In a study of the effects of an anticipated reward on the interaction between rewarder and rewardee, the hypothesis was advanced that the offer of a reward heightens a child's sense of outerdirectedness and dependency upon the rewarding adult. Twenty-nine preschoolers who had demonstrated some intrinsic interest in puzzles were asked to assemble a pair of puzzles under one of two conditions, reward promised (RP) or no reward promised (NRP). As predicted, children in the RP condition verbalized more often and glanced at the experimenter more than did children in the NRP condition. In addition, although treatment group differences in quality of puzzle performance and in subsequent interest in puzzles did not attain statistical significance, both measures showed significant negative correlations with number of verbalizations among children in the RP condition. This finding suggests that the promise of reward per se may not inevitably undermine intrinsic motivation and task performance; instead, such undermining effects may depend upon the impact of the reward on the interaction between rewarded child and rewarding adult. (Author/JMB)