Children with Behaviour Problems at Home and School

In this article we will discuss about the children with behaviour problems at home and school.

What is a Behaviour Problem?

Before parents and teachers can practice the principles of mental hygiene in their daily relations, it is necessary to — have a clear understanding of the meaning of a behaviour problem. According to Charlotte Buhler who explains it in psychological terms, “a problem is a hindrance that disrupts the continuity of processes within the individual or in a group”.

As such any behaviour that disrupts the teaching- learning processes, which disturbs the individual group interaction or which disrupts the individual’s ability to function adequately, will constitute a behaviour problem. A very significant thing to note is that a behaviour becomes a problem when it goes to an extreme, when it persists and develops and results in maladjustments of the individual.

If a teacher comes across a boy in the class who is impertinent in his answers or who shows aggression on a certain day, it may not be regarded as a problem but if this behaviour is repeated day in and day out, the teacher has to be on guard because now it indicates deeper or chronic disturbances in the child deeper underlying tensions. Even a serious single disturbance such as a severe temper tantrum or a serious lie may constitute a behaviour problem in the psychological sense of the word.

Another angle from which a certain behaviour can be labeled or regarded as a problem is the socio-cultural norm of the group to which the child belongs. Members of this group are expected to conform to certain norms or standards. The behaviour of an individual has to be acceptable to the group. As such repeated non-conformance to the group standards will lead to a behaviour problem which involves social objection or concern, someone objects to it, someone is concerned about it.

It may be a parent or parents, teachers, physicians, social workers, neighbours or associates. Thus “a behaviour problem is to be viewed as discrepancy between the behaviour of a child and the demands placed on him by his associates.” If parents, teachers, companions do not expect a child to steal, stealing will be regarded by them as a behaviour problem but stealing is no problem if the social set-up to which the child belongs, encourages stealing and other criminal or anti-social propensities.

The first view lays stress on the individual and the forces within him whereas the second view brings cut the importance of the forces outside the individual, the demands of people or society in the form of norms and value systems. A behaviour problem is the resultant of both these forces.

It is the outcome of the interaction of forces within the individual his motives, wishes and desires, and those coming from his environment resulting in an inability to with stand a serious shock or prolonged strain or in maladjustments or attempts at faulty adjustments.

There is no clear dividing line between behaviour which is normal and the one which is a problem. As Rivlin puts it, “The problem child cannot be distinguished from the normal one merely by enumerating behaviour tendencies………. The distinction is one of degree… When the child’s behaviour patterns reveal such maladjustment that we question the possibility of his adapting himself to his present or to his adult environment, then he is considered a problem youngster……………. Whether or not he is a problem child depends, therefore, on the total picture he presents …………….. not on any single characteristic”.

Types of Behaviour Problems and Their Importance:

Attempts at classifying behaviour problems have been made by many research workers and psychiatrists in the field such as Kanner, Howard and Patry, Paynter and Blanchard, Ackerson, Stogdill, MacClenthan, Martens, Marfatia and others. Different theoretical hypotheses have saved as bases of these varied classifications. Without entering into this controversial issue, we shall mention below the types of behaviour problems and the categories under which they fall as outlined by Loittit.

1. Conduct Problems:

(Those which interfere with other people).

These are of two types:

(a) Of limited social significance, and

(b) Of serious social significance.

Those which are of limited social significance and particularly associated with home include feeding difficulties, enuresis insomnia, nightmares, sleep­walking and sleep-taking, grinding of teeth, masturbation- excessive sex curiosity, heterosexual interests and activities, homosexual activities, thump- sucking, nail-biting, temper-tantrums, breath-holding, disobedience, stubbornness, incompatibility with parents and siblings, difficulty in making friends, undesirable companions and the like. Those associated with home, school and neighbourhood include lying, swearing, fighting, destructiveness, incorrigibility, bullying, teasing, cruelty and others.

