Reverse Psychology - Children

Children

Reverse psychology is often used on children due to their high tendency to respond with reactance, a desire to restore threatened freedom of action. Some parents feel that the best strategy is sometimes "reverse psychology": telling children to stay in the house when you really want them to choose to go outside and play'.

Questions have however been raised about such an approach when it is more than merely instrumental, in the sense that 'reverse psychology implies a clever manipulation of the misbehaving child' and nothing more. With respect to '"emotional intelligence"... successful fathering', the advice has been given: 'don't try to use reverse psychology....such strategies are confusing, manipulative, dishonest, and they rarely work'. In addition, consistently allowing a child to do the opposite of what he/she is being advised, undermines the authority of the parent.

Read more about this topic:  Reverse Psychology

Famous quotes containing the word children:

    A grandchild is a miracle, but a renewed relationship with your own children is even a greater one.
    T. Berry Brazelton (20th century)

    There are no adequate substitutes for father, mother, and children bound together in a loving commitment to nurture and protect. No government, no matter how well-intentioned, can take the place of the family in the scheme of things.
    Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)

    Many more children observe attitudes, values and ways different from or in conflict with those of their families, social networks, and institutions. Yet today’s young people are no more mature or capable of handling the increased conflicting and often stimulating information they receive than were young people of the past, who received the information and had more adult control of and advice about the information they did receive.
    James P. Comer (20th century)