How to Praise a Child the Right Way: What the Research Says

Praise is one of the most powerful
parenting tools available — and one
of the most commonly misused. Research
consistently finds that not all praise
is equally effective — and that some
of the most well-intentioned praise
actually undermines the confidence,
resilience, and motivation it is
intended to build.

Understanding what the research shows
about praise — what works, what backfires,
and why — is one of the most practically
useful things a parent can know.

Why Praise Matters — and Why
It Can Go Wrong

Research on praise and child development —
including foundational work by Carol
Dweck at Stanford University — finds
that praise significantly shapes children’s
beliefs about their own abilities,
their motivation, and their response
to challenge and failure.

But research also finds that the
type of praise matters enormously —
that ability praise and effort praise
produce fundamentally different outcomes —
and that well-intentioned ability
praise can actually produce lower
resilience, lower motivation, and
more fragile confidence than no
praise at all.

The Two Types of Praise —
and What Research Shows

Ability praise — praising the
child for innate qualities:
“You’re so smart.”
“You’re so talented.”
“You’re a natural.”
“You’re so gifted.”

Research findings on ability praise:
Research by Dweck and colleagues
finds that children praised for
ability — after succeeding at
a task — subsequently:

Choose easier tasks — to
protect their ability reputation.
Show lower persistence when
they encounter difficulty.
Show lower enjoyment of the task.
Are more likely to lie about
their performance.
Show lower performance on
subsequent challenging tasks.

Why: Ability praise makes confidence
contingent on continued success.
When the child encounters difficulty —
which they inevitably will —
they interpret it as evidence
that they are not actually smart
or talented — producing shame
and withdrawal rather than effort.

Effort and process praise —
praising the child for what
they did:
“You worked really hard on that.”
“You tried a different strategy
when the first one didn’t work.”
“You kept going even when it was difficult.”
“You really focused on that.”

Research findings on effort praise:
Children praised for effort subsequently:

Choose more challenging tasks —
because challenge is an opportunity
to grow rather than a threat to identity.
Show higher persistence when
they encounter difficulty.
Show higher enjoyment of challenging tasks.
Show higher performance on
subsequent challenging tasks.

Why: Effort praise makes confidence
contingent on something the
child controls — their effort
and strategy. When they encounter
difficulty they interpret it
as a signal to try harder
or try differently — not as
evidence of inadequacy.

The Key Principles of Effective Praise

Be specific. Research on praise
specificity and motivation finds
that specific praise — naming
exactly what the child did —
is significantly more effective
than general praise.

“You organized your ideas
really clearly in that paragraph” — specific.
“Good job” — general, less effective.

Specific praise tells the child
exactly what behavior to repeat —
general praise leaves them uncertain
about what they did well.

Be genuine. Research on praise
authenticity and child development
finds that children — from a
surprisingly young age — can
detect inauthentic or inflated
praise. Research by Wulf-Uwe
Meyer finds that children as
young as seven interpret excessive
praise for easy tasks as a
signal that the adult has low
expectations for them.

Praise should reflect genuine
assessment — not inflation.
“That was the most amazing
drawing I’ve ever seen” — for
ordinary work — produces distrust
rather than confidence.

Focus on process not outcome.
Research on process praise and
motivation finds that praising
the process — the effort, the
strategy, the persistence —
rather than the outcome — produces
stronger motivation and more
genuine learning.

“You figured out a really
clever approach to that problem” — process.
“You got them all right” — outcome.

Praise effort independent of success.
Research on effort praise and
failure resilience finds that
praising genuine effort — even
when the outcome is not successful —
builds significantly stronger
resilience than praising only successful outcomes.

“You worked really hard on
that — even though it didn’t
go the way you hoped.”

This communicates that effort
itself is valued — not only
successful effort.

Match praise to the child’s
perception. Research on praise
and self-concept finds that
praise that conflicts with the
child’s own assessment of their
performance is less effective
and can feel patronizing. If
a child knows they did poorly —
telling them they did brilliantly
damages trust rather than building confidence.

Acknowledge improvement and progress.
Research on progress feedback
and motivation finds that praising
improvement — relative to the
child’s own previous performance —
is significantly more effective
for motivation than praising
performance relative to peers.

“That’s so much better than
last time — you’ve really improved.”

This focuses on personal growth
rather than social comparison.

