Pseudochoices

A "pseudochoice" is a threat in disguise as a real choice. Educational expert Alfie Kohn has used the term when describing the "choices" given to students, children and teenagers by teachers and parents, but it could easily apply to any power-based relationship.

Kohn says that one of the main reasons students are burning out and disengaging from school is that they feel powerless and have a lack of a say or choice in what happens to them in school. As Kohn puts it, the "choice" is really just "Obey or Suffer." This "choice" can be presented in a way where it’s obvious that coercion is used or it can be done in a way that’s more subtle, but either way it is not a real choice.

Kohn explains the "Obey or Suffer" situation as follows:

A teacher or parent may appear to be giving a choice, but it is deliberately limited in such a way that there is little true reasonable choice. For example, there are typically just two options given, and neither of these two "choices" are something the person would freely choose on their own. One choice is always something which is obviously very undesirable while the other is obviously something the teacher, parent, etc. wants the other young person to do. Thus, the giving of two "choices" is really just a threat that’s been sugar coated, or as mentioned above, a threat in diguise as a choice.

A parent might say to a child, "You can either chose to stop jumping the bed or have a time out." Obviously, the child would not voluntarily pick either option because they are enjoying jumping on the bed.

2. A parent or teacher wants to make it appear that the student/child/teenager "chose" the punishment, so therefore deserves it and has no reason to complain. For example, a father might say, "You chose to have your cell phone taken away," when the father wants to punish his son for talking on the phone after the father ordered him to stop. But the motivation for staying on the phone was not to get the "reward" of having it taken it away so the father is acting fraudulently and an intelligent person would realize this.

3.

- A teacher pretends to let the class pick out of a few options, but whatever the class picks it is the "wrong" choice. So the class ends up doing whatever the teacher wants anyway.

What are the effects of pseudochoices? The same as if outright coercion had been used – the person would feel powerless, helpless and disrespected . Their wishes and wants have been invalidated. The effects might be even greater, because they might feel that they are being manipulated or controlled but not realise how.

---

2011 - I thought of this one day "Your choice my foot"

12/03/2012 05:48:42 PM

EQI.org Home Page

Core Components of EQI.org

Other EQI.org Topics:

Emotional Intelligence | Empathy
Emotional Abuse | Understanding
Emotional Literacy | Feeling Words
Respect | Parenting | Caring
Listening | Invalidation | Hugs
Depression |Education
Personal Growth

Search EQI.org | Support EQI.org

EQI.org Library and Bookstore

google ad goes here

Online Consulting, Counseling Coaching from EQI.org

(slightly adapted)

In his excellent book, "Beyond Discipline," Kohn begins by asking the important question: What exactly is meant by "choice"? He then writes:

In practice, the word may be misleading; it may be used to describe situations in which students actually have very little opportunity to make meaningful decisions. What is described as a choice may, in any of three distinct ways, actually be a pseudochoice.

1. “Obey or suffer.”

Lee Canter (quoted in Hill 1990, p. 75) gives us his idea of letting students make decisions: “The way you teach kids to be responsible is by telling them exactly what is expected of them and then giving them a choice” as to whether they comply (obey).

Here we have a rather peculiar understanding of the word responsible, which looks suspiciously like a euphemism for “obedient”. (See Alfie's Glossary) But Canter’s pronouncement also contains a sharply limited view of “choice,” which amounts to either

(a) doing “exactly what is expected” by the teacher or

(b) facing the consequences (punishment).

In Appendix of his book Beyond Discipline, Kohn creates what could be called his cynic's glossary of terms used by many advocates of the new style parenting and education.

For example:

re•spon•si•ble adj. obedient, compliant.

re•spect n. fear

be•have v. obey

Pseudo means: not actually, but having the appearance of; pretended; false, etc. In other words, a pseudo choice would be the presenting of two or more "choices" when in actuality only one could truly be chosen (ie "give me all your money or die").

chacha.com/question/what-pseudo-choice-mean

You're not free if you can't leave

what exactly is meant by “choice”? That’s the question we need
to ask anyone who claims to endorse the concept. In practice, the
word may be misleading; it may be used to describe situations in
which students actually have very little opportunity to make meaningful
decisions.
What is described as a choice may, in any of three distinct ways,
actually be a pseudochoice.

