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No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

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Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#141

Post by Malician »

SiVal wrote: post #119
llukas wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Punishment always changes behavior only when you're looking/enforcing. You'll never know if you police kid enough. Is that your goal?

Replace your first word with "Reward" and re-read it. My own observation is that both of these claims are partly true but that there is some effect that remains even when they think they are not observed. Parents often see what kids think they don't, so I have empirical evidence of this (as all parents do).

I don't buy the idea that punishment and reward are just different sides of the same coin.

Reward works well for building a healthy rapport and relationship. I don't think punishment is entirely ineffective, but if it isn't rare and judicious it may well end up causing more harm than help. The problem is that the response to punishment is visible immediately while the downsides may only appear many years later.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#142

Post by Klinky »

jessriedel wrote: post #103
Klinky wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the goal of the parent is "get child to grandmas, so I can go to work to continue to take care of this child", while the child's goal is "I want to continue to watch cartoons in this very spot and not move, and I'll have a tantrum if I am told to move due to poor impulse/emotional controls in my under-developed brain, unless I am 'tricked'", then who's goals are more important? If the child resents such a "trick"…

You are attributing large sweeping claims to me that I'm not making.

To be honest, I am actually not.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#143

Post by analog31 »

andrewfromx wrote: post #64
marcell wrote: post #62

Quoting the article: > "Sarah, put on the green coat or the red sweater. We're going to go out, okay?" Choice among humans increases the likelihood of compliance. And choice isn't important, it's the appearance of choice that's important. I've gotten this exact advice from so many articles and pop psych pieces. Maybe they are written by non-parents or their children are much easier, but it never works for me. My 4 ye…

haha exactly. I love when really smart people write articles about dealing with children and then you discover they are non-parents themselves. Or, they are work-a-aholics and never interact with their own kids 24/7 like full time parents do.

Or they are parents, but they're not me.

I've got two kids, both teenagers now. In my view it's not just that kids are different, but that parents are different too. My impression is that most parenting advice assumes that the parents themselves have unlimited self discipline, organization, and emotional stamina.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#144

Post by TACIXAT »

paganel wrote: post #102
SerLava wrote: post #5

> Let’s say you have an adolescent daughter and she says to you, “Mom, you are such a bitch. What have you ever done for me? You only think of yourself.” > The teen may be at the dinner table and just being quiet and not saying negative things. Well, when you're starting out, one of the positive-opposites can sometimes be reinforcing the non-occurrence of the behavior. And you just say, “Marion, it's nice having dinn…

> Let’s say you have an adolescent daughter and she says to you, “Mom, you are such a bitch. What have you ever done for me? You only think of yourself.” Maybe it's because I grew up as a kid in another culture (Eastern Europe) and some time ago (I'm 36 now) but do kids nowadays really call their parents "bitch"? My parents almost never laid their hands on me (the couple of times they actually did I had deserved it)…

My dad and I are very casual. We enjoy fighting (wrestling), pushing each other into strangers, tampering with food, turning car seat heaters on sneakily on a hot day. Very normal for us to call each other names when these things occur. I don't think there is anything I could say to him that he'd even blink at.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#145

Post by moron4hire »

WWLink wrote: post #69
andrewfromx wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

haha exactly. I love when really smart people write articles about dealing with children and then you discover they are non-parents themselves. Or, they are work-a-aholics and never interact with their own kids 24/7 like full time parents do.

I get the impression most of the people on this site are workaholics.

Turns out most of our concept of being "busy" or "a workaholic" is an illusion. If you sit down and track how you use your time, you'll probably find you don't work anywhere near as much as you think and you use a lot of spare time very inefficiently.