What to Avoid

Empty praise. Research on empty
praise — praise without specific
content — finds that “good job,”
“well done,” and “amazing” —
delivered reflexively and frequently —
lose their meaning and their
motivational power over time.

Praising for easy tasks. Research
finds that praising children
for completing easy tasks —
tasks they can do without effort —
communicates low expectations
and produces lower motivation
for challenging tasks.

Conditional praise. Research
on conditional praise — “I’m
so proud of you when you do
well” — finds it associated
with contingent self-esteem —
confidence that holds only
when performance is good —
which is both fragile and associated
with anxiety and self-criticism.

Over-praising. Research on
inflated praise — excessive,
over-the-top praise for ordinary
performance — finds it associated
with increased narcissistic
tendencies and reduced willingness
to attempt challenging tasks
in children with low self-esteem.

Praising in front of peers
in ways that create embarrassment.
Research on social context and
praise finds that public praise —
particularly in adolescence —
can produce embarrassment rather
than motivation, particularly
for self-conscious children.

Praise and Different Children

Research on praise and individual
differences finds that different
children respond differently
to praise:

Highly sensitive children —
process praise more deeply
and are more significantly
affected by both genuine and
inauthentic praise. Keep it
genuine and specific.

Children with low self-esteem —
research finds that inflated
praise for children with low
self-esteem can actually decrease
motivation — because it creates
pressure to maintain a performance
level they don’t believe they can sustain.

Children with anxiety — research
finds that ability praise increases
anxiety about future performance —
because it creates a reputation
to maintain. Effort praise reduces
this pressure.

Try This This Week

Practice 1 — The Effort Praise Switch
What it is: A deliberate switch
from ability praise to effort
praise — the single most evidence-based
praise change available.

How to do it: This week —
every time you are about to
say “you’re so smart” or “you’re
so talented” — pause and replace
with specific effort or process praise:

“You worked really hard on that.”
“You found a clever strategy.”
“You kept going even when it felt difficult.”
“You really focused.”

Why it works: Research by
Dweck consistently finds that
this single switch — from ability
to effort praise — produces
significantly better motivation,
persistence, and resilience over time.

Practice 2 — The Specific Praise Practice
What it is: A deliberate daily
practice of replacing general
praise with specific praise —
building the precision that makes praise most effective.

How to do it: This week —
replace every “good job” or
“well done” with a specific observation:

“Good job” → “You put everything
away without being asked —
that was really responsible.”
“Well done” → “You explained
that really clearly — I understood exactly what you meant.”
“Amazing” → “The detail you
put into that drawing is genuinely impressive.”

Why it works: Research on
praise specificity consistently
finds that specific praise —
naming exactly what was done —
is significantly more effective
than general praise for building
both motivation and genuine self-concept.

Practice 3 — The Progress Recognition
What it is: A deliberate weekly
recognition of genuine progress —
praising improvement relative
to the child’s own previous performance.

How to do it: Once each week
identify one area where your
child has genuinely improved —
however small — and name it specifically:

“Do you remember how hard
that was for you two weeks
ago? Look how much better
you’re doing now — that improvement
is because of the work you’ve put in.”

Why it works: Research on
progress feedback and motivation
finds that recognizing genuine
personal improvement — relative
to the child’s own previous
performance rather than peers —
produces significantly stronger
intrinsic motivation and more
genuine confidence than outcome-focused praise.

The Bottom Line

Praise is powerful — which
means it matters enormously
how it is given. The research
is clear: effort and process
praise produces stronger motivation,
better resilience, and more
genuine confidence than ability
praise. Specific, genuine praise
is more effective than general
or inflated praise. And praising
effort independent of success
builds the failure resilience
that genuine confidence requires.

The shift from “you’re so smart”
to “you worked really hard”
is a small change in language —
and a significant change in
what it teaches children about
themselves, about effort, and
about what happens when things get hard.

Sources

Dweck, C. S. (2006).
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.
Random House.

Mueller, C. M., & Dweck, C. S.
(1998). Praise for intelligence
can undermine children’s motivation and performance.
Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology, 75(1), 33–52.

Henderlong, J., & Lepper, M. R.
(2002). The effects of praise
on children’s intrinsic motivation.
Psychological Bulletin, 128(5), 774–795.

Brummelman, E., et al. (2014).
“That’s not just beautiful —
that’s incredibly beautiful!”
The adverse impact of inflated
praise on children with low self-esteem.
Psychological Science, 25(3), 728–735.