Am I Enabling My Child’s Behaviour?
- HEALIS AUTISM CENTRE
- 2 minutes ago
- 3 min read
According to Attaway (2022), enabling your child’s behaviour can look like this:
Only allowing your child to be in non-triggering/safe environments
Over-validating their ‘fears’/ negative emotions
Not allowing them to take accountability for their behaviour
Inconsistent parenting as a result of feeling bad for your child
Enabling is the technique of over-assisting, such as saving your child from difficult or uncomfortable circumstances without taking into account whether they are capable of handling it alone (Sommer, 2016).
What can I do to prevent enabling behaviours?
With behaviours such as those that are expressed through meltdowns or excessive stimming, it is important to be aware of the difference between supporting and enabling. Supporting your child can be carried out through teaching your child to ask how to leave an environment or condition that seems to be triggering the event and guiding them to self-regulate (e.g. breathing exercises, reminder to stay calm, or even just waiting patiently for them to self-regulate), or helping them grow the tolerance for being in an uncomfortable situation by gradually exposing them to these situations in small doses. On the other hand, enabling is about just letting them avoid these situations as they desire, and therefore never developing any tolerance for them.
Supporting your child can also be expressed through celebrating any small achievement of showing desirable behaviours, such as attempting to tie their own shoelaces instead of waiting for mummy and daddy to do it. Celebrate their attempt even if they don’t do it right, and praise them for their efforts!
Often, the problem occurs when parents step in too early to help them because the child is taking too long or does not want to do it; aka enabling the behaviour. If the refusal is leading to a meltdown or other undesirable behaviours, provide more scaffolding for the skill they are lacking, eg. getting them to only complete the last step of tying their laces, or using hand over hand prompting so it’s easy for them to do. While it may be easier to give in or “enable” them in the short run, it does not help them progress beyond their current levels if this keeps happening.
Another common form of enabling can be seen in parents who help their child with academics. Enabling parents have higher tendencies to do their school work on their behalf or remove books when the child is stressed. Instead what parents can do to support their child in academics is to set goals with them and offer them a choice (e.g. answer the question verbally or through images) that could help reduce the stress but still ensure that they finish what was assigned (Wilson, 2021). This helps to build task tolerance and significantly decrease reliance on parents to manage their aversive behaviours towards tasks.
Although enabling your child’s behaviour can sometimes be due to subconscious or convenient choices, it is a crucial factor in determining your child’s level of reliance and independence. Thus, working towards being supportive of your child’s growth is vital.
Written by: Tara
References
Attaway, J. J. (2022, October 18). Supporting vs enabling. Child Mind Institute. https://childmind.org/article/supporting-vs-enabling-a-child-with-challenges/
Sommer, S. (n.d.). Supporting vs enabling young adults with autism and learning differences. CIP Blog. https://info.cipworldwide.org/blog/supporting-vs-enabling-young-adults-with-autism-and-learning-differences
Wilson , B. (2021, October 29). 10 easy-to-implement behavior strategies for children with autism. Applied Behavior Analysis Programs Guide. https://www.appliedbehavioranalysisprograms.com/lists/5-easy-to-implement-behavior-strategies-for-children-with-autism/
Picture Reference
Kindel Media from Pexels, [Woman in blue shirt talking to young man in white shirt] [Photograph] Retrieved from: https://www.canva.com/
Comments