Most awards are earned through an accomplishment of some sort; however, it has become common practice in modern society to provide awards simply for participation.
You may have heard the saying “if everyone is special, no one is.” This same principle can be applied to the concept of participation trophies — awards that are given to everyone involved in a competition regardless of their success.
In a way, this defeats the entire purpose of a trophy, which is to celebrate some kind of accomplishment. I personally find it easier to understand giving a participation award to a child, for example, as a way of boosting his or her self-esteem and building motivation to continue an activity. However, this can still be a harmful practice.
If everyone is given an award simply for participating, this removes its significance. The rarity of an award is what makes it so important and serves as motivation for people to win. When trophies are handed out to everyone, there is no longer an incentive to do a good job, since you know you will receive it either way.
That is the way I personally view it, but there are many different opinions on this topic. Some, like Gem Awards, state that the use of participation trophies encourages positive reinforcement such as teamwork, communication and trust. Others argue that, among other issues, it results in an inability to deal with failure.
Learning how to cope with mistakes is one of the most important lessons to learn in life, and it is impossible to learn this without experiencing failure. Mistakes help us grow and give us the chance to evaluate our performance to decide how to improve next time. This process is lost when rewards are based on completion and not quality.
Participation trophies can reinforce the idea that you do not have to work hard to be rewarded, especially for children.
Beliefs often begin to form in early childhood, and these trophies, while well-intentioned, can be misleading and cause adverse values in younger children.
I do not consider participation trophies to be quite as harmful when used as a starting point rather than a common occurrence. However, when a child becomes used to these rewards and starts to expect them regularly, this can create a poor work ethic and lack of motivation, stunting character development and creating a sense of entitlement.
This is not to say that participation trophies are all negative. There are several positive effects, as I mentioned earlier. It is never a bad thing to help someone else build confidence, but an issue arises when this creates a false sense of accomplishment.
I believe everyone should strive to create the highest quality of work possible to the best of their ability, and this can be inhibited when every effort is rewarded regardless of its quality. This removes the motivation to work hard and ultimately leads to a sense of entitlement that should be avoided as much as possible.
Canning is an intern for the Liberty Champion.