The damage that behavioral methods can cause to the child is serious. An emotional injury is being caused by ignoring their needs and manipulating their feelings, even denying them signs of affection if they do not behave as parents want.
This means that the child does not understand, despise himself, tell himself that he is only entitled to love and attention if he obeys and can compromise the healthy emotional bonding to his attachment figures.
If we reach this situation the child can develop an insecure attachment. An example would be those children who, in the absence of their parents, are very fearful and distressed, but, when parents arrive, they reject them.
Early schooling
But nevertheless, do not have to generalizeWell, emotionally healthy children may, perfectly, not be prepared to separate from their parents and feel no desire to interact with a stranger they do not trust, and, equally, be angry when their parents appear and show it by rejecting them.
That said, we should not take away from these very childish reactions of children who are not prepared to go to daycare and, when meeting with their parents, they show their anger and grief with negative reactions.
If this happens, we must be attentive, because we must understand that young children are not prepared to rationally understand our reasons for leaving them in the care of others.
The first solution to this problem would be to delay their schooling, but, logically, not all parents can opt for this. If we cannot avoid entering the nursery even though the child does not adapt, even if he is very small and cannot understand it, we must also explain it with serenity, because, although he will not assimilate all the words, he will perceive our closeness and understanding.
Be very present when you are with us, consciously attentive to your needs and never get angry or feel hurt if you reject us, but understand that it is the way you express your discomfort.
Behaviorism and attachment
Apart from the specific case of early schooling the issue of insecure attachment It has a lot to do with the behavioral parenting methods we have talked about, and, in general, with the inconsistency in the demonstrations of affection and safety of parents.
The signs of insecure attachment are quite obvious. The child is ambivalent about his attachment figures. Sometimes they approach and grab almost obsessively and others show rejection, resistance to contact or pure indifference.
Again, in this respect, we have to clarify some things. I do not know a two-year-old child who sometimes does not show these attitudes: sometimes they need the mother attached to them, they suck without stopping, they cry if they separate and others need to reaffirm their discovery I refusing to deny anything that the mother proposes or with tantrums when they fail to do what they have decided for themselves that they want or need to do. So let's see, then, what exactly is insecure attachment.
Insecure attachment
A child with insecure attachment usually has a mother or father who does not react consistently. Sometimes they are warm and affectionate, but sometimes, precisely when the child is most in demand, they are cold and inaccessible. Does it remind you of what we have seen in some behavioral parenting programs and books that precisely recommend coldness when the child cries or claims?
Parents feel a mixture of rejection and hostility with love, but feel unable to be close to the child when he is uncomfortable because of an unmet need (physical contact, food, discomfort, fear or tiredness). Your answer, instead of listening to your child and being safe and caring, is to deny the child's needs and blame everything on manipulation or whims. And the little one, lost, will learn that his parents, precisely, do not respond to his most pressing attention demands. A clear reason why I don't like Supernanny's methods.
To get that attention you may parents are isolated or rejectedBut, normally, their need for love and attention is so great that they either submit to the adult designs denying themselves or will act showing much more demanding, naughty, aggressive or having exaggerated tantrums.
The child in this case behaves in a way that responds to an attachment figure that is minimally or unstably available accentuating its immaturity and dependence to maintain the proximity of the attachment figure.
If we continue the advice of the supposed experts of the behavioral upbringing that advise us to be cold before the demands of the child and to ignore itIn addition to exposing them to dangers due to our neglect, we are transmitting an inappropriate message: that we will only want them if they do not bother us and that they cannot be sure of our attention even if they need us.
In Babies and more | Behaviorism techniques in "parenting methods", Maternity and paternity course: we will express love, Being a good father (I), (II), (III), To be good parents there are things that can not be missed , Conscious motherhood and fatherhood