Those which are of serious social significance and are fundamentally anti­social in nature are all types of delinquencies such as stealing, truancy, sex delinquency, begging, gambling, cruelty, arson, homicide and suicide.

2. Personality Problems:

(Those which more directly affect the individual in his personal adjustments).

These might include aggressiveness, submissiveness or withdrawing behaviour which manifests in various forms such as inferiority feeling, seclusiveness, shyness, hypersensitivity, self-centredness, conceit, jealousy, day-dreaming, anxiety, absent mindedness, secretiveness, suspiciousness and feelings of being persecuted. All these behaviour problems make adequate adjustment rather difficult.

Personality problems of the most serious type include psychoneuroses and phychoses which make adequate adjustment very difficult or impossible.

The following is the list of behaviour problems for which boys and girls have been referred to the Child Guidance Clinic at the College of Nursing, New Delhi during the last seven years of its functioning:

1. Backwardness in studies and slow-learning.

2. Retarded speech, stammering, indistinct and nasal speech.

3. Aggressiveness.

4. Temper Tantrums.

5. Tremors of hands and fits,

6. Inability to retain food — bouts of vomiting.

7. Vague, free floating pains and aches.

8. Lying and stealing.

9. Running away from home and school.

10. Food tads — disturbances of eating.

11. Enuresis and dribbling.

12. Severe pathological inter-sibling rivalry.

13. Pharangeal, respiratory and muscular ties.

14. Depression and apathy.

15. Sleep-walking and sleep-talking.

16. Disobedience and Stubbornness.

17. Schizoid Tendencies and withdrawing behaviour.

18. Functional fits.

19. Hyperkinetic behaviour.

20. Persistent thumb-sucking.

It will be interesting to note which behaviour problems are regarded as most serious, by teachers, pupil teachers, parents, educational psychologists and mental hygienist. Various studies have been made in this direction. The most important ones are by Wickman Stodgill, MacClenthan, Martens, Laycock, Ellis and Miller, Peck, Haggerty, Owens and Bain in countries outside Indian and by Dr. Pires in India. We spend herewith a table showing “Seriousness Rankings” of Behaviour problems by different groups of people. Only the ten most serious Problems have been mentioned in this table. The table in shown in Appendix IV.

Etiology of Behaviour Problems:

Behaviour problems are of multiple causation. A full appreciation of the many etiological possibilities is necessary before a successful treatment of any of the several problems mentioned above can be undertaken. A proper appreciation of the causes of behaviour problem is, however, made difficult by the fact that individuals differ from one another, mentally, emotionally and physically.

Heredity is often held responsible for many behaviours deviations. Bed-wetting aggressiveness or shyness are often ascribed to inheritance. If anything comes nearest to inherited influences, it is the physical or physiological handicaps that are natural or inborn.

It is an undeniable truth that the behaviour of a child is the behaviour of a living, biological organism; and if that organism does not function adequately because of hereditary or pathological factors, it may behave differently from more perfect organism – more perfect from anatomical and physiological points of view. This happens when the organism suffers from abnormal functioning of enduring glands, epilepsy, brain damage, chorea or post encephalitis, deaf mutism, blindness, cleft plant or motor aphasia and the like.

Does the physical defect in itself result in a specific from of behaviour? The answer is in the negative. A certain physical defect may condition the child’s reactions to social stimulation for example “…the child with a bad heart who must be quiet, may be the butt of other children’s teasing and from this may develop excessive shyness and avoidance of social contacts.”

In another situation that very physical handicap may stimulate aggressiveness or violence. Physical handicaps impose a strain on the parent-child relationships. Parents do not always accept the handicaps on a realistic basis. They do not always respond rationally to the painful fact of having a handicapped or chronically- ill child. They become worried, feel guilty and become self-accusatory and this disturbs healthy parent-child relationships.

