angry kidSigh. Must we always blame the moms?

A new study points the finger for "aggressive, defiant, and explosive" behavior in  kindergartners directly at "tumultuous, negative relationships" with their mothers in the children's earliest six months of life.

According to the study's lead author, Michael F. Lorber, Ph.D., while the research team had gone in expecting to find that a combination of the child's temperament and the mother's treatment put kids at risk of acting out and creating conflict as they grew to school age, what they instead determined was that "it was negative parenting in early infancy that mattered most."

In other words, if your kid is a biter or a hitter or a yeller, now everyone's really going to think it's your fault.

Does that really seem entirely fair? Listen, as parents, I'm sure we play a large part in shaping our children's behavior -- good and bad. And I'm sure there are parents who have had a strong hand in shaping their kids' aggression. (Whether "negative parenting," as the researchers define it, is just slowness to bond or actual abuse is not entirely clear; obviously abuse is never OK.)

But our children also play a large role in shaping their own behavior – and ours. Isn't it just a little possible that a child who is difficult during their toddler and elementary school years may also have been difficult to parent as an infant? Isn't it possible that the creation of that early parental bond – flawed or strong – is a two-way street?

Isn't it possible that it's not entirely the mother's fault?

As the parent of two generally well-behaved children, I can tell you that they pretty much arrived that way. Yes, I have worked hard to try to impart good values of the caring and sharing variety, to teach them manners and respect for others and all that sort of thing. But really, it seems to me that they emerged from the womb with a certain innate sense of kindness and understanding and empathy. It hasn't really been that difficult to wrest them into shape, behaviorally speaking.

I'm not boasting. Rather, I'm offering sympathy to parents whose kids grow into the class biter or hitter despite the fact that their mothers and fathers are doing -- and have from the start done -- their best to parent lovingly, supportively and appropriately. I'm guessing some kids really are harder to parent (though no less deserving of good parenting) than others.

True, we don't know always know what family dynamics are like in the privacy of people's homes, but isn't it possible that, sometimes, a biter is just a biter and a hitter is just a hitter and it's not the mom who has made him or her that way? Perhaps, instead of judging parents because their child misbehaves, we should instead judge them on the way they respond to that misbehavior. Or better yet, perhaps we shouldn't judge them at all.

Do you think parents are always responsible for young children's bad behavior?

 

Image via  AngryJulieMonday/Flickr