Ask The CogniTive sCienTisT - Can Teachers Increase Students’ Self-Control?

Oct 15, 2026

Explores whether teachers can improve students’ self-control, focusing on cognitive science findings about self-regulation. Defines self-regulation as the capacity to inhibit automatic reactions, manage emotions and attention, and plan behavior, noting its strong links to academic and social success. Uses classroom-relevant scenarios (work focus, music practice, patience in a task) and explains how structured environments and reducing triggers may help students who struggle.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryHealthcare

FormatPDF

Pages6

Reading Time15 min

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Can Teachers Increase Students’ Self-Control?

What is self-regulation?

Classroom examples and judgments

How teachers can help

Ask The CogniTive sCienTisT Can Teachers Increase Students’ Self-Control? ILLUSTRATIONS by CATHERINE ME URISSE How does the mind work—and especially how does it learn? Teachers’ instructional decisions are based on a mix of theories learned in teacher education, trial and error, craft knowledge, and gut instinct. Such knowledge often serves us well, but is there anything sturdier to rely on? Cognitive science is an interdisciplinaryfield of researchers from psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, philosophy, computer science, and anthropology who seek to understand the mind. In this regular American Educator column, we consider findings from this field that are strong and clear enough to merit classroom application. By Daniel T. Willingham Question: Some children seem to have very little difficulty staying on task, but others, try as they might, get distracted easily. And Daniel T. Willingham is a professor of cognitive psychology at the University of Virginia. His most recent book, Why Don’t Students Like School?, is designed to help teachers apply research on the mind to the classroom setting. For his articles on education, [go to www.danielwillingham.com](go to www.danielwillingham.com). Readers can pose specific questions to “Ask the Cognitive Scientist,” American Educator, 555 New Jersey Ave. N.W., Washington, DC 20001, or to[amered@aft.org. Future columns will](amered@aft.org. Future columns will) try to address readers’ questions. those seem to be the same students whose tempers flair at what seem to be small provocations. Why is it that some children have so much trouble controlling themselves? Is there anything I can do to help them? Answer: Among cognitive scientists, this quality is usually called “self-regulation” and it has been the subject of intense study in the last five years. The idea is that there is often a rapid, automatic response to a situation, but that automatic response may not be the one that the individual, upon reflection, would want to make. Self-regulation refers to the ability to inhibit the automatic response and to do something else; more generally, it refers to the ability to control one’s emotions, to control attention and other cognitive processes, and to plan and control behavior. This capacity turns out to have enormous consequences for academic and social success. And, as teachers observe daily, children differ widely in how much of this capacity they seem to have. Recent research indicates that teachers can help students—especially students having the most trouble—by providing an organized classroom environment, and by removing elements in the environment that can trigger impulsive behavior. 22 AMERICAN EDUCATOR | SUMMER 2011 What do the following three scenarios have in as a marshmallow. He could, at anytime, ring a bell to summon common? the experimenter, and then he would be allowed to eatthe marsh mallow. But if the child could refrain from eating the marshmal- • Construction workers pour cement for a side low until the experimenter returned on her own, a second walk outside your fifth-grade classroom, clearly marshmallow would be added and the child could eat both. Thus, visible through the windows, but Vincent manages to ignore like Rosalind, the child had the choice of having something plea this interesting scene and focus on his work. surable immediately, or forgoing it in anticipation of gaining an • Fourteen-year-old Rosalind practices her piano scale exercises even greater reward later. faithfully, even though she’d rather hang out with her friends, Finally, some researchers have trusted that when you describe because she dreams of playing Chopin. self-regulation, people know what you mean. People generally feel confident in judging whether an individual is rather impulsive • Malik has been carefully building a block structure for five or more measured in his or her responses. These judgments seem minutes when another pre

FAQs

What does “self-regulation” mean in this article?

It refers to the ability to inhibit an automatic response and instead do something else—controlling emotions, attention, and other cognitive processes while planning and controlling behavior.

Why do some children struggle to control themselves?

The article explains that automatic reactions to situations may not be the ones a person would choose after reflection, leading to differences in how much self-regulation students seem to have.

How can teachers help students improve self-control?

By providing an organized classroom environment and removing environmental elements that can trigger impulsive behavior, especially for students having the most trouble.

Oct 15, 2026

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