PERFECTIONISM / 003 [CAN EXTRA PRAISE AFTER WINNING BACKFIRE?]

Question
What happens when a parent's love and attention seem to depend on how well you perform?

Study
Researchers surveyed 153 Israeli high school students, around 16 years old. They asked whether their mother showed more love and appreciation when they did well at school, and how they felt and coped after success and failure.

Findings
Students who felt their mother's affection grew when they succeeded were more likely to feel superior after success and ashamed after failure. Both feelings were linked to working obsessively, feeling like you can never ease off. Shame after failure was also linked to avoiding challenges. This held up even after taking into account parents who withdraw love after failure. So extra love after success was a problem on its own.

What It Means for Athletes
It sounds harmless: celebrating a win with extra warmth. But if love seems to come with a result attached, a young athlete can learn that their worth depends on winning. That creates a fragile confidence that swings with every result. Note that this study was about school, not sport, and measured everything at one moment. But the pattern is easy to recognise in youth sport.

Try this: parents, show the same warmth after a loss as after a win. Praise effort and specific actions ("I saw how hard you kept pressing") instead of the result ("I'm proud because you won").

Source
Assor, A., & Tal, K. (2012). When parents' affection depends on child's achievement: Parental conditional positive regard, self-aggrandizement, shame and coping in adolescents. Journal of Adolescence, 35, pp. 249 to 260.

BEHIND THE SCIENCE
Translating sports science into information athletes can actually use.