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These posts review specific evidence-based parenting strategies.

Strategies if Your Child or Teen is Being Bullied

Nov 7, 11 12:40 PM

Your child reporting that he or she is being bullied can be very upsetting. According to the Center for Disease Control, 19% of kids are victims of bulling on school grounds. Bullying can include physical and/or verbal confrontation, social exclusion and spreading harsh rumors; it can also occur through electronic and online technologies. Available evidence suggests that those who experience a pattern of being bullied experience significant mental health challenges (the same is often true among those who engage in a pattern of bullying). Among the children who are bullied low self-esteem and under socialization are common. In the animal kingdom predators prey on vulnerable members of the herd who can be found on the fringes or in isolation. This is often the case for children who are repeatedly bullied as well. If your child is experiencing a pattern of being bullied, or if any incidents of bullying are causing him or her distress, consider the following:

  1. Get expert assistance. An evaluation by a well qualified child mental health professional is usually a good idea, even if you are able to get the bullying to stop by other means. It is much better to understand any contributing problems, and to develop a plan for managing or fixing them, than it is to let a child or teen languish. To find a qualified professional near you click here.
  2. Consult with the school about the bullying. I’ve never met a teacher or school administrator who is willing to tolerate bullying. It is ideal to have this consultation with a child mental health professional at your side. The consultation can be used to reach a clear understanding about what has happened and to develop a plan for fixing things.
  3. Encourage your child or teen to travel with at least one friend as she or he travels from one location to another at school. As I implied above, bullying is much more likely to occur when a child or teen iis traveling solo. This step might involve inviting prospective friends over to your house in order to develop or to create friendships. If your child or teen cannot, or will not, name friend candidates her or his teacher(s) may be willing to do so.
  4. If your child or teen is a victim of cyber bullying consider first whether his or her online life is adaptive (please see my blog entries that cover monitoring online activity and internet addiction to help in this determination).
  5. If you know the parents of the alleged bully, and you have no clear reason to believe that they would be hostile, consider arranging to have them over to your home to discuss what everyone can to do garner wellness and peace. (In many instances it may be better to do #1 before this one so that a qualified mental health professional can help you to think through the issues, including how you want to manage the meeting.)
  6. If your child has not discovered things that he or she is good at, or does not have regular access to activities that put such talents on display, I would make changing this a top priority. Please see Chapter Two of my book Working Parents, Thriving Families, to read about specific strategies for pulling this off.

Here also are three strategies that often are not advisable. Keep in mind that even a broken clock is right twice a day. So, just about any strategy has some chance of working. But, I am suggesting that the odds of the following working, independent of significant negative side effects, are probably low:

  1. Encouraging a child to be physically aggressive. Yes, there is reason to believe that assaulting a bully might cause him or her to retreat. But this teaches all sorts of unsavory lessons, risks school disciplinary action and can be excruciatingly difficulty for a child or teen to pull off.
  2. Succumbing to your child’s or teen’s plea for you to do nothing. If your child told you that mold was growing in his or her locker at school and you could tell that this was making him or her sick, would you adhere to his or her begging to not take action? Keep in mind that any number of different kinds of action may be in order (see above). What I believe is generally more advisable is to find out what your child or teen reasonably fears could happen if you initiated a plan for fixing the problem (e.g., retaliation by the bully, someone finding out that he or she is in counseling). You might then take steps to make the odds of such happening remote. (A consultation with a mental health professional is especially advisable if your child is insistent along these lines.)
  3. To view the problem as completely resolved if the only change the occurs is that a pattern of bullying stops. I think it is very important to a child’s or teen’s wellness to take steps to understand and to resolve the underlying issues that caused such a painful cycle to begin.
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Should I Let My Teen Daughter Wear a Sexy Halloween Outfit?

Oct 20, 11 9:23 PM

The title of this entry is a common question this time of year. I will first offer three guiding questions and then address the issue specifically.

Whenever a minor you’re in charge of wants to do something that you’re inclined to disallow, I would ask yourself three questions. This thing that your child or teen wants to do:

Is it physically harmful?

Is it psychologically harmful?

Does it unduly tax your resources (e.g., time and money)?

If the answer to all three questions is “no” it is often advisable to allow your child or teen to do that thing, even if it drives you crazy. So often we parents say to our kids “learn to think.” But, what we really mean is “figure out what I think and parrot that back.” Following these guidelines promotes the development of effective decision making skills and discourages dishonesty and excessive dependency.

