The Necessity of Self-Regulation

post time 27. June 2008 member DrNaramor

Self-regulation is the ability of an individual to be aware of, monitor, and adjust, if necessary, their behaviors and emotional responses.  Self-regulation is a skill that is taught and acquired over the course of childhood, although it is sad how many adults have not mastered the art of self-regulation (just consider road rage).  Self-regulation (or emotional regulation) is not the absence of feelings or emotions – it is the ability to manage them and display them appropriately.  Ultimately, self-regulation includes the acceptance of negative thoughts and emotions as normal but with the understanding that they must be coped with and expressed in appropriate ways.

Self-regulation is a normal aspect of growing up and is especially important in the lives of toddlers, pre-schoolers, and school-aged children.  The child should gradually learn what are and are not socially acceptable behaviors.  For example, we expect two-year-olds to throw tantrums (sometimes in public); hoever, the same outburst from a five- or six-year-old meets with social disapproval.  We expect a five-year-old toshow outward disappointment at losing a T-ball game, but twelve-year-olds should be able to accept a loss more graciously.

There are consequences of not having adequate self-regulation.  Children who do not learn to successfully manage their behaviors and cope with their emotions are at increased risk for social rejection, particularly in settings such as school, church, sports, or in the community.  Children who have poor self-regulation are much more likely to be unpopular with their peers and adults.  Research has demonstrated that children with poor self-regulation are much more likely to grow into adults who face employment challenges, have higher than average divorce rates, and suffer in greater numbers from anxiety and depression. 

Self-regulation is developed when parents take an active role in their child’s life.  Parents who monitor their child’s behavior and explictly teach them appropriate ways to handle situations and circumstances, assist the child in developing this essential skill.  Teaching self-regulation is a gradual process.  During the younger years parents must be actively engaged in this training.  Responsibility for self-regulation is gradually turned over to the child and marks their emerging maturity and independence.

 

Category Discipline, General, Parenting | 0 Kommentare »

Schedules of Reinforcement

post time 2. June 2008 member DrNaramor

In business there are whole theories based around the way people are rewarded for their work or behaviors.  One such theory, Schedules of Reinforcement, is also used in the field of psychology and has to do with the way behaviors are either reinforced or extinguished.  There are four primary schedules of reinforcement but let’s reflect on the strongest reinforcer of all, which is called the Variable Ratio of Reinforcement.

The Variable Ratio of Reinforcement means that every so often a particular behavior is going to be rewarded.  The person generating the behavior can’t be sure when the behavior will be rewarded so they keep trying and keep trying.  Every once in a while they get what they want (the behavior is rewarded) which then encourages them to keep trying the same means of getting the reward. 

An example of a person engaging in a Variable Ratio of Reinforcement is a gambler at a slot machine.  The person knows that if they just keep feeding the machine nickels (or has inflation put the price at a quarter?) eventually they might get rewarded with a payout.  And, of course, they are hoping for a BIG payout!  The machines “know” that if they reward the gambler with a small payout they are even more likely to keep putting nickels in the little slot – again looking for a bigger payout.  By now the gambler is “hooked!”  Just a few more nickels, just a few more minutes, and the gambler is SURE the big reward is coming.

This type of behavior is the most difficult of all to change or stop.  In psychological jargon it is the “most resistant to extinction” and the easiest to get started again once it has been stopped.  The rewards aren’t predictable in terms of frequency or size, but there ARE rewards at some point.  And when the reward does come it simply strengthens the gambling behavior.

“What does this have to do with my child?” you are asking.  After all your child isn’t a gambler; never goes near the slots!  I assure you, Variable Ratios of Reinforcement are alive and well in most of our households.  No, we don’t have slot machines, but we do have gamblers!  In our homes it sounds like this: 

“Can I have some cookies?” 

“Not now, it is almost dinner time.” 

“Can I please have just one cookie?” 

“No, not now.” 

“Pleeease?  I promise to eat all of my vegetables.” 

“I said, no.” 

“But, but… please!” 

“FINE! Have a cookie; have a dozen! But you had better eat all of your dinner.” 

