When Reminders Backfire: Why Nudging Parents to Read with Their Kids Isn’t So Simple

Shared reading between parents and children is one of the most well-established ways to support early literacy and long-term development.^{1, 2} Despite this awareness, many parents fall short of their own goals; according to Andersen and Hansen, a substantial proportion of parents report wanting to read more with their children than they currently do. 

This disconnect reflects a familiar behavioral pattern. People don’t always struggle to follow through because they lack motivation or knowledge, but rather it’s having limited capacity–parents are constantly dealing with factors fighting for their attention. The long-term benefits of reading with children compete with immediate demands such as dinner, work, and exhaustion, which puts reading on the back burner. Behavioral scientists call this bounded rationality–our tendency to make suboptimal decisions when cognitive resources are stretched. 

Reminders could be a solution; a quick nudge at the right moment can subtly bring a forgotten intention back into focus. But decades of research show mixed results. Sometimes reminders work,³ sometimes they do nothing.⁴ On the rare occasion, they can even backfire, prompting the opposite of the desired behavior.⁵ 

Using parental reading as a real-world case, Andersen and Hansen’s study builds on a long-standing question in nudge research: Who do reminders actually work for—and when?

The research unfolded in two stages. First, the authors conducted a survey experiment with 3,144 parents of primary school children in Denmark. Parents were randomly assigned to three conditions: a hypothetical scenario where they received a reminder, another where they received advice, and one where there was no intervention. Participants then reported how likely they were to read with their children that evening. The survey also collected data on characteristics like self-efficacy, motivation, conscientiousness, and perceived barriers to reading. 

To examine differences across individuals, the researchers grouped parents based on these traits. The authors then ran a field experiment over the course of 9 weeks with 570 parents who said they wanted to read more but didn't because they forgot. These parents were randomly assigned to receive three weekly text message reminders or no reminders. Their behavior was measured through an online reading platform that tracks actions such as logging in, browsing e-books, and reading content over several weeks. 

At first glance, reminders seem to have a counterintuitive effect. The results of the survey showed that imagining receiving reminders reduced parents’ stated intention to read, while advice increased it. This aligns with the mixed evidence from nudge research suggesting that reminders may not universally motivate behavior. 

That said, when the researchers examined by subgroups more closely, they found more nuanced patterns. Parents with low self-efficacy and high motivation showed a significant increase in intended reading behavior when imagining reminders. On the flip side, parents with high self-efficacy reported a lower likelihood of reading with their child, especially those with low motivation to change. 

The field experiment revealed what happens in practice. Among parents who report forgetting to read, reminders led to a short-term increase in engagement. In the first week, parents who received reminders were more likely to log into the platform and interact with the reading content. But by the second week, the impact became statistically insignificant. Over time, reminders had no sustained effect on engagement. Nudges get parents to show up temporarily before they fall back to regularly scheduled programming. 

Even though our lives would be much easier if reminders led to positive behaviors every time, the reality is much more complex.

Firstly, knowing the target impacts the success of reminders. The same intervention can produce opposite effects depending on the person. For some parents, reminders were helpful prompts. For others, they felt unnecessary, even irritating at times. Second, effects decay quickly. Even when reminders work, they tend to create short-lived spikes rather than lasting change which is really what the end-goal is. Finally, attention is not the same as action. Reminders can push people to the starting line, but they don’t carry them across it. Habit formation requires more than just a simple reminder. 

This points to a broader design challenge: reminders work best when paired with support that helps people act. Reducing friction like linking directly to a pre-selected book can make it easier to follow through in the moment, while simple scheduling prompts such as “after dinner tonight” help translate intention into action. Small elements of gamification, like tracking a reading streak, can also make progress visible and motivating over time. Together, these additions shift reminders from simple prompts into tools that support follow-through and, ultimately, habit formation.

So, if interventions rely on reminders to drive meaningful behavior, they may be overestimating both their reach and durability. Choice architects need to think beyond the nudge itself and design systems that make follow-through easier and more rewarding in the moment.

Reminders may work best as part of a broader system, instead of as a standalone solution. If forgetfulness is only one barrier to any action, addressing just that won’t be enough to observe consistent behavior. Parents may also need better access to engaging materials, more time, or more confidence in how to read with their children. 

Another takeaway is that personalization could be critical. Instead of sending reminders broadly, interventions could focus on identifying who is most likely to benefit and using that insight to tailor both timing and message content accordingly. 

Future research could take both these suggestions into testing to further evolve reminders as a nudge practice. Perhaps doing so would contribute to the most important question of all: what turns a moment of attention into a lasting habit? 

Reminders promise a simple fix–if people forget, just remind them. But Andersen and Hansen demonstrate that moving from intention to action is not as simple. 

Such a nudge can surface intentions but they don’t resolve the deeper frictions that prevent follow-through. What this research reveals is not a failure of reminders as an intervention, but instead, a limitation of how we think about behavior change. Closing the gap between what people want to do and what they actually do requires designing environments that support action in the moments that matter. Because in the end, the ultimate challenge is more than just getting parents to read. It’s making it possible for that intention to turn into a lasting habit. 

Andersen, S. C., & Hansen, J. A. (2025). Nudging parental engagement: Do reminders improve shared book reading? Journal of Behavioral Public Administration, 8, 1–11. https://doi.org/10.30636/jbpa.81.381

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