Let me now turn my attention to the title question. In this instance we’re probably not talking about a risk of physical harm or unduly taxing parental resources, at least most of the time. It’s most likely that we are talking about potential psychological harm. Regarding the latter, a primary question to consider is as follows: Does my daughter generally want to present herself in a sexually alluring manner?  Of course, there are always exceptions to any general principle, but often girls who typically wish to present themselves in a sexually provocative manner are suffering from significant insecurity about their value in other areas. It’s sort of like (and not necessarily on a conscious level) this: “people won’t find my personality or my skills appealing, so I need to draw them in with my sexuality.” If this is true of a girl she will often attract those inclined to value her primarily for this attribute, and likewise be less appealing to those peers who are operating at a higher level.

But what about a girl who wants to wear a provocative Halloween outfit who doesn’t generally lead with her sexuality, and who will be well monitored during the festivities? For such a girl there may not be much risk of psychological harm in dressing this way on one night. That said, and at the risk of sounding like I’m talking out of both sides of my mouth, it’s been my experience that girls who are secure within themselves often don’t wish to dress in this way to begin with.

Let me try to read your mind regarding two additional questions:

How do I decide if an outfit is sexually provocative?

This brings to mind what Justice Potter Stewart said after he admitted that he could not offer a good definition of pornography: “…but, I know it when I see it.” That said, if you’re a dad you may have a stronger inclination to over-react to even adaptive manifestations of your teen daughter’s femininity (I know my tolerance starts being challenged once one of my daughters’ outfits travels above the knee). So, if you’re a dad it may be a good idea to defer to the determination of a woman with good judgment and a healthy self-esteem (hopefully mom).

What should I do if my daughter is someone who wants to lead with her sexuality?

I would consult with a qualified mental health professional to figure out if her self-esteem is fragile or in need of repair. If it is, there are a number of interventions that can be tried to strengthen her sense of efficacy and value. To find someone by you click here. In closing let me also note that I offer numerous specific and time-efficient strategies for promoting self-esteem, effective decision making and adaptive monitoring in my parenting book Working Parents, Thriving Families: 10 Strategies That Make a Difference. For now I hope you can have fun with your progeny this Hallowee. Afterall, they will all be living away from us soon enough.


 

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10 Tips for Parenting Your Progeny’s Online Life

Oct 7, 11 12:56 PM

When considered from the lens of parenting, I liken Facebook, and services of its ilk, to dust mites. It’d be awesome if I could eradicate them, but that’s not realistic. Instead, I try to look upon online services that are available to my kids as offering opportunities to further realize my parenting agenda. This post offers my top 10 tips for tapping this opportunity.

#1. Maintain a weekly dialogue with your child. Having weekly one-on-one time to discuss how your child’s life is going is an essential foundation for just about any parenting agenda. “What are the best thing and the worst things that happened today, even if they were minor?” “Who are your top three friends these days and what do you like about them?” “What’s it like to be in 7th grade these days?” (Click here for a blog entry that lists other potential conversation starters. Please also see Chapter One in my parenting book Working Parents, Thriving Families, for detailed coverage.)

#2. Limit sedentary electronic pleasures to two hours a day. This is the recommendation of several authoritative bodies. If a kid is plugged in more than this he may be missing out on other important activities (e.g., being physically active, doing academic work, engaging in extracurriculars, socializing face-to-face).

#3. Use the social networking mediums that your kid is using and link to your child. If your child uses Twitter discover what it can do for you and be sure to follow each other. If your child uses Facebook use it as well and friend each other.  You also want to make sure your child doesn’t have two social networking accounts: the one you’re connected to and the one on which he goes rogue.

#4. Monitor your kid’s computer use. We want to strive for the middle ground. Over monitoring a successful and responsible child dampens the development of independence and can unduly tax a parent-child relationship. Under monitoring a child who is struggling, or who is putting herself into harmful situations, is obviously not a good idea either. This is where your world’s leading expertise of your child is essential to inform your steps. Regardless of the dosage of monitoring that you decide is advisable, programs that allow you to track your child’s computer use can be very helpful (e.g., www.spector.com/spectorpro.html, www.webwatchernow.com).

#5. Network with other parents and use parenting resources. Whenever you’re hanging out with other parents (e.g., on the sidelines of games, before a parent meeting starts) ask them what strategies they use. While you may hear from parents who seem misguided in their approach (e.g., washing their hands of a monitoring responsibility), others may have clever insights and ideas to share. There are also an abundance of online resources available for parents. (e.g. www.wiredkids.org, www.familyinternet.about.com, www.familysafemedia.com).

