A mother has sparked a debate after revealing the lengths she went to to encourage her teenage daughter to clean her room.

In September, Tiffini Hamer, who goes by the username @proudmomager on TikTok, uploaded a video to the platform in which she revealed that she had relied on grains of organic black rice, which resemble mouse droppings, to get her daughter to clean.

The video began with Hamer walking around her daughter’s messy bedroom, with the clip showing the teenager’s unmade bed and clothes and hangers strewn about the floor, before the mother held up a bag of organic black rice.

In the clip, Hamer then filmed herself as she proceeded to place grains of the rice around her daughter’s bedroom, with the mother’s strategy including sprinkling the rice in the closet, on the desk and in her daughter’s sheets.

“When your teen won’t clean her room,” Hamer captioned the clip.

The video, which has been viewed more than 16.1m times, has sparked mixed reactions in the comments, with some viewers finding the strategy amusing while others have criticised Hamer for the trick.

“Thank you for the best idea,” one person commented, while another said: “Omg this is genius!”

However, others suggested that the teenager’s room may be an indicator of poor mental health, with someone else writing: “Maybe she’s overwhelmed or needs help.”

“Idk… if my kid’s room looks like that, I’m going to check up on them, their mental health, their time management, etc,” another person said.

While many viewers were critical of the tactic, Hamer revealed in a follow-up video that the strategy had worked, and that her daughter had cleaned her room after assuming that the mess had caused a mice infestation.

“Since you all asked, she even cleaned her closet and got rid of clothes,” Hamer captioned the video showing her daughter’s tidy room.

In a second follow-up video, Hamer had her daughter address some of the criticism, with the teenager explaining that her room had become messy over four days, and that every time she had tried to clean it she had gotten distracted.

The teenager also claimed that, if she were suffering from mental health issues, she would tell her mother, as she is her “BFF” and she feels like she can “tell her anything”.

“My mom did NOT humiliate me by posting my room, if she thought it would have, she wouldn’t have posted it,” she concluded.

The Independent has contacted Hamer for comment.

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