1. “Obey or suffer.” Canter (quoted in Hill 1990, p. 75) elaborates
as follows on his idea of letting students make decisions: “The
way you teach kids to be responsible is by telling them exactly what
48
BEYOND DISCIPLINE: FROM COMPLIANCE TO COMMUNITY
is expected of them and then giving them a choice” as to whether
they comply.

Harmony With Nature And Evolutionary Trends

Here we have a rather peculiar understanding of the word responsible,
which looks suspiciously like a euphemism for “obedient”
(see Appendix 2). But Canter’s pronouncement also contains a sharply
limited view of “choice,” which amounts to either (a) doing “exactly
what is expected” by the teacher or (b) facing the consequences.

nsistent with a pattern we have already noticed, the philosophy
and techniques of Assertive Discipline are echoed in the New
Disciplines, notwithstanding the claims of the latter to be substantially
different. If a child is late returning from recess, for example,
Dreikurs suggests that in the future we give her “a choice of returning
with the others or standing by the teacher during recess until it is
time to return to class” (Dreikurs et al. 1982, p. 123).
But children may not even get to recess in the first place if teachers
have offered them the sort of choice described in Discipline with
Dignity. A student who for any reason has not completed a task on (the
teacher’s) schedule is to be told, “You can do your assignment now
or during recess” (Curwin and Mendler 1988, p. 15; also see Charney
1991, Collis and Dalton 1990). Remarkably, this is even commended
to us as an illustration of letting students make decisions.
To begin with, notice that the options for the student have been
gratuitously reduced to two—a practice that can sometimes be justified
but ought not to be accepted without careful reflection.10 On
closer examination, though, these sorts of examples do not present
children with a real choice at all. Typically no child wants to miss
recess. The teacher is really saying, “Finish your work now or I’m
going to take away something you like”—or, in generic terms, “Do
what I tell you or I’m going to punish you.”
Wrapping this threat in the language of choice allows the teacher
to camouflage a conventional use of coercion by pretending to offer
the student a chance to decide—or, in the sanitized language preferred
by one proponent of this technique, the teacher is “using
choices . . . to elicit or motivate desired behaviors” (Bluestein 1988,
p. 149). The fact that these behaviors are desired—indeed, required—by

49
Punishment Lite: “Consequences” and Pseudochoice

someone else means that the putative chooser doesn’t really have
much choice at all. “As soon as we say ‘Either you do this for me or
I’ll do that to you,’ the child will feel trapped and hostile” (Faber and
Mazlish 1995, p. 90).

2. “You punished yourself.” In a variation of this gambit that is
a hallmark of Assertive Discipline, students are punished after disobeying
the teacher’s command, but the punishment is presented as
something they asked for: “If they choose to behave in an inappropriate
manner” as determined unilaterally by the teacher, “they will
also choose to accept the negative consequences of that choice”
(Canter and Canter 1992, p. 169). Thus: “You have chosen to sit by
yourself at the table” (p. 81); “you will choose to have your parents
called” (p. 194); and so on.

Once again, the New Disciplines follow in lockstep. In Discipline
with Dignity, we are encouraged to tell students who break the rules
that they have “chosen to go home for the rest of the day” (Curwin
and Mendler 1988, p. 15) or have “chosen five minutes in Siberia
(time-out area)” (p. 107). In Cooperative Discipline, a child is likewise
told that she has “chosen to go to [time-out in] Mr. Jordan’s
room” (Albert 1989, p. 77). And in a book called Teaching Children
to Care, we find the same thing: “I see you are choosing to go to
your time-out place” (Charney 1991, p. 114).11

Again, the appeal of this tactic is no mystery: it seems to relieve
the teacher of responsibility for what he is about to do to the child.
(Apparently, students not only always choose their own behavior,
but also choose the teacher’s response! Teachers would seem to be
exempt from the axiom that people are responsible for their own
choices.)