On the other hand, the handicapped child himself develops feeling of frustration, inadequacy, insecurity and dependency. He may link up his frustrations and deprivations with inner apprehensions and may interpret them as a punishment for all that is bad in him, as a result of rejection or love from his parents. These emotions may conduce to all sorts of maladjustment which may manifest in the forms of withdrawal, social timidity, hostility, dependence or suspiciousness.

A small boy who was referred to the Clinic, refused to go to school because of his disfigurement. He was teased and nicknamed by his classmates. Another boy, due to infantile paralysis of one leg, was not able to share in the pursuits of his companions and was the objects of derision.

Gradually the withdrew from the normal contacts, developed shyness, solitary habits and became suspicious. Similarly feeble-mindedness may result in scholastic backwardness and the consequent unsatisfying experiences in the ordinary classroom. This is turn, may lead to truancy or other undesirable pursuits.

Among all the factors that are pertinent to the development of personality and conduct problems, those associated with the home are of paramount importance. It is in the home where “the young child encounters the initial experiences which determine whether he will develop a sense of personal security and of being loved and accepted. In the home, the child meets the situations which determine the extent of his sense of adequacy and of personal worth.”

The factors connected with the home are a variety of inter-personal relationships that obtain there, the type of emotional atmosphere and discipline, the influence of grandparents, poor economic conditions, parental illness or absence from home and the like.

The most important inter-personal relationships that obtain in the home are those between parents and the child. Parents may deal with their children in a manner calculated to foster the development of insecurity, inadequacy and guilt. The child may feel rejected or neglected. His parents do not understand him. They find nothing in the child except his shortcomings. They punish him for slight offence.

Nothing is done to help him to realise his aspirations, to develop his interests, to stimulate him to self-effort and thus encourage self- reliance and a sense of personal worth. The child may feel neglected and unwanted not only because of the parental antagonism shown to him, but also because of the favouritism shown to another child. Even an overprotected child is a potential behaviour problem.

The emotional and mental development of the over-protected child is hampered. Too much of over-protection may be due “to an unconscious rejection of the child, accompanied by strange feelings of guilt which give rise to an over-compensation in the form of extreme solicitude”.

Thus over-protected children not only lake a feeling of emotional security, they never get an opportunity of achieving independence in meeting problems—the keynote of adequate personality development. Some parents may constantly nag at their children or dominate them at all times. Some of them may be absolutely undemonstrative in their affection for the child or they may make too many demands which the child is incapable of fulfilling.

Or the parents may be perfectionist in their attitudes. All these parental attitudes, strengthened by negative disciplinary measures, criticism and scolding, threats of abandonment and of punishment are conducive to the development of feelings of insecurity, inferiority and guilt in the child, to compensate which he manifests variety of behaviour problems.

Parental relationships among themselves may be faulty and unsatisfactory. Instead of mutual understanding, respect, affection, and co-operation in the solution of home problems, parental relationships may be marked by discord, bickering mutual distrust, fights and scenes.

The child exposed to parental discord will suffer a considerable damage to his ego. His sense of security and self-respect will be undermined, because the environment created by such parental discords and disagreements is full of emotional tension, hardly suitable for nourishing feelings of security and adequacy.

The child’s sense of security is shattered because he cannot believe (although he wants to believe) that both the parents are at least fundamentally good. He cannot believe because each parent accuses the other of every kind of baseness.

Thus lack of harmony in parental relationships interferes with the satisfactions to the child’s ego needs and “militates against the development of the social skills necessary to good social and personal adjustment.”

Inter-sibling relationships are marked by a certain amount of jealousy and rivalry. These relationships may suffer a set-back at the unexpected arrival of a younger brother or sister or because of the favouritism shown by parents towards a particular sibling. Favouritism on one hand may create insecurity and inadequacy and on the other, cause greater feelings of jealousy among siblings.

Both these situations are emotionally disturbing and conducive to maladjustments. The child’s ordinal position in the family may have some relationship with behaviour problems. “The oldest child is often pressured to assume responsibilities beyond his ability; the middle child is frequently neglected; and the youngest one either spoiled or over-protected, and find it difficult to develop independence.”