#6. Set up rules. Here are some I’d suggest:

√ No swearing.

√ No discussions of sexual or illegal activity.

√ No threatening others.

√ No “friending” people above the age of              (i.e., your 11 year old child’s 19 year old cousin may be super nice to her and a great person, but friending her on Facebook may afford your child access to inappropriate adult material, either on her cousin’s page or on the page of someone in her cousin’s network).

√ Under the “How You Connect” portion under “Privacy Settings,” make sure they are all set to “Friends.”

√ Public searches should be disabled on Facebook. This means that people cannot find your child’s page through internet searches. Under “Privacy Settings” click on “Apps and Websites,” then click on “Edit Settings”  that is next to “Public Search.” Then uncheck the “Enable Public Search” box.

√ You must get others’ permission before posting his or her picture online. Depending on the age and maturity of your child you may also decide that you must also approve all pictures before they are posted; this would also allow you to determine if your child’s friend’s parents’ approval should be garnered.

#7. Role-play scenarios. This is an excerpt from a 2008 national study of the online experiences of kids aged 10-15, authored by Drs. Michele Ybarra and Kimberly Mitchell, that appeared in Pediatrics: “Fifteen percent of all of the youth reported an unwanted sexual solicitation online in the last year; 4% reported an incident on a social networking site specifically. Thirty-three percent reported an online harassment in the last year; 9% reported an incident on a social networking site specifically. Among targeted youth, solicitations were more commonly reported via instant messaging (43%) and in chat rooms (32%), and harassment was more commonly reported in instant messaging (55%) than through social networking sites (27% and 28%, respectively).” Given how common such experiences are we do well to train our kids how to respond. “Hunter what would you do if someone put on their Facebook page a hurtful lie about you?” “Aiden what would you say if someone asked you for your address?”

#8. Set up parental controls on computers that your child uses. This would include things like using browsers designed to block explicit content from kids (e.g., bumpercar,  www.cybersitter.com), not allowing your child to covertly install software (i.e., through settings within the system software), and making sure that there are sufficient parental controls on your child’s other gear that can go online (e.g., cell phone, video game console, portable gaming unit). After you set up your controls offer a tech savvy 20-something person a gift card if he can try to circumvent your controls; offer a higher value gift card if he is successful and can show you how to install effective countermeasures.

#9. Make sure your child understands the limits of privacy on the internet. Colleges search Facebook pages for information, as do employers, volunteer organizations and other people who might be a gatekeeper for some experience, membership or standing that your child may desire in the future (e.g., I recently heard of a coach of a travel baseball team who rejected a kids application to play on the team because of what he found at that kids Facebook page). A good rule of thumb: if you wouldn’t want the world to see it, think four times about posting it.

#10. Consider what you might do to promote the privacy of your family’s online experience. Each computer has an IP address that tells internet sites you visit where you’re located. However, there are services available that make it more challenging to do this (e.g., www.hidemyass.com, www.anonymizer.com). As a start you might read up on IPs and privacy (e.g., http://www.livinginternet.com/i/iw_ip.htm). Moreover, many websites will, without you knowing it, collect information from your computer. However, there is software available that allows you to approve or disapprove this activity (e.g., for Macs: www.littlesnitch.com; for Windows: www.zonealarm.com).  Keep in mind that some have argued that Facebook’s true customers are not its users but the corporations to which it sells information about its users.

For other websites and resources please also see the “Further Reading and Viewing section of Chapter Three in Working Parents, Thriving Families, or the Chapter Three section at www.resilientyouth.com. You may also enjoy reading 10 Strategies If Your Child is Addicted to World of Warcraft (WOW).

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Six Tips For When You Lose It With Your Kid

Sep 10, 11 3:24 PM

All of we parents say and do things with our kids that we regret. These are not knowledge deficits (i.e., we know we’ve erred) but are performance deficits, the causes of which are as varied as the number of stars in the sky. (Most of the time these lapses would not cause the staff at a state’s welfare department to become alarmed, and this entry is not meant to address such instances.) These are moments when our personal reservoir of resources has been depleted by stress and we snap, issuing forth with harsh invectives. This post is meant to give you some strategies to try once you’re back on your game and parenting with intention.