Even in cases where we really can state unconditionally that a
child has “chosen” to do something bad—notwithstanding the concerns
about such sweeping statements raised in Chapter 2—the child
certainly does not choose to be punished for it. The teacher does
that to him. In short, this is a fundamentally dishonest, not to mention
manipulative, attribution. To the injury of punishment is added
the insult of a kind of mind game whereby reality is redefined and

50
BEYOND DISCIPLINE: FROM COMPLIANCE TO COMMUNITY

children are told, in effect, that they wanted to have something bad
happen to them (see Crockenberg 1982, pp. 65–70).

“You’ve chosen a time out” is a lie: a truthful teacher would have
to say, “I’ve chosen to isolate you.”

3. “Choose . . . and Suffer.” In yet another version of pseudochoice,
children are allowed or even encouraged to make certain decisions
specifically so they will suffer from their own poor judgment.
This technique falls under the rubric of what Dreikurs called natural
(as distinct from logical) consequences, which he defined somewhat
circularly as “the natural results of ill-advised acts” (Dreikurs and
Grey 1968, p. 63).

Of course, there is a kernel of truth here: many times, we do
learn from the unpleasant results that follow from poor choices. If I
leave my books too close to the edge of the desk, they may fall over;
if I stay up late, I’m probably going to be tired in the morning. However,
letting a child experience the “natural consequences” of her action
may not be particularly constructive, depending on her age, the
nature of the action, and other factors. Many people like to point out,
for example, that a child who constantly insults her peers will soon
have few friends as a result. But to conclude that this will “teach” her
to be a nicer person overlooks basic human psychology—specifically,
the reciprocal relation between perceptions and behaviors, and
the way they can spiral out of control. The fact that others steer clear
of this child may simply cement her disagreeable image of them—or
of herself.

Similarly, an aggressive child may eventually get his teeth
knocked out by someone bigger than he is, but this will likely teach
him the importance of making sure that he wins the next fight, not
the futility (much less the immorality) of fighting. Lilian Katz (1984, p.
9) has observed that “the school of hard knocks, although powerful,
is likely to provide the wrong lessons to children”—and the same
could be said about many natural consequences.

In a program called Discipline with Love and Logic, children
aren’t merely allowed to live with the results of their actions; they are
“forced to make . . . decisions” so that they will come to regret the

51
Punishment Lite: “Consequences” and Pseudochoice

bad ones (Cline and Fay 1990, p. 48). As a result, “children don’t get
angry at us; they get angry at themselves” (p. 78; also see Dreikurs et
al. 1982, p. 118). The authors are quite clear about the intent: “We
want our kids to

xx hurt from the inside out”

(Cline and Fay 1990, p. 91;
emphasis in original).

The sample dialogues offered in this manual
suggest a smug satisfaction on the part of the adult who watches as
children “learn” (read: suffer) from their own mistakes.
The salient questions here are these: What message do adults
send when they deliberately allow something unpleasant to happen
to a child even though they could have intervened? What conclusions
does the child draw about how much the adult cares about him, or
whether he is worth caring about, or how he should come to regard
other people in general?

Incredibly, the authors of Discipline with
Love and Logic talk about the importance of empathy, even though
precisely the opposite of empathic concern would seem to be communicated
to a child by an adult following their prescription.

In conventional punishment, a child is at least left with a sense
of self intact and the capacity to stand in opposition to the punisher.
Not so with this insidious strategy,

Xx which tries to turn the child against herself.

Any doubt about the lack of respect for children
demonstrated by this approach is erased when the authors give us
leave to ignore any objections that children may make to something
we have done to them: “Once you encounter resistance, you’ll know
[the technique is] working” (p. 103).

A caring adult wants to help children learn to make responsible
decisions about the things that matter to them—and to help them see
the results of those decisions.

That, however, is very different from
what has become of the concept of choice in the New Discipline
programs. Here, “consequences” are neither logical nor natural.