Jeepers, Parenting is so over analysed today, there are thousands of books, articles, studies, you name it, and now there is an article on praising our kids, what next? Toss out the books and just do what comes naturally and if "good job" comes out of your mouth when your child has done something well then so be it. I really don't think it will have a detrimental effect on him.
Just to play devils advocate for a minute - do you think that maybe the phrase 'good job' comes naturally is because of the way we were raised and because we hear it all the time? Maybe it's not that natural I guess the point I am trying to make is that maybe what we believe has been shaped a lot by the cultural influences around us and if we didn't step back and analyse what we were doing, there are a lot of things that seem 'normal' and 'natural' because the people around us do them but aren't actually natural. If we never analysed what we are doing, I think even normal and natural things like breastfeeding would be faded out eventually because it stopped being seen as 'normal' a few years ago because of advertising campaigns by formula companies. It only takes one generation to do something or not do something before the following generation sees it as 'normal' and 'natural'.

I am not saying that Alfie Kohn has all the answers (even Alfie himself admits he doesn't), but I think we do have to be aware of our cultural influence and the reasons that we think the way we do. What we consider to be natural, may in fact not be natural at all but a learned behaviour from our childhood. Actually, the Unconditional Parenting book addresses the issue of why we believe what we believe about parenting and why it is so important to understand what underpins our values. It the values that we don't realise that are there that can be the most dangerous ones because they drive us and the are the basis for our beliefs.

There is also not just one article on our kids examining the effects of praise - there has been heaps of research dating back many years. Most of it has been done to understand what happens in education. Alfie Kohn started out his research and study looking at what happens in schools. Most of his parenting stuff is an overflow from that.

I found it very confronting when I first read about his ideas ... it went against everything I believed (and I was a behaviour management teacher before I became a mum). I have had heaps of experience with kids from all different situations and all different behaviours and now I have my own kids. But it has been a process for me to understand what it actually means. One of the most powerful things that I have gained from looking more into this is that I am understanding myself as a parent and why I do the things I do. Some of my beliefs have changed as I have started to realise why I think the way that I do and as I really start to question that.

I don't think that this information is trying to treat children like precious petals or anything like that, rather I think it is trying to question our beliefs about parenting to help us better understand why we do what we do. It's designed to challenge our thinking and cause us to look at what is underpinning many of our beliefs.

Really, the praise aspect of this style of parenting, is just one small part of a much bigger picture