The "Virtue" of Mischief :)

[Christopher]

I was inspired to write this after reading about Augustine's youthful 'pears' incident. Mischief is wonderful

I read a paper awhile back about the development of morality in children, and included in that paper were also the first examples of mischief. If I recall the paper correctly - Children, roughly around the age of 1.5-2 years old, begin to understand and develop codes of conduct. These codes are rule-based functions that include motivations such as care for others and personal autonomy (the roots of moral conduct as defined by psychology). With the development of understanding rule-based conduct, children begin to do something extraordinary: they intentionally break the rules!

One example I recall rather vividly -- after a child began to develop understanding of rules, one day the following incident occurred: the child was playing with pebbles on the floor indoors. His mother came in, looked down at him and said "pick up those pebbles. You know it's not ok to make a mess here." The child, still clutching a handful of pebbles, looked down at the pebbles on the floor, looked up into his mothers eyes, held out his hand, then opened his fist and let the rest of the pebbles fall to the floor where they made a great mess. He laughed at this hysterically!

"Moral" of the story: There is something in us that loves to break rules, and our natural pleasure in doing so means that we are biologically motivated towards it! Mischief can be a wonderfully healthy thing, and it's probably one of the defining characteristics in many innovators today.

Christopher

[Selene]

I was inspired to write this after reading about Augustine's youthful 'pears' incident. Mischief is wonderful

I read a paper awhile back about the development of morality in children, and included in that paper were also the first examples of mischief. If I recall the paper correctly - Children, roughly around the age of 1.5-2 years old, begin to understand and develop codes of conduct. These codes are rule-based functions that include motivations such as care for others and personal autonomy (the roots of moral conduct as defined by psychology). With the development of understanding rule-based conduct, children begin to do something extraordinary: they intentionally break the rules!

One example I recall rather vividly -- after a child began to develop understanding of rules, one day the following incident occurred: the child was playing with pebbles on the floor indoors. His mother came in, looked down at him and said "pick up those pebbles. You know it's not ok to make a mess here." The child, still clutching a handful of pebbles, looked down at the pebbles on the floor, looked up into his mothers eyes, held out his hand, then opened his fist and let the rest of the pebbles fall to the floor where they made a great mess. He laughed at this hysterically!

"Moral" of the story: There is something in us that loves to break rules, and our natural pleasure in doing so means that we are biologically motivated towards it! Mischief can be a wonderfully healthy thing, and it's probably one of the defining characteristics in many innovators today.

Christopher

Christopher:

It makes complete sense to me. We all test rules at various points in our developmental path. We also, at a point in maturation, decide that certain rules cannot be broken.

Interesting. If you remember the article's author or the title, I would appreciate getting it. E-mail would work.

Adam

[anthony]

Christopher,

This rings a bell! Mischief as a counterpoint to extreme seriousness - as a hard-wired pleasure - as a means to innovation.

Don't you think that its anti-authoritarianist-aspect (whew, not going to repeat that) is what makes it healthy?

Also, that it puts a different perspective on a challenging problem, often opening new mental doors?

I've considered this too; also its relative, Humour, but that's another topic.

Tony