Smooth Parenting - Secret Insights Into Why Children Resist Their Parents
I watched an interesting thing today. My wife and I were at a basketball game in which our sixth-grade granddaughter competed in a cramped middle school gym. This team, that had lost every game up to today, played almost flawlessly and won the game 40 to 8. The girls played like a team and were a joy to behold. But one thing was very different today.
The highest scorer on our team was phenomenal. She stole the ball, she moved the ball, and passed to teammates. She drove the ball to the basket and scored time and time again. She did everything her father had been yelling from the sidelines for her to do for the last six games. He had especially been shouting (very loudly) for her to not just stand there but to dribble and move the ball. Well, today she moved the ball all over the court. What was interesting is today is the first time she did all those things. And today is the first game that her father missed. Was this a coincidence? I don`t think so. She demonstrated the concept of resistance. A deep understanding of this concept can make you a better parent, teacher, or boss.
The Concept of Resistance
NOTE: Skip over this part if you are not into theory but I find it interesting.
McLaren (1994) defined resistance on the part of members of a subordinate social class as ways in which they reject "their reformulation as docile objects" (p. 196). Depending upon the context, resistance may be manifested in many ways such as work slowdowns, feigned ignorance, public denial of hurt feelings, or sabotage.
Now, let me put on my "What the heck does all that stuff mean?" hat and translate in easily understood terms. Resistance means:
No one likes to be mistreated (or to perceive they are being mistreated) and there will be consequences for those who mistreat others. If they are more powerful than we are, we will resist them in ways that may be hard to identify.
It is a way of getting even, of using the only power left to those who have little power: the power of going beyond non-cooperation to resisting the goals of those who are mistreating us.
Examples of Resistance
Since this is not a formal journal article but a more informal article to help parents, I`d like to share a couple of examples of resistance but withhold the references as they can distract and slow your reading.
Example One: Resistance by Withholding Gratification
One of the most memorable examples I`ve come across was a study done in a typical urban high school. The researcher sat in the rear of the classroom and became so much a fixture in the classroom that students behaved as if she were not there. What she recorded was behavior of resistance. The way it worked was that the teacher who did not relate well with the students and talked down to them made the mistake of revealing what was important to her. She was in love with a certain part of her subject and when she taught that area she would get animated and passionate about it. In response, students acted more distracted and less involved than normal and never gave her the satisfaction of feeling as if they were learning anything. What was most noteworthy about the study was the way students would, when the teacher`s back was turned, smile at each other after acting out their resistance and noting the exasperation of the teacher. They found what was important to her and resisted by withholding the involvement that would have made the teacher happy.
Example Two: Resistance by Brinksmanship
Brinksmanship may be a term with which you are not familiar. Not every teacher or parent knows the definition but they have lived the experience. Brinksmanship is the seemingly innate ability children have to figure out the literal meaning of a rule and play around on the brink of explicit disobedience. A simple example would be if a mom said to the kids, "No cookies after dinner tonight." The obvious intent is that the kids can`t have a desert. If little Susie gets caught later sneaking an ice cream bar from the refrigerator, her defense is that mom did not say, "No ice cream bars." Kids are experts at this. I can feel you nodding your heads right now. Brinksmanship generates what feels like endless arguing between children and their parents.
Other Examples
It is not within the scope of this article to go into great detail, but there are many other categories of resistance, all the way from work slowdowns to outright sabotage to cause work to cease altogether. The history of labor unions is a rich area of study to understand the concept and application of resistance. Resistance can quite literally be the wrench in the works that stops everything from working.
The literature related to slavery is also replete with references to resistance. I remember reading a journal entry of a slave owner prior to the civil war. He wrote that he just couldn`t understand why his black slaves could not move faster or why they had so many accidents that lost time and productivity. If you were a slave, how hard would you be willing to work to enrich your owner? Would you maybe instead shuffle along slowly, talk slowly, not know anything, and have a lot of accidents? I know I would. Their behavior did not make sense to the slave owner because he did not understand resistance.
The Application to Parenting
The subtext to this article would maybe be the common saying, "Pick your battles."
If you are the type of parent who believes that the core of good parenting is to have rules and enforce them, you are in for a lot of grief. You will continually set up situations that will encourage resistance. Your kids will withhold the gratification you need to be encouraged as a parent. They will make brinksmanship an art form and argue with you continually using the literal definition of your rules. The most common word out of their mouths will be "but." They will never move fast enough nor do their work well enough to please you. Why because they are punishing you for operating from a base of rules instead of love, communication, and respect.
If, on the other hand, you are a thoughtful parent who takes the time to listen to your children and talk things through with them, you will minimize the natural reaction of resistance with which they seem to be born.
What Can You Do?
My suggestion is that the most important thing is to recognize resistance and to try to head it off before it gets entrenched. In other words, don`t exasperate your children. I`m not in any way saying don`t have high standards and don`t enforce them. I am saying don`t make up stupid rules and think good parenting is being an inflexible tyrant. All good relationships involve negotiation!
This article is highly related to my article entitled, "Two Kinds of Parents." The insights in that article might be helpful in expanding some of the ideas laid out here.
I hope this has been helpful and has added a tool to your parenting tool belt.
Live long and parent well!
Jacob has been writing articles for several years and focuses on learning and teaching and on effective parenting. He is also a math guy so he loves his gadgets. Check out his site about an Electronic Notepad and a Smart Pen to you save you time and effort by producing both a digital copy and a hard copy of your notes and sketches.
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