Your son or daughter just gambled that if they persisted long enough they would get a reward, a payout from the mom or dad slot machine!  And by giving in to their request you just strengthened their behavior so the next time they want a “payout” they will persist even more (perhaps add a whine or two or an octave or two).

There are millions of examples of kids “gambling” to get what they want.  Perhaps it is candy or a toy at the checkout stand, another few minutes at the video game, another half hour of TV before bedtime, or more time to play outside.  Whatever it is, just bear in mind that when you give in to the nagging, pleading, whining, wheedling, or whatever, you have just guaranteed yourself many more repeat performances.  Oh, and don’t forget that it is one of the hardest behaviors to change!

  

Category Discipline, General, Parenting | 0 Kommentare »

Time In vs Time Out

post time 12. September 2007 member DrNaramor
  1. Time Out as a discipline strategy can be used successfully and is sometimes unsuccessful.
    1. Time out as a means of disciplining a child has been long used by psychologists, teachers and parents alike.
    2. Time out is used when a child breaks a rule or is disobedient. Generally, the child is isolated to their room, a corner, chair or other place where they are expected to sit and think about their actions and ways to improve or change them.
    3. Many people suggest that one minute for each year of age is an appropriate length of time for a time out.
    4. Once the child has served their time out then they are free to resume their activities and, hopefully, the undesirable behavior will stop.
    5. There is usually nothing done in the way of intervention by adults that will assist the child in being successful in changing behaviors. The apparent belief is that time out alone will change the behavior.
    6. While I agree in that the time out will stop the behavior in the short term, it does little, or nothing, to help the child change the behavior in the future.
  2. Time IN. Several years ago while discussing “time out” with a colleague, thought came up of parents having “time in” every time the child had a “time out.” I like to use this concept regularly in parenting classes and workshops.
  3. Time In for Parents–Whenever the child is given a time out for discipline the parents need to treat it as time in for themselves. Time to be involved, include yourself, instruct your child and inconvenience yourself.
    1. Time to “in”volve yourself
      1. Parents need to involve themselves in their child’s life and behaviors. Take time to know what your children are doing and who their friends are.
      2. What activities are your children involved in?
      3. What are they talking about?
      4. What music are they listening to?
    2. Time to “in”clude yourself
      1. Take time to be a team mom or dad, join the parent teacher association at school, be a den mother or scout leader–include yourself in your child’s activities.
      2. Know your limitations in this area—some parents do better in peripheral positions of support rather than coach or leader.
    3. Time to “in”struct your child
      1. Take time to talk with your child about ways to resolve disagreements.
      2. Take time to talk with your child about specific ways to change their attitude or behavior
      3. Teach your child. Don’t use time out alone to try to solve the problem.
        1. Be clear about your expectations. Your child needs to know what to do in order to be successful.
        2. Be specific about rules. Consistency is essential.
        3. Be clear about what happens if rules are broken.
        4. Be clear about boundaries. Be the parent.
      4. Don’t assume your child will learn appropriate rules from church, school, television, etc. You need to teach them what you want them to know. Remember that our children learn a lot about us by observing our behavior.
        • What do you do when the light turns yellow?
        • What do you do at a stop sign or corner?
        • What do you do when the cashier gives you too much change?

        Example: A boy is getting a newspaper from the news stand and a man asks him to hold open the door so he wouldn’t have to pay for his paper. The boy learns that stealing is okay.

    4. Time to “in”convenience yourself
      1. Parenting is incovenient. What do you do when your children are pitching a fit in the grocery store? Do you whine an nag for them to stop? OR do you stop shopping and take them out of the store to deal with the issue? Yes, in is inconvenient, but if you take time to train them you won’t have to nag every time you take them into public places.
      2. Another parent once told me about his two teenage daughters who were out of control. He came home from work one week and caught them throwing kitchen knives at each other. When we talked about the consequences for the behaviors the parents decided that they should probably put the girls on restriction. But as we talked about it the father said he wouldn’t do it because it was like he was being punished for their behaviors. He wasn’t willing to be inconvenienced to ensure the girls were adhering to the rules of their restriction. As a result the family came back a few years later for therapy. By that time the girls were truant from school, had run away from home and were living with boyfriends all in part as a result of the parents not wanting to be incovenienced in their parenting role.
      3. Yes, it is inconvenient to drive the kids places, to be involved in their activities, to take the time to teach them, but it is what you need to do in order to be a good parent.

