During
early childhood a child is developing emotionally and beginning to form a
patter of behavior that may stay with them far into the future. During this
time a parent or caregiver can help positively shape the child’s development.
Two common practices that can be used to shape a child’s emotional and
behavioral development are operant conditioning and emotion coaching. While
these practices can greatly help development, a caregiver’s emotional
competence and their reactions to the child’s emotions also play a major
factor.
The
concept of operant conditioning goes off of the idea that learning certain
behaviors is a result of the relationship of that behavior and the reward or
punishment that results (Sewell & Higgins, 2014). B. F. Skinner theorized
that “through operant conditioning the consequences of a behavior produce
changes in the probability of the behavior’s recurrence” (Santrock, 2016, p. 21).
Giving a rewarding stimulus to a behavior will make that behavior more likely
to recur while a negative stimulus will make it less likely to recur. Some
parents and guardians choose to ignore negative behavior thinking that their
lack of interest will deter the child from doing said action. However ignoring negative behaviors does not
help to modify that behavior. According to Baumrind (2003) “parent’s nonaction
signifies to the child approval of his behavior, not neutrality”. By using
operant conditioning parents and caregiver can influence the behaviors that
their children engage in and exhibit.
Parents and
caregiver need to be vigilant when using operant conditioning with young
children. In these cases the caregiver’s response to a behavior has to occur
soon after the behavior is exhibited in order for the child to make a clear
association between the behavior and the response (Sewell & Higgins, 2014).
If the response come to late the child may not recognize what they are being
rewarded or punished for. When using operant conditioning it is also important
to be consistent with your reinforcement or punishment of certain behaviors.
According to Sewell and Higgins, (2014) “intermittent reinforcement can be
confusing for the child and is ultimately ineffective for the parents because
it makes bad behaviors much harder to extinguish”. While it may be overwhelming
guardians have to have the same rules for all children present. They must be
consistent in rewarding and punishing the same behaviors for all of them. If a
child witnesses another child under the same care perform an unacceptable
behavior that goes unpunished that child is likely to exhibit the same behavior
(Sewell & Higgins, 2014).
The
second practices used to shape a child’s emotional and behavioral development
is emotion coaching. According to Santrock (2016), parents who are emotion coaching
monitor their child’s emotions, use negative emotions as opportunities to teach
their children, assist their children in labeling emotions and teach them how
to deal with their emotions (p. 165). There are parents who use a contrasting coaching
style called emotion dismissing. According to Lunkenheimer, Shields, and Cortina
(2007), “an emotion-dismissing philosophy is present when parents are unaware
of low-intensity emotions, view negative emotions as toxic or overwhelming,
invalidate or criticize their children’s emotions and want to avoid or protect
their child or themselves from negative emotions”. This style of coaching
emotions is not recommended and can lead to issues in the child. Children of
emotion dismissing parents can be more subdued, sadder, and more fearful. They
can also suppress showing their true feelings lack the skills necessary to
remedy their emotions and may not know how to respond to others emotions (Denham,
Bassett, & Zinsser, 2012). Due to these reasons and many more emotion coaching
is more widely used and recommended.
Emotion coaching can
hold multiple benefits for the children according to Denham et al. (2012), “Children
of emotion coaching parents formulate coherent knowledge about emotional
expressions, situations, and causes”. Most emotion coaching takes place when
negative emotions cause negative behaviors. It is thought that the coaching of
negative emotions offers greater opportunity for learning and intimacy than
does the socialization of positive emotions” (Lunkenheimer et al., 2007). The
approach to emotion coaching can be done in many ways but often follow the same
pattern. Carter (2009) broke it up into three different steps: first label and
validate feelings, second deal with the bad behavior, and third problem solve
with the child. In the first step the caregiver empathizes with the child in
order work through what the child is feeling (Carter, 2009). “Parents may
highlight, validate, or clarify children’s emotions,
helping them to express emotions authentically, in a regulated manner” (Denham
et al., 2012). This step is the most crucial and has to be completed. This is
how children work through their emotions and learn to label what they are
feeling. “Research has shown that frequent parent–child emotion talk is
essential to young children’s emerging emotional competencies” (Lunkenheimer et
al., 2007). Next it is important to address the negative behavior. Do not be
afraid to punish the child for their negative behavior, no matter how strong of
a negative emotion they felt. Mild punishment by a loved and respected
caregiver may have beneficial side effects on the child (Baumrind, 2003). After
the child has had to pay a consequence for their action it is important to talk
through the issue that may have caused the negative behavior and see what can
be done to prevent it from happening again.
References
Baumrind,
D. (2003). Effects of Authoritative
Parental Control on Child Behavior. (892-900). Ipswich , MA : EBSCO Publishing. Retrieved from
http://persweb.wabash.edu/facstaff/hortonr/articles%20for%20class/baumrind.pdf
Carter,
C. (2009). Emotion Coaching: One of the Most Important Parenting Practices in
the History of the Universe. Greater
Good. Retrieved from http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/raising_happiness/post/emotion_coaching_one_of_the_most_important_parenting_practices_in_the_histo
Denham,
S. A., Bassett, H. H., & Zinsser. K. (2012). Early Childhood Teachers as
Socializers of Young Children’s Emotional Competence. ResearchGate. Retrieved from
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Katherine_Zinsser/publication/233755854_Early_Childhood_Teachers_as_Socializers_of_Young_Children's_Emotional_Competence/links/0fcfd50b3926f77e3c000000.pdf
Lunkenheimer,
E. S., Shields, A. M. & Cortina, K S. (2007). Parental Emotion Coaching and
Dismissing in Family Interaction. ResearchGate.
Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Erika_Lunkenheimer/publication/227874430_Parental_Emotion_Coaching_and_Dismissing_in_Family_Interaction/links/54adaf870cf24aca1c6f6adc.pdf
Santrock, J.W. (2016). Essentials of Lifespan Development (4th ed.). New York :
McGraw-Hill
Sewell,
A. & Higgins, P. (2014). Recognizing The Importance of Parental Influince
in Social and Behavioral Development. Developmental
Physiology at Vanderbilt. Retrieved from https://my.vanderbilt.edu/developmentalpsychologyblog/2014/04/recognizing-the-importance-of-parental-influence-in-social-and-behavioral-development/
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