#1: Be kind with yourself in how you think about your lapse. Such moments are as universal to family life as dust mites. Sure, it’d be nice to be rid of them, and we strive for that as best as we can but, at the end of the day, we’re only human. Moreover, research suggests that our kids, assuming our family life is generally healthy, make less of these skirmishes than we do.

#2: Do a psychological autopsy with your child after you both have calmed down. In other words, have a calm discussion about what happened. During this conversation own your lapse without qualification. “John, it was wrong of me to call you lazy and slow witted. Neither of those things are true. I was having a bad day and over reacted to your complaints about doing your homework. That was wrong of me and I apologize son.” Let your kid respond and reinforce that with which you agree. Then, if your child misbehaved in some fashion, try to raise his or her awareness. This is done independent of the apology. That is, I don’t want to sound like I’m trying to place responsibility for my behavior onto my child. “John, thinking more about this, is there anyway you can think of that you could have acted better?” If your child comes up with a reasonable answer you can salute his or her growing maturity. If not, you can suggest what you have in mind. “Well, I think it would have been better for you to do your homework, without complaint, after being warned that I had had enough complaining for one day.”

#3: Consider what you can do to keep yourself from turning this type of intermittent lapse into a regular pattern. Some useful questions to consider: is your self-care sound (e.g., getting sufficient doses of sleep, healthy foods, physical activity, fun, interpersonal connections, and calm)? Is there a pressing stress on you that may need more focused attention? Could you use more help or support and, if yes, how might you get it?

#4: Assuming your child’s behavior prior to your lapse was problematic, consider what you can do to keep such from becoming a dysfunctional pattern. Some questions to consider: could the behavior your child is demonstrating be signally the presence of an underlying problem that needs attention? Are your child’s health habits in need of adjustment? (As much as we adults can be adversely affected by poor health habits, this is even more the case with our kids.) Does your child have any insights into what might be driving the behavior?

#5: Spend one hour a week one-on-one with your child doing nothing but paying attention to him or her and offering positive thoughts and feelings. (Please note that this is different from quality time–a valuable activity to be sure– but which usually involves my dividing my attention with the thing we are doing together.). This dosage of weekly attention is to a child psychologist what an apple a day is to a pediatrician.

#6: If the trigger for your lapse is your child resisting doing a chore or some other obligation, consider setting up a behavioral contract to make it in your child’s best interest, as he or she looks at things, to comply. This switch can turn you from acting like a harsh warden to a benevolent bystander. Click here to read a blog post that covers this method a bit more. Click here to learn more about my book, which covers all the issues in this post in depth.

In closing remember that there is a small army of highly trained mental health professionals available that is willing and able to be of help. To access one data base of such mean-lean-healing machines, click here.

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Seven Tips for When Your Child First Leaves Home for College

Aug 9, 11 10:35 AM

And ever has it been known that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.   Khalil Gibran

The first transition from home to college is huge. Double that statement if the child in question is the eldest. Please consider these seven tips for getting the most out of the experience.

1. Carve out one-on-one time with your departing child and savor those moments. As the wheel turns new and exciting opportunities become available in our relationships with our children. However, we also say goodbye to phases that we will never experience again. Your baby will never again live under your roof as a child. This deserves shared time and reflection.

2. Share the positive thoughts and feelings you are having with your child, including those regarding your impression of the man or woman he or she is becoming. Don’t stop any tears that might well up (plus you probably won’t be the only one)

3. Write a letter to your child that expresses what you are thinking and feeling. Then leave it among her or his belongings to be discovered later.

4. If your child agrees, and it is within your means, set up a method for video conferencing.  Even if you don’t use it much, it can be a comfort to you and/or your child to have it set up. (If you both have iPads or iPhones this can be done through the application FaceTime. Another relatively straight forward choice is offered by www.skype.com.) Also keep in mind that many retailers of computer hardware and software offer discounts to students, though you may need to ask about it to get it.

5. Encourage any siblings your departing child may have to come to terms with what they are thinking and feeling about the departure, and to communicate the positive aspects of such to their departing sister or brother. It can also be mutually meaningful and beneficial for them to author letters, drawings and symbols that commemorate their relationship.

6. Agree on when and where each person in the family will say goodbye. No one wants to be stuck with the sense of having missed an opportunity. Also, if you decide to say goodbye on campus, keep in mind that your child is not likely to want much drama on display for others.

7. Give yourself a huge pat on the back (and maybe even a treat). Your shepherding has been effective enough to land your child in college. Way to go!!

