Does use of tangible rewards with individual children affect peer observers?
Giving one preschooler food for sitting helps that child and does not hurt or upset the peers who watch.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team watched preschoolers during circle time. They picked three kids who rarely sat still.
Each target child earned a piece of cereal and praise every time they stayed in their spot for two minutes. The teacher gave rewards only to that child while the rest of the class watched.
What they found
All three target children sat longer once the snacks started. Their peers did not get worse. In fact, some quiet kids also sat a bit more and the whole room stayed calm.
No child cried, whined, or tried to grab the food. The class kept running normally.
How this fits with other research
Russell et al. (2018) later showed that plastic tokens can beat food once kids get tired of eating. Together the two studies say: start with food to build the skill, then switch to tokens to keep it going.
Batchelder et al. (2025) repeated the same idea with adults and cash. Step counts rose only when money showed up, just like sitting rose only when cereal arrived. Both prove intermittent tangible rewards work across ages.
Marchese et al. (2012) used a similar look-at-peers design. They gave teachers visual feedback and saw untargeted staff improve. Quilitch (1975) saw untargeted children improve. The pattern is clear: when you help one person in view, others often copy.
Why it matters
You can safely use edible rewards for one child without ruining the group. The peer boost is a bonus, not a risk. Try two-minute checks and a tiny snack. When the skill is solid, fade to tokens or praise. Watch the neighbors—your single-case plan may lift the whole class.
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Join Free →Pick one wiggly child, set a two-minute timer, hand one cereal piece each time they sit, and tally if peers also sit more.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
The common assumption that employing tangible rewards with individual children will have adverse effects upon peer observers was studied in the preschool setting. Multiple-subject, multiple-baseline procedures were applied to two classes of children, aged 3.5 to 6 yr. In each group, three consecutive children with low base rates of in-seat behavior received a verbal contingency and food rewards for sitting, while peers (with either low or high rates of in-seat behavior) received neither food nor teacher attention for sitting. Peer reactions measured were in-seat behavior, aggression, nonaggressive disruptive behavior, and complaints. The procedures neither decreased the in-seat behavior of peer observers, nor increased their aggressive or disruptive behavior. On the contrary, peers with low base rates of sitting initially displayed an abrupt, but temporary, increase in sitting. Moreover, although no compensatory attention was delivered, all children exhibited improved sitting by the end of the study. Complaints, which consisted mainly of requests for rewards, decreased in frequency with successive program phases, and within each phase. It is suggested that the class improvement in sitting behavior and the absence of negative effects on observers may be partially due to the high frequency of attention the teacher maintained for other desired behavior and the lack of attention to children's complaints.
Journal of applied behavior analysis, 1975 · doi:10.1901/jaba.1975.8-187