I have an infant. I spend a lot of time with him. During the week I probably take care of him more than my wife does, because she goes to work very early. I also work in a VR startup, scrambling to get projects done. Somehow, I still find time to cook dinner with my wife, watch the latest episode of whatever one TV show we are following, get a few house chores done, and waste time on HN and Twitter. The only times it feels like I'm too busy to get everything done is when I'm wasting too much time on HN and Twitter.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#146

Post by JonoBB »

marcell wrote: post #62

Quoting the article: > "Sarah, put on the green coat or the red sweater. We're going to go out, okay?" Choice among humans increases the likelihood of compliance. And choice isn't important, it's the appearance of choice that's important. I've gotten this exact advice from so many articles and pop psych pieces. Maybe they are written by non-parents or their children are much easier, but it never works for me. My 4 ye…

There was a TV programme in the UK called The 3 Day Nanny, about a super nanny who would come in and sort out problem children and parents in 3 days. It ran for a few seasons.

Fast forward till she had her own child, and I saw an interview with her. She was completely shattered. Like a wreck. She had her own difficult child, and coupled with little available help from others, she couldn't cope. She looked and sounded defeated and expressed that she felt guilty that, of all people, she was not coping.

There is a reason some parents "get it right" and, I'm sorry to say, but thats just as likely down to the kid.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#147

Post by Klinky »

manarth wrote: post #140
Klinky wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the goal of the parent is "get child to grandmas, so I can go to work to continue to take care of this child", while the child's goal is "I want to continue to watch cartoons in this very spot and not move, and I'll have a tantrum if I am told to move due to poor impulse/emotional controls in my under-developed brain, unless I am 'tricked'", then who's goals are more important? If the child resents such a "trick"…

> If the goal of the parent is "get child to grandmas" > while the child's goal is "I want to continue to watch cartoons" > who's goals are more important? At what point/age is it OK to control someone, and when/why does that stop? As an adult, if I want to spend the day on the sofa watching cartoons, who has the right to stop me, and drag me off somewhere else?

> At what point/age is it OK to control someone, and when/why does that stop?

When they have not established an ability to control their life or take care of themselves? See how long the infant or toddler lasts without supervision. See the teenager make the best choices for their lives without the ability to earn a living(although technically I moved out at 17).

When they can afford their own self determination as defined by the society they live in?

Parental control is more of a gradient that should ease as the child gets closer to adulthood. The goal of the parent should be to make a self-sufficient independent individual. That's not always their goal though.

>As an adult, if I want to spend the day on the sofa watching cartoons, who has the right to stop me, and drag me off somewhere else?

Your landlord, mortgage company, local tax auditor would have the legal right to evict you if you failed to make good on earlier promises to pay rent, mortgage, taxes. If you're living with someone else who is paying for your ability to watch cartoons then they could probably kick you out whenever they felt like it.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#149

Post by taneq »

JonoBB wrote: post #146
marcell wrote: post #62

Quoting the article: > "Sarah, put on the green coat or the red sweater. We're going to go out, okay?" Choice among humans increases the likelihood of compliance. And choice isn't important, it's the appearance of choice that's important. I've gotten this exact advice from so many articles and pop psych pieces. Maybe they are written by non-parents or their children are much easier, but it never works for me. My 4 ye…

There was a TV programme in the UK called The 3 Day Nanny, about a super nanny who would come in and sort out problem children and parents in 3 days. It ran for a few seasons. Fast forward till she had her own child, and I saw an interview with her. She was completely shattered. Like a wreck. She had her own difficult child, and coupled with little available help from others, she couldn't cope. She looked and sounded…

Exactly this. People compare stories about what they did and try to figure out what was right or wrong, but in the end, so often it's just a matter of what the kid in question is like.

Something very similar happens in business, IMO. Managers talk about different styles or techniques but in the end, the success of their team is as much about the team members' skills and dynamics as it is about the manager.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#150

Post by taneq »

moron4hire wrote: post #145
WWLink wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get the impression most of the people on this site are workaholics.

Turns out most of our concept of being "busy" or "a workaholic" is an illusion. If you sit down and track how you use your time, you'll probably find you don't work anywhere near as much as you think and you use a lot of spare time very inefficiently. I have an infant. I spend a lot of time with him. During the week I probably take care of him more than my wife does, because she goes to work very early. I also work i…

It sounds like you are, in fact, not very busy (except with family stuff). Which is a good thing!
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