(By the way, if your child is experiencing, or starts to experience, psychological symptoms keep in mind that most universities have a counseling center that offers free or low fee services. If the university has a graduate program in the mental health professions they may also have a training clinic on campus that offers outpatient care.)

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My Child Gets Afraid A Lot. What Can I Do?

Jul 7, 11 9:56 AM

Our science tells us that some children are born with an anxious temperament. These temperaments can often be identified by the toddler years, and sometimes sooner. Kids with such personalities may cling excessively to their parents (or other attachment figures) and respond to novel situations, people or things with hesitation and/or fear. Moreover, about one third of such children may go on to develop an anxiety disorder (compared to eight to twelve percent of the general population). All this said, there are at least nine things parents can do, and not do, to help.

#1: Try to reduce parental anxiety. If I have unrealistic fears about the person, thing or situation under consideration I may be facilitating my child’s anxiety without even realizing it.

#2: Avoid avoidance. If the person, thing or situation your child is fearing is developmentally appropriate for him to be exposed to (e.g., going to the first soccer practice of a new team), it is often a good idea to not avoid it just because he is afraid of it. None of we engaged parents are happier than our least happy child. So, when our kids hurt we hurt, and often worse. Hence it can be an understandable knee-jerk reaction to allow our child to avoid those people, things and situations that distress him without considering whether doing so is helpful or not. However, what we often find is that avoiding developmentally appropriate experiences that are distressing can facilitate more and more avoidance and more and more anxiety.

#3: Avoid preemptive reassurances. I suggest to the parents in my practice: “Imagine I said to you as you sat down. ‘Listen, don’t worry about the ceiling collapsing on your head while we meet. It’s quite secure.’ Of course, your attention would be drawn to the ceiling and you could not help but wonder what danger I’m referring to.” A pre-emptive reassurance states that there is something worthy of being reassured about and can be like saying to a kid (unintentionally of course): “Go ahead and freak out now.”

#4: Avoid excessive reassurances. This is similar to the previous suggestion. Imagine a friend said she was nervous about a job interview and you responded by hugging her and kissing her and suggesting she’ll be fine regardless of what happens. A peer might just find it odd. A kid, who often looks to her parent to decide what to make of her world, might imagine that maybe she has underestimated the gravity of the situation.

#5: Remember that most anxiety passes once a kid is in the situation. Assuming the situation is developmentally appropriate and a child does not suffer from an untreated mental health disorder (e.g., Panic Disorder) and assuming adults are not throwing gas (excessive reassurances) on the fire, a child with an anxious temperament will usually show some initial distress but then be fine.

#6: Preemptive exposures to the situation can be helpful. Doing a dry run to the new classroom before school starts, going to the soccer field before the first practice, meeting the new coach before hand, and other preliminary exposures to what is feared can sometimes soften the initial distress, especially if such is practical and not accompanied by preemptive or excessive reassurances.

#7: Having your child breathe into his belly and try to make his muscles as soft as a cooked piece of pasta can help just before facing the feared person, thing or event. It is very difficult, and maybe even impossible, to be anxious and to have a relaxed body. In doing this, work on muscles in groups. That is, first relax the hands and arms, then the shoulders, neck and head, then the chest and belly and then the legs and feet, all while pretending that the lungs are in the lower belly instead of the chest cavity.


#8: If part of your child’s avoidance strategy is to cling to you, consider leaving the premises once you’ve dropped your child off. Of course, this assumes that you’ve determined that a responsible adult is in charge and that the situation is developmentally appropriate for your child. You can always leave your cell phone number with the adult in charge in case something surprising happens and you need to return. (It would generally not be advisable to tell your child that he may call you if he gets upset.)

#9: Consider consulting with a mental health professional if these strategies do not resolve the problem. To obtain a referral click here.

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Failure: An Important Part of a Psychologically Healthy Childhood

Jun 22, 11 8:38 AM

Recently I was on a sports field and overheard heard this conversation between a mom and a coach:

Mom: “Coach Jim didn’t make the all star team. Did they tend to pick older boys?”

Coach: “Ahhh, not really. Older boys are often more skilled, and so more of them were chosen, but some younger talented boys were picked too.”

Mom: “What do I say to him? I don’t want him to be crushed. I think I’ll just say that they were choosing older boys this year”

Coach: “Whatever you think is best.”

On this same ball field, as is the case all across America, children are routinely praised for poor outcomes. A kid grounds out weakly without advancing a runner and hears “good hit Colin!” A girl pitches ball four to load the bases and is told: “good pitch Sarah!” Moreover, kids receive positive feedback on a very high proportion of plays (in my neighborhood, well over 90%).

