Being a child in today’s society: myths about childhood

The idea that children are "miniature adults" can lead us to misunderstand their psyche.

Much of today's published literature focuses on the difficulty that today's parents have in dealing with, educating, dealing with and managing the relationship with dealing with, educating, handling and managing the relationship with their children.. Parental-filial conflicts and the feeling that parents are "overcome" by their children's misbehavior seem to be more frequent than in the past.

However, another equally relevant issue would be to consider the perspective and the child's own experience of the childhood stage in the present time, which we will analyze below and which may be more complex to handle than one might think. It is advisable to discard certain myths about childhood in order to understand the psychology of children.

Social changes that today influence child development

Urra (2007) makes an interesting analysis of the factors that have been modified in today's society and that may be influencing how children develop psychologically today.

Permissiveness

Today's society is more permissive than in previous decades, when a more authoritarian structure prevailed.Today's society is more permissive than in previous decades, when a more authoritarian structure prevailed (e.g., the government dictatorships prevalent in the West during much of the 20th century). On the other hand, the values that seem to be transmitted in recent times, perhaps as a reactionary response to the submission to the indicated authority, are related to materialism, individualism, consumerism, hedonism or relativism.

2. Exposure to adult content

A large volume of media content is oriented towards programs that are violent, sexual, that promote success based on purchasing/economic power, competitiveness, etc. To which must be added the amount of time that minors spend in front of the television, Internet, social networks, video games, etc., and the amount of time they spend on the Internet.social networks, video games, etc., alone and without the supervision of an adult who can instruct them in their proper use.

3. Life today is frenetic

The change in the style and pace of personal life. Parallel to the advance of technologies, the pace of life has accelerated in such a way that a "stopwatch" operation has been internalized in which the individual must perform as many activities and tasks throughout the day. There is a concept called "agenda child" proposed by the same author, which is used to designate children that combine school attendance with an endless list of extracurricular activities and obligations. and obligations.

4. Liberalization of the family model

The family structure has been altered from previous generations. Today we can observe single-parent families, heterosexual, homosexual, reconstructed families derived from previous divorces, etc. This variety has generated different forms of family organization, which has repercussions on the type of education received by the offspring.

On the other hand, there is currently more "intra-family" than "extra-family" life: contact with grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc., has been reduced since parents and children have less time for this and, therefore, limit family life to the members who live together.

5. Abandonment of responsibilities

The neglect of the role of some parents, which confuses the showing of affection or love through gifts and material rewards combined with unlimited permissiveness with the educational role that would theoretically be attributed to parents (offering time, dedication, dialogue, active listening, support, sharing experiences, establishing norms, guidelines and limits, teaching values, etc.).

6. Questioning educational styles

The existing educational discrepancy between families, being able to differentiate between the application of permissive, authoritarian, negligent, overprotective, etc. styles. In addition, differences between families and teachers also seem to be more evident, creating a climate of questioning or distrust of the teacher in the face of possible sanctions applied to the student).

Erroneous beliefs and myths about childhood

Some of the major myths about child psychology that are held today are as follows.

1. Psychological essentialism

There is a type of belief shared by some of the parents "overcome" by their children's misbehavior concerning the presence of an intrinsic evil in the child. presence of an intrinsic evil in the child that leads him or her to that leads them to commit the behaviors of disrespect, rebellion, defiance and disobedience. Nothing could be further from the truth. Until the stage of youth and the beginning of adulthood (around 24-25 years of age) the individual does not have a complete development of all the cerebral structures that allow him to exercise a deep reasoning on his own acts or to behave in a mature, ethical, civilized, empathic way; these structures are known as prefrontal cortex.

The minor, therefore, does not have the capacity that is attributed to him to consciously embitter existence. and premeditated to the parents, since at this age the child does not know very well what is the right or appropriate thing to do in a given situation; he is learning to do it. Therefore, it seems unfair to think that the child should behave as a "miniature adult"; the child is a child.

2. Learning does not shape the personality

Related to the above, it does not seem right to conclude that the child behaves in a certain unsuitable way because he "came out this way". because "he has been brought up this way"..

It is true (already in late childhood and adolescence) that the person ultimately responsible for the behavior is the one who performs it and that there is a difference in temperament that discriminates between individuals who are more serene or more "moved", but it is no less true that given that the child is in constant learning process the environment plays a determining role in modeling the child's behavior. behavior of the child.

Thus, the interaction between personal factors (internal or personal) and factors derived from the context (external, such as the type of family and education received) are the causes of the behavior that children finally externalize. In this sense, the different educational styles (democratic, authoritarian, permissive or negligent) have a determining influence.

3. Affection has its price

Another of the ideas frequently applied by some parents is the fact of thinking that it is possible to generate the feeling of affection of the children. to generate the children's feeling of affection towards them through material rewards, as mentioned above.as mentioned above. Contrary to what it may seem, children are equally happy with half or a quarter of the money that parents invest under the pretext of pleasing their little ones.

Research and analysis of a large number of interviews and testimonials conducted over the past decade indicate that children value the time and attention their parents give them every day far more than concrete material rewards. the time and attention their parents devote to them on a daily basis..

Active listening, dialogue, joint decision making, shared activities, an empathetic and understanding attitude towards difficulties that may arise on both sides, etc., are aspects that count to a much greater extent than providing them with the latest console model on the market.

Conclusion

The preceding lines are intended as a set of reflections that, in certain cases, can help parents to understand in a deeper way the reasons why their child's behavior is not as expected. By analyzing the indicated erroneous beliefs, everyday conflict situations can be solved in alternative ways, in which the application of empathic capacity can be of vital importance.