    Conclusion–Parenting is tough work. Parenting takes commitment, consistency, and tenacity. You can’t quit. You can’t give up. No one will do your job for you. You asked for the job, YOU must do it. If you don’t have the tools or the skills, get them. Our future as a community and a country depend on you doing your part.

Category Discipline, Parenting | 2 Kommentare »

Parenting Styles and Their Outcomes

post time 16. August 2007 member DrNaramor

Four parenting styles have been identified and studied over the course of the past four decades. Each parenting style is evaluated using two paradigms: the amount of warmth and the amount of control parents use with their children.

Parents high in warmth:

  • Give frequent praise
  • Encourage their child
  • Are involved with their child
  • Respond to the child’s emotional needs
  • Spend lots of time with their child
  • Talk with their child about lots of things such as daily activities
  • Limit criticism
  • Punishment is used sparingly and purposefully
  • Limit signs of disapproval

Parents low in warmth

  • Are critical
  • Use punishment frequently
  • Often ignore their children
  • Show little affection
  • Show little approval
  • Are sometimes hostile toward their children
  • Have limited communication with their children

Parents high in control:

  • Limit the child’s freedom
  • Actively enforce rules
  • See to it that their child carries out responsibilities
  • Can be dictatorial
  • May try to regulate every area of the child’s life

Parents low in control:

  • Child does whatever he/she wants, whenever he/she wants
  • Child has few responsibilities
  • Child does not even consider parent’s response to their actions

Four Parenting Styles Described:

Indifferent – Parents who are low in control and low in warmth

  • These parents focus on their own lives and stress
  • They have no energy for their child
  • Do not display affection (or have no affection) for their child
  • Set no limits for their child
  • Their children are often uninvolved in life and community activities

Permissive – These parents are low in control and high in warmth

  • They allow their child a lot of freedom
  • They put few, or no, restraints on their child
  • Child receives unconditional love from parents
  • There is communication from the child to the parent but not much in the way of guidance and/or advice from parents to the child
  • Child is more likely to inform their parents of their plans rather than ask permission
  • Permissive parents do not show negative emotions such as frustration or anger to the child

Authoritarian – These parents are high in control and low in warmth

  • They issue commands and expect obedience
  • They have little communication with their child other than to tell them what to do
  • Parents set inflexible rules and rigidly enforce them
  • Parents allow child to gain little independence

Authoritative – These parents are moderately high in control and high in warmth

  • Parents accept and encourage growing independence and autonomy of the child
  • There is lots of open communication between child and parents
  • Parents set flexible rules (more flexible as child ages and matures)
  • Parents set limits on behaviors, but limits are reasonable
  • Parents provide aage-appropriate explanations for rules that are appropriate for the child’s level of comprehension
  • Their actions so not seem unfair or arbitrary to the child, so the child is more willing to accept limitations

Outcomes of the Parenting Styles

Indifferent

  • These children have worst outcome
  • Children often display destructive impulses
  • Children often display delinquent behaviors
  • Children become sexually active at a younger age
  • Children are more likely to be low in academic achievement
  • Children are more likely to be low in career achievement
  • These children often have poor interpersonal relationships and unsuccessful marriages
  • Children are more likely to have low self-esteem

Permissive

  • These children tend to be self-indulgent
  • More likely to be impulsive
  • Become sexually active at a young age
  • Are often socially inadequate
  • May be rebellious and aggressive in teen years
  • Have trouble setting boundaries
  • Have trouble defining appropriate behaviors
  • Have lower self-esteem, self-reliance, and self-control
  • May become domineering in adulthood
  • Often display little direction in their lives
  • They are low in both academic and career achievement
  • These children may also be active, outgoing, and creative

Authoritarian

  • Children tend to be withdrawn
  • They are often fearful
  • They are more dependent
  • Do not learn to make decisions for themselves
  • They are moody
  • Easily annoyed
  • Irritable
  • As teens (especially boys) they may aver react to restrictive environment and become rebellious and aggressive
  • They are more likely to become passive aggressive
  • they are often sulky and unfriendly
  • Children who are expected to conform and blindly obey often do not develop qualities that are essential to high-status, professional and/or leadership positions