Is it easy to understand why this happens. No engaged parent is more happy than her least happy child. When one of our kids hurts we hurt worse, so it’s natural to try to avoid the pain that failure brings. Moreover, we are very interested in making sure that our kids have a solid self-esteem and are concerned that failures, or an absence of consistent positive feedback, may leave our child falling short of developing well.

However, what we sometimes fail to realize two things: (1) failure is a critically important part of a psychologically healthy childhood and (2) too much praise dulls it. I once asked a panel of child mental health experts on a TV program I host. “If it were possible to raise a child into adulthood and make sure that she never failed at anything would you want to do it?” Everyone on the panel instantly declared “no” as such an adult would be handicapped when inevitable failures come along. Moreover, praise that is vague, inaccurate, overdone or overstated loses its impact and can actually have detrimental effects.

Let me focus a little bit on failure and review some of the benefits it offers:

√ Failure helps a kid to understand what her true talents are (i.e., if one is praised for every outcome, even the bad ones, it is more complicated to discern one’s true capacities).

√ Failure provides the opportunity to learn how to think adaptively about failing and how to respond effectively to it. Sure, I might be able to protect my child from the notion that he has failed (e.g., by stating falsehoods) for much of his childhood, but at some point the world will visit failure upon him. Better for him to learn how to think about it and respond to it early on, before dysfunctional attitudes and coping styles might develop, and when I can have a greater impact on how he responds to failure. Moreover, I certainly don’t want to condition my child to believe that she is owed a good outcome simply because she is a good person who means well and tries hard.

√ Failing offers the opportunity to learn a very important psychological formula: crisis = pain + opportunity. None of us likes pain, of course. But is it not woven into the fabric of all of our lives? Part of being resilient is to recognize that pain, to paraphrase a poet, is like a dragon guarding treasure; and, the fiercer the dragon the more valuable the treasure. However, the dragon must have its way before the treasure can be accessed. Time after time I’ve seen examples of resilient kids and families taking the hit and, because of the hit, coming out on the other side stronger, wiser, more effective and happier.

A few suggestions for those moments when your child produces a poor outcome:

√ Sometimes no comment is the best comment. For some kids striking out can be as upsetting as having a fly land on their nose. It may not need to be remarked upon.

√ If a comment is needed, sometimes waiting is advisable (e.g., for my child to become more responsive, so that it is less public)

√ Don’t lie or exaggerate. This is not the same thing as saying everything on my mind. But, when I do speak I want it to be truthful. This strengthens my long-term credibility and models virtuous behavior.

√ Provide empathy when your child is hurting without qualification. “That hurts doesn’t it.” “I could see why you’d be upset over that happening.” “It hurts to not be able to come through for your team.” Keep the butts off it initially (e.g., “…but you’ll get ‘em next time”). This can be especially difficult for we lunatic-parents to endure (i.e., we love our kids so much it makes us crazy), especially when our empathy leads to more opening up about the pain. But, tolerating this is a gift we give our children.

√ After feelings and thoughts have been vetted consider whether a plan of action is warranted: drilling, studying, problem solving, etc. If the failing represents a painful pattern think of it as a problem to be solved.

√ Value things like effort (e.g., your child hustles even when a losing outcome seems inevitable) and character (e.g., you child congratulates an opponent for a good play, lifts up a team mate who was feeling down) making sure that such comments are tied to specific examples.

√ Keep praise for effective performance proportionate, especially when around others from outside of the family.

I realize I’m hitting only some high points here. A much more complete accounting of these issues, together with stories that illustrate the points, can be found in my parenting book Working Parents, Thriving Families. I’ve also written a blog entry titled Five Questions for Effectively Parenting Kids in Sports. Finally, if your child has a pattern of responding to failure that is consistently impairing (e.g., public displays of anger, inconsolable and persistent sadness) consider seeking out the services of a qualified mental health professional.

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Seven Tips for When Your Child Refuses to Do a Chore

May 18, 11 9:15 AM

What’s a parent to do when a child resists doing a chore? In this post I offer seven tips for dealing with such a situation. These tips are premised on three assumptions:

  1. The chore is age appropriate and skill appropriate for your child. Said another way, the task is within your child’s reach to complete.
  2. Your child is not suffering from an untreated psychiatric problem. If a child suffers from depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, or another diagnosable mental health disorder he or she may need interventions that are more sophisticated than what’s indicated below.
  3. Your child’s resistance to the chore is not in response to someone else’s psychiatric problem (e.g., someone acting in an abusive fashion, someone abusing alcohol, etc.).

