Children's success in school improves when they understand how and when to request help. However, an analysis published in Current Directions in Psychological Science revealed a paradox: dozens of studies showed that while seeking help is fundamental for self-regulated learning, providing excessive assistance—particularly in challenging subjects like math—can lead children to associate help with feelings of incompetence and may undermine their motivation and reduce curiosity and persistence.
Witnessing Help
The researchers found that children tended to look favorably on individuals who help others. Conversely, children view those who require or accept help less favorably, associating help with incompetence and recognizing that others share this view. This belief may contribute to children's reluctance to seek assistance.
Children also made different inferences about others depending on the type of help that they received: "direct help" (which did not support learning new skills, such as providing correct answers or taking over) and "indirect help" (which provided a long-term solution, such as giving hints or asking questions). Children inferred that people who received direct help were less smart and would learn less, suggesting that the children were aware of an unintended negative consequence of direct help. The researchers caution that this could lead to unfair judgments about people and groups at a young age. When children notice that some groups in their community get more help than others, they might think that those groups are not as capable. This can lead to unfair stereotypes about different social groups.
Providing Help
Children as young as 14 months provide help to others, even if they have to face challenges to do so. Helping others has many positive consequences for helpers, however, the researchers found that children, like adults, distributed help unequally based on group membership, helping their in-group more than out-groups. In a classroom setting, educational differentiation, such as ability grouping, often results in lower ability groups receiving more help, which can then foster negative self-perceptions and further educational inequality. Individualized support is crucial, but when help is based on association within a group, it can strengthen stereotypes rather than reduce inequality.
Helping Children Help Better
To combat these negative consequences, the researchers suggest that it is essential to promote intellectual humility—the understanding of one's knowledge limits and respect for others' expertise. Encouraging intellectually humble attitudes in children can foster a positive view of seeking help as a sign of competence and learning motivation. Teaching methods that focus on improving skills rather than just getting good grades can help disrupt the negative association between help and incompetence. And finally in the case of educational differentiation, the researchers suggest that adjusting learning materials to children’s needs in an individualized rather than group-based manner could make differences in help much less important or noticeable.
StepUp Note
The hidden message of helping is, “I’m helping you because you need help.” StepUp to Learn exercises “help” by giving students daily practice in independent, retrieval-based learning. The student’s job is “watch and learn, then think and do.” It’s a special pleasure to watch children “learn how to learn” as they do the daily skill practice that helps them become independent learners.
Note by Nancy W. Rowe, MS, CCC/A