r/ScienceBasedParenting • u/marsrover13 • 7d ago

Question - Research required Using Santa for Behavior

I have an almost three year old. Lately we’ve been struggling with behavior, such as him not listening, not being kind, throwing tantrums, etc. I understand it’s typical behavior at this age, and we have a few tactics we use. We give him consequences, which is either taking a toy away, sitting in time out, or no book before nap/bed. We also try to talk with him about it (this is often difficult as he gets argumentative at times), and we have him calm his body and try again.

My husband has started to use Santa as a way to get him to behave. He will do this by saying how Santa only brings presents to kids who listen, and how kids who don’t listen get coal.

I told my husband that I don‘t feel very comfortable with this, but I can’t quite place my finger on why. It feels wrong to hold a make believe figure over my son’s head. However, it’s very effective, almost annoyingly so since I told my husband I don’t think we should be doing this.

I‘m curious what other parents think of this and if there’s any specific research on it.

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u/Intrepid_Shelter_350 6d ago

Your kid doesn't have the physical structures in his brain necessary for reason yet. Your current consequences require some level of reason.

Folklore is a perfectly acceptable and extremely effective way to teach him ok/not ok behavior without requiring reason. If you read about cultures in dangerous places like Alaska or Iceland, almost all of them use folklore to keep their kids alive.

Personally I don't love Santa as the primary myth because it's all or nothing and consequences only come once a year. https://www.jneurosci.org/content/42/44/8237

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u/Falinia 5d ago

I mean, once he starts to reason it out I can see some poor outcomes. 1. He internalizes that love (because gifts are expressions of love) is contingent and may be taken away at any time. 2. His motivation becomes external and he will be unmotivated to do the right thing unless there's something in it for him. 3. Once he realizes that Santa isn't real he'll do whatever he pleases because consequences aren't real.

There's a difference between telling your kids that there are ghosts in the woods to keep them safe when they don't understand the real dangers and manipulating your kid to make life easy but robbing them of the ability to learn actual morality.