Tip #1: Make it clear what you expect. Your idea of a clean room and your child’s idea of a clean room may be very different. One way to avoid this problem is to write down on an index card what effective task completion looks like. For instance, a clean room = bed made, all clothes put in their place and all food particles/dishes out of the room and either in the trash or the dishwasher (for pre-readers this can be indicated with pictures). It’s also a good idea to put down how long you expect it to take for your child to complete the task.

Tip #2: Don’t make it sound like you’re asking for a favor. “Colin would you Puhleezzee take out the trash just once this week without a hassle?! Puhleezzee!” sounds like I’m asking for a favor, and we all get to say no to favors.

Tip #3: When giving a command make eye contact and use as few words as possible. If my child is watching TV, or I’m issuing a command from another room, the odds of compliance go down. Moreover I facilitate the escalation of anger and resistance if I start lecturing in these moments.

Tip #3: Establish a reward.  In the mildest cases of non-compliance your praise for a job well done may be sufficient. If that doesn’t work you can make your child’s access to a privilege contingent upon having done the chore properly. “Jaden from now on you earn the privilege of watching TV by doing kitchen duty.” After having done the chore multiple times in a row a bonus can be offered (e.g., a game rental, a trip to an ice cream shop, etc.).

Tip #4: Give your child the opportunity to control aspects of the task. “Peter which day of the week would you like to pick up the dog’s poop off the lawn?” “Brooke do you want to take your shower right after dinner or right before bed?” “Claire do you want to rub my shoulders before or after you rub my feet?” (Just kidding on that last one…or am I?)

Tip #5: Give a warning that the task is about to be due. “DJ I know you’re into your video game but in 15 minutes I’m going to need you to stop and pick up your toys and put them in their place.”

Tip #6: Use time out if the reward is not sufficient. If your child resists doing the chore after you’ve given three commands to do it (issue the threat of time out when giving the command the second time), have her sit in a hard chair for a minimum sentence of one minute for each year she has lived outside the womb (don’t let your child know what the minimum sentence is). After the minimum sentence has elapsed your child can get out if she is sitting there quietly and she agrees to do the chore. If either or both conditions haven’t been met, and without announcing that you are doing so, cylce through new periods of minimum sentences until your child is sitting there quietly and agrees to go do the chore.

Tip #7:, Seek out help if your child has a persistent patter of non-compliance, that is not responding to your best efforts. For a referral for a provider near you click here.

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Happy People Live Longer & Have Better Health

Apr 19, 11 8:35 PM

Earlier this year researchers Drs. Ed Diener and Micaela Chan published a comprehensive review of the scientific literature examining the association between subjective well being (SWB; the research term for happiness), longevity (as in length of time someone is alive) and health. To get an electronic reprint of the study click here. In this blog entry I will summarize some of their findings and suggest one evidence based strategy to promote happiness.

In considering the positive and significant association between longevity and SWB the researchers reviewed 26 longitudinal studies (a study that follows subjects over an extended period of time, usually decades). These studies cumulatively examined 316,911 individuals. In the “Take-Home Message” portion of the article the researchers write: “If high SWB adds 4 to 10 years to life compared to low SWB, this is an outcome worthy of national attention.”

In considering the positive and significant association between health and SWB the researchers reviewed 17 longitudinal studies; these studies cumulatively studied 121,096 people. Quoting the researchers: “…moods and emotions are consistently…associated with…blood pressure, cortisol, and inflammation, as well as indicators of disease such as artery wall thickening…(this) occurs in addition to the effects of negative feelings and depression, suggesting that positive affect may have distinctive biological correlates that can benefit health.”

There are many things adults can do to promote happiness. For instance, in an earlier blog entry I described a family exercise involving writing gratitude letters. Another strategy is to practice acts of kindness as the “helper’s high” is scientifically validated phenomenon. To do this make one day a week your kindness day (maybe one that has traditionally been a struggle). Here are 10 ideas to get you started:

• Write a thank you note to a person who cleans a space that you routinely traverse.

• Leave some money at a drive through for the customer behind you.

• Take out an add in a local newspaper recognizing a teacher’s excellent service.

