. He asked who wanted to be a professional sports star. About 30 or so kids out of about 100 put their hands up. He said statistically speaking only one would... maybe.

Afterwards the teacher asked us what we thought of him. I said he was more realistic than most speakers we'd had in that he said we couldn't necessarily achieve everything we wanted because we might just not be good enough. The teacher practically flamed me for my negative attitude saying that we COULD achieve ANYTHING we wanted to. After some tooing and froing the conversation ended before I pointed out that if everyone who wanted to play in the NBL did, we'd need about 400 more teams, and then there wouldn't be enough support and the league would go under.

Hell some kid events don't even keep score, they let the kids play and say that everyone one won.

Hehe, this reminds me of the Simpsons where they move and Bart is put in the "special" class in the new school. They play musical chairs with more chairs than kids and say "everybody wins!"

[Cairber]

As an example, the sensei at the local karate dojo was incensed at one parent who angrily complained that his kid wasn't advancing in belt levels quickly enough. He kicked the kid and his parents out of the dojo IIRC. So many kids seem to think that good grades are something you just buy, bully, or threaten your way into.

I have had the same experiences. I am an assistant Tang Soo Do instructor and I see this all the time. Parents get upset when their kids don't get to test. We have 5 schools and three of them have taken to giving the kids more belts; that is, instead of having to wait to get from white to yellow, they give the kids a camo belt half way to make them feel like they are making progress. The other two schools don't do this. I have found that students who come from the schools that don't bend and give camo belts have much better students.

[Winston Blake]

No, "I can live my life any way I want to" is not a reasonable statement. It is absolutely a narcissistic statement. The fact that you don't see that is only proof that you are not as far removed from this problem as you think. Notice that the statement does not have any qualifiers or conditions on it.

This question still seems misleading to me. If it was worded as "I can live my life in any way" rather than "any way I want to" then a response of "yes" would absolutely be narcissistic. However, worded as it is, it could go either way. For example, I would have answered affirmatively to the question, but the way I want to live is by being a responsible human that contributes to society. Unless that's an excessively self-appreciative statement, such a response would have been improperly construed as narcissism++. Most of the people who are overly narcissistic are going to respond yes, but plenty who aren't are as well, skewing the result.

However, I don't know enough about statistics to know if this is something they were predicting and could accout for or if it corrupts the data.

I think the questions are a bit misleading too. For example, compare "I can live my life any way I want to" to "I can do anything if I believe in myself."

Obviously that's false (violating laws of physics, a mentally impaired kid winning a Fields Medal, etc), but I bet a lot of kids would mindlessly say yes, simply because it's a conditioned response. Primary school bombards kids with sentimental slogans that have the conditions excised. Nobody would claim 'Kids these days found to be more solipsistic than ever!' based on the above question.

Of course the teachers and parents automatically know there are conditions and limitations, but I can remember being confused as to what the hell grown-ups meant by this (and other slogans) until I reached high school and actually understood what working towards a career meant. I have to wonder if a lot of the anti-scientific sentiment out there is fueled by early indoctrination with the above philosophy that "Anything is possible". If you look at republicans clinging to George Bush, that brainbug of 'Things will get better if you just keep on believing in yourself' is pretty damn pervasive.

[Hotfoot]

I think what's key here is that the type of praise you give kids matters. If all you ever say is "Oh you're so smart!" or "Good Job!", it comes with a slew of problems. One is that they'll be afraid of being called dumb if they get the answer wrong. By saying "smart" as opposed to "right" or "correct", they associate smart people as always being right, which is an incorrect conclusion. The second is that they'll eventually realize that the praise is itself a meaningless platitude, like when kids are forced to say they are sorry as opposed to actually being sorry.

More directed praise is better, like describing what a child did well on a particular assignment. One key thing in handing out reviews is that you CAN include what the child did wrong, but you don't want to utterly demolish them. It serves no purpose to tell a child that they are utterly worthless and shouldn't even bother trying. Remember, there is a difference between showing a child their limitations and convincing them that they shouldn't even bother.

Now, obviously, this is geared towards more of an elementary school and middle school mindset, where you are trying to teach children basic skills they will need for their entire lives. The idea of that level of education is to try and get every child to have an adequate understanding of the material. Not everything has to be a competition at this stage. It's pointless to have a typing class, for example, where children are graded by direct competition with each other. If one child enters and can already type 60 wpm and other children haven't even seen a computer before, it's idiotic to fail everyone just because they can't keep up with the exceptional child. At this stage, you have to consider how well the child is learning the material they need to know more than just saying "you fail because you aren't exceptional student B."

That said, not all competition is a bad thing. It may not be the best example in the world, but when I play games online, I notice a trend of people who quit because they are losing, many times to keep their scores from going down as a result. Meanwhile, I keep playing, because I know the only way I can improve my game is by playing against people who are better than me. Kids who don't learn that lesson will simply give up when faced with adversity or students who are more advanced than they are. The jackasses who quit because they are losing are the same kids who would cheat or cram for a test just to get a good score rather than learn the material, or avoid classes they could do but would rather not because it would force them to lower their GPA. They're so obessed with having a good score that they can show off that they forget the point of the material, regardless of if it's winning a video game or actually knowing how to find x.

To provide a quick counter point, this isn't to say that all children should take advanced classes because enough hard work can let them achieve moderate success in them. Obviously, there is a cutoff point that comes in high school where a child should know if they are capable of achieving success in a course without spending so much time on it that their lives are consumed. That said, anyone should be able to pass basic chemistry, biology, physics, algebra, geometry, and so on, and everyone should leave high school with a basic understanding of these subjects. This is where the realistic assesment comes in. If a child's interest is not physics, and they're only marginally good at science, they would be ill-advised to take AP or Honors Physics.

Moreover, kids need to learn that hard work is more important than natural talent. I can't stress how important this is. Kids who buckle down and do the work required of them go so much farther than kids with "natural talent" who never lift a finger in class. Of course, what happens in schools is that the naturally bright kids are left to the wayside because many teachers don't know what else to do with them to motivate them, and they can't put the entire class at their level.

So yes, the tendancy at the moment is to coddle our kids and fill their minds with meaningless words, but it is a trend that is attempting to correct itself.

As far as "I can do anything!" I would personally replace that mindless drivel with an exercise in which the children tell me what they want to be when they grow up, and then have them do the research on what it would take to achieve that goal. Then explain to them how hard the work would be to achieve that goal. The idea being that you show them what would be required of them, not to tell them that they couldn't do it, but giving them a somewhat more realistic vision of what kind of determination it would take. They still might not have the complete idea of what it takes, but it's a damn sight better than "You can do anything you set your mind to."