Authoritative

  • These children tend to become the best adjusted overall
  • They are self-reliant
  • They are self-controlled and more responsible
  • They are socially competent
  • They have higher self-esteem
  • The have better school performance
  • They are more popular with peers and adults
  • They are more likely to have open communication with their parents
  • They are more likely to begin sexually activity later than many of their peers
  • They are more cooperative with adults
  • They tend to cope better with stressors
  • They are more curious and purposeful
  • They are more achievement oriented
  • These children are more likely to develop the qualities that are essential to success in high-status occupations
  • More likely to be successful in marriage and career
Category Parenting | 0 Kommentare »

Treating Learning Disorders

post time 13. August 2007 member DrNaramor

This post is the second of a two part series on learning disorders (read part one) and is in response to some excellent questions posed in the comments.

Treating learning disorders:

Once a particular learning disorder has been diagnosed there are a number of ways to treat it. The child may receive individual help through their local public school as long as the learning disorder is severe enough to qualify for services. The parents may enroll the child in a special program that will assist with specific disorders. For example, a child with an academic disorder may be assisted by a private tutor, a commercially available tutoring program (such as Sylvan Learning Centers, or Mathnasium), or something similar. If the child struggles with a language disorder they may be better served by working with a speech and language therapist. An occupational therapist would work with a child that has motor delays, particularly fine motor delays.

Can the child ever reach their potential?

As to the child’s ability to reach their potential. The child who most benefits from treatment is the one that is identified and treated as early as possible. I would caution, however, that public schools are more likely to make inaccurate or incomplete diagnoses. I’ve had three patients in the last two weeks who were diagnosed by their local public schools as autistic and treated for that disorder, only to be told years later that the child either had ADHD or nothing wrong with them at all. How frustrating and confusing that is for the parents.

Programs and Services:

As mentioned above, local public schools offer individualized or small group assistance for certain types of learning disorders. They also offer limited speech and language therapy. There are commercially based programs as well, such as Sylvan Learning Centers and Mathnasium. Although I don’t always like the approach Sylvan uses and recommend them only sparingly. I don’t know enough about Mathnasium’s approach to critique it yet. Private help is available for speech and language therapy, occupational therapy, and cognitive rehabilitation.

I hope that is helpful.

Category Learning Disorders | 2 Kommentare »

Diagnosing Learning Disorders

post time 6. August 2007 member DrNaramor

Learning disorders occur when a child has average, or above, intelligence but is failing to learn (achieve) what would be expected for a given age or grade level.  There are three learning disorders: Reading Disorder, Mathematics Disorder, and Disorder of Written Expression.  Reading Disorders are also called dyslexia. If you dissect the word dyslexia you have “dys” meaning not working properly and “lexia” having to do with words.  Dyslexia refers to any type of reading difficulty.  Some people think only of perceiving letters backwards (mixing up d and b or p and q) but dyslexia can also indicate other problems such as poor reading comprehension, poor reading fluency, or unusually slow reading.  To diagnose a learning disorder an IQ (intelligence) test and achievement test are administered to the child.  When there is a difference between the child’s level of intelligence and their achievement level in a particular subject area a learning disorder might be diagnosed.  You would also need to take into consideration the child’s age and whether, or not, they have had age-appropriate educational opportunities so far.  Learning disorders can be diagnosed by a school psychologist or a clinical psychologist. 

Category Learning Disorders | 2 Kommentare »

Inaugural Airing

post time 4. August 2007 member DrNaramor

Well it is over and out there. It was a lot of fun but exhausting. I am looking forward to hearing from people.

Category General | 2 Kommentare »

Welcome! New show Sat. August 4th 10AM on 590AM KTIE

post time 4. August 2007 member DrNaramor

This Saturday brings the launch of our new radio show “Pit Stop for Parents” on NewsTalk590 KTIE and I am excited and nervous at this new direction in my life. A radio show! It is a bit of a stretch for me personally. At one time in the not-so-distant past I never would have imagined myself addressing fifty people let alone tens of thousands.

Category General | 0 Kommentare »
   

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