Rituals Improve Children's Ability to Delay Gratification

Veronika Rybanska, Ryan McKay, Jonathan Jong, Harvey Whitehouse

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    44 Citations (Scopus)
    156 Downloads (Pure)

    Abstract

    To be accepted into social groups, individuals must internalize and reproduce appropriate group conventions, such as rituals. The copying of such rigid and socially stipulated behavioral sequences places heavy demands on executive function. Given previous research showing that challenging executive functioning improves it, it was hypothesized that engagement in ritualistic behaviors improves children's executive functioning, in turn improving their ability to delay gratification. A 3-month circle time games intervention with 210 schoolchildren (Mage = 7.78 years, SD = 1.47) in two contrasting cultural environments (Slovakia and Vanuatu) was conducted. The intervention improved children's executive function and in turn their ability to delay gratification. Moreover, these effects were amplified when the intervention task was imbued with ritual, rather than instrumental, cues.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)349-359
    Number of pages11
    JournalChild Development
    Volume89
    Issue number2
    Early online date18 Feb 2017
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - Mar 2017

    Bibliographical note

    This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Rybanska, V, McKay, R, Jong, J & Whitehouse, H 2017, 'Rituals Improve Children's Ability to Delay Gratification' Child Development, vol 89, no. 2, pp. 349-359, which has been published in final form at https://dx.doi.org/10.1111/cdev.12762

    This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving.

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