Commands Activate the Behavior and Pleasure of 2-Year-Old Children

In three studies we investigated the responses of 18- and 24-month-old children to a series of commands to perform such tasks as putting rings on a pyramid and feeding a doll. The commands were given by an experimenter in a positive and responsive manner. The children at both ages not only performed a large number of the tasks but did so with alacrity and enthusiasm. In contrast, their free play with the test items prior to commands was desultory and their affect, flat. Then, in subsequent trials, without commands or praise, they repeated a major part of the tasks with comparable enthusiasm. It is therefore proposed that a potent incentive for obeying commands lies in the pleasure very young children take in fitting their actions to the words of others, a pleasure that sustains subsequent reenactment of the actions without commands.