• Stick a couple of movie passes in a package of diapers at your local grocery store with a note “I know it’s tiring to take care of a baby. Please use these to lighten the load some night. A friend who has been there.”

• Spend an hour volunteering at a local soup kitchen.

• Put coins in strangers’ meter that looks like it could use it.

• Give blood.

• Invite someone with young kids with her or him to cut you in line at the grocery store.

• Leave a note of appreciation for your mail carrier’s service.

• Bring a box of baked goods in for the office at your child’s school.

I review other ideas for acts of kindness in my book Working Parents,
Thriving Families: 10 Strategies that Make a Difference. I’d also very much like to hear ideas from you, my reader 😉

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Five Questions for Effectively Parenting Kids in Sports

Mar 3, 11 1:55 PM

This past weekend I watched an episode of ESPN’s Outside the lines regarding the suicide of 25-year-old LPGA golfer Erica Blasberg. Certainly this episode resonated with me as a psychologist, as I often deal with these kinds of issues in my practice. But, this piece touched me more as a dad of three kids who play sports (one heavily so). So, I thought I’d devote a blog entry for sharing five questions for a parent to consider when his or her child plays a sport.

1.     As a parent do I insist upon outcomes, effort or both?

I would argue that it is effort that we should encourage and allow the outcomes to fall where they may. The capacity to give effort when one doesn’t feel like it is a very important psychological muscle for promoting success. Thus, common messages relayed in sports along these lines generalize well to other areas in life (e.g., practice well when no one is watching, try your hardest even if your opponent is dominating you and try to improve no matter where you stand relative to other kids). Alternatively, emphasizing the win, the hit, the points, or other outcomes, especially without regard to other important considerations, can promote unwise philosophies, practices and outcomes.

2.     Does my child enjoy the sport?

Sure, there are rainy Mondays and valleys of weariness that all of us experience in the areas of our lives that typically produce joy. But, for at least a considerable portion of the time, is my kid having fun playing the sport? If not, there may be more downside than upside in continuing and/or my kid’s involvement in the sport may be more about my satisfaction than his or hers.

3.     Does the sporting experience support or interfere with adaptive character development?

This question may be especially important for athletically gifted kids. One father I know recently started to lightheartedly ride his athletically talented son for holding back during a rec basketball game (his son was a top player on two very competitive basketball teams but the rec team was made up of boys who played the sport only one day a week); his son explained that he could have scored more points, but not without cutting down on how much he passed the ball to open teammates, something that he thought would have been wrong to do. This is an illustration of how sports can engender and highlight character development.

Alternatively, it is possible for a sport to become a venue for consistent eruptions of anger, verbal or physical bullying, despair and cheating; in such instances, and left unchecked, the sporting life may be doing more harm than good. Relatedly, and as a parent, what is my emotional reaction to each of the following scenarios? Scenario #1: my child turns in a dominant athletic performance that leads to a win for the team, but he or she intentionally shames another child along the way. Scenario #2: my child tries hard but turns in a subpar athletic performance, which then facilitates a team loss, but along the way he or she lifts the spirits of a child who was feeling down. Understanding my emotional response to these scenarios (you know, the one we have when we’re being honest with ourselves and no one is looking) can tell me a lot about what I’m communicating to my child about priorities (either directly or indirectly) and also let me know whether an adjustment is in order.

4.     When academics and sports compete against each other, which wins?

Granted, those of us who value both academics and sports do what we can to keep them from coming into conflict. But, inevitably, when they do, what happens? Can there be any doubt that efforts spent towards becoming a good student stand to leave many more doors open in adulthood than efforts spent towards becoming a good athlete? Moreover, and for those who are playing at a level in high school where this concern is relevant, recruiters are more-and-more disinterested in students with a compromised academic record (i.e., they don’t want to deal the hassles that result when a student they recruit cannot perform academically).

5.     Does my kid realize that my bond with him or her cannot be threatened by how he or she does in sports?

As I review in chapter two of my book, self-esteem appears to be comprised of at least two core elements: of a sense of worthiness (i.e., I have inherent value and am loved) and a sense of competence (i.e., there are important things that I’m good at). Our kids benefit when they know they have a loving bond with us that can’t be severed when they stink at things, make poor choices or otherwise experience negative outcomes. Having this bond is more important than just about anything else we can provide for our child as they grow up.  So, one could argue that just as most sports require donning protective physical equipment, we do well as parents to require that our child dons protective psychological equipment, in this case a sense that his or her connection with us can’t be threatened by a score.

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