Reinforcement Behavior in Grown-up but Child-like Individual

Reinforcement Behavior in Grown-up but Child-like Individuals

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Reinforcement Behavior in Grown-up but Child-like Individuals

Reinforcement Behavior in Grown-up but Child-like Individuals

A 2-4-year-old girl, often referred to by society as "bad" or "clever"...

I'm sure you can imagine this profile in your mind.

Perhaps some of you even have a child with this profile.

Rest assured, I'm not here to tell you something that would make you sad. In this article, I want to highlight something that you should be aware of.

This behavior, which can also occur in boys of this age, is especially common in girls and can sometimes turn into a nightmare for their parents.

The summary of this reinforcement behavior is as follows: the child throws a tantrum, cries, throws herself on the ground, and doesn’t stop when things don’t go her way, bothering her parents more and more.

Parents can reach a point of exhaustion. No matter what they do, nothing seems to work. Whether they give in or not, whether they speak or remain silent, whether they get angry or not...

They have a child who nullifies every intervention... The child is always the winner. She is clever, aware, and almost understands everything—never missing a thing.

Sometimes, parents even reach a point where they believe the child is making up excuses to cause problems. Why is this cup not straight but tilted? Why did you sit there instead of here? Dad, why did you step there, you should’ve stepped here... and so on...

These requests may seem meaningless and illogical. Not only the requests but also the behavioral issues and the intensity of reactions... even aggression, fights, throwing things, hitting, scratching, and hurting the parents...

These children’s behaviors are described as reinforced behaviors, and this is certainly not a mental disorder... but it can feel like a nightmare for the family.

It’s a problem that has an easy solution, but one that may take time. The need to extinguish these reinforced behaviors and then find a harmonious relationship where the family can breathe easily.

It is, in fact, an example of the concept of conditioning we use to explain behavior development in life.

When some children are very intelligent, more knowledgeable than their age, and more talkative and skilled than their peers, they may not know how to manage these skills when life’s boundaries come into play. This can be considered natural. One might say that if the child were less intelligent, it might not be as much of an issue. However, the main factor in the child exhibiting these behaviors is often the parents’ faulty attitudes. When the attitude changes, the child improves. The child is a reflection of their parent, especially their mother, but with one difference: they are the "smart" reflection of their mother.

I’ll see you in another article...

Take care...