Other conditions in the home that are prejudicial to the development of feelings of security and adequacy, are the over-indulgent grand-parents interference in the problems of discipline, the loss of one or both the parents resulting in the feelings of deprivation and loss of love, poverty and over­crowding at home, resulting in many frustrations and inadequate living conditions, chronic illness of one or the other parents casting a shadow of depression and anxiety over other members of the family ; and the continued absence on one or the other parent from home resulting in the exaggerated emotional dependence on the parents at home and in the emergence of problems of discipline.

Many behaviour problems have their origin in the influences of the neighbourhood. It is an important conditioner of the child’s behaviour. Many of our young-men develop delinquencies because such patterns of behaviour are available in their neighbourhood – patterns like lying, stealing, obscene talk and promiscuous sex interests.

Studies made by Shaw and others show “that delinquency rates are higher in disintegrating neighbourhoods i.e. those where residential sections have given way to industry, where the facilities for recreation are far from satisfactory.” Among the influences outside home, the school occupies the most important place as an etiological factor.

It is here that the child, for the first time, comes in contact with other children who are geographically remote from him and whose socio-economic and cultural background may be quite different. The school makes for the broadening of the child’s social horizon, and if it is an adequate school, it can play a decisive role in his learning to make a successful social adjustment.

Unfortunately, there are certain conditions in our schools which make a successful social adjustment not only difficult but which positively foster undesirable behaviour in those children whose ego has already been disturbed by the traumatic forces in the home.

The subject-matter and not the child, is still the centre in most of our schools. Too much emphasis is still laid on scholastic achievements. School advancement is still based on marks and grades, competitions is strongly encouraged, teachers and parents still press their children to succeed in school. Individual differences are hardly recognized and merely considered in day-to- day activities.

Most of the teachers are unsympathetic and antagonistic; they do not care to understand the child; they lay more stress on subject- matter and instructional techniques and neglect or minimise children. They manifest, like parents, personality patterns that deflate the child’s ego. Methods of teaching do not give any opportunity for self-expression and expression of personality.

School organization is much too rigid and its various techniques (including examinations) merely aggravate the child’s feelings of inadequacy and cause him deep humiliation. The aims of teaching are still oriented to the stuffing of knowledge rather than to the complete guidance of the child. Classes are too large for the teacher to give special attention to the child who exhibits some deviations. There is one and the same curriculum for all children. All these conditions result in defeatism, embarrassment, humiliation, boredom, and lack of interest- psychological sceursors to behaviour problems.

A perusal of the causes of behaviour problems, discussed above will reveal that in general, these problems arise because the child’s fundamental emotional needs are not fulfilled. When the child is denied, affectionate warm, security-giving, self-enlarging satisfactions, when he does not get recognition and a sense of achievement, when he feels guilty, when he cannot indulge in playful activities, he is in danger of developing various behaviour deviations.

Some Specific Behaviour Problems:

In this section, we propose to consider very briefly a few specific behaviour problems, their causation and the way to deal with them. The number of behaviour problems is in hundreds; we have chosen only six problems, three to represent conduct problems and three to represent personality maladjustments.

1. Temper Tantrums:

Temper tantrums are very common in early childhood and are a source of annoyance to parents. When in temper, children shout at the top of their voice, have fits of screaming, throw away things, stamp the floor with their feet and kick up their legs.

Tempers should be regarded as an attempt by the child at controlling or dominating the environment and his parents. He may show temper when he fails to achieve what he wants to achieve or when his will is opposed or when he loses in competition or when he has to face an unfavourable comparison. He shows temper when he is tired or physically not well or when he wants attention from parents who, he thinks, are neglecting him.

Many a time, tempers are merely symptomatic of resistance to necessary routine and training that is forced on the child. If tempers are frequent there should be a proper physical checkup, and other causes discovered should be removed. Tempers in general can be reduced if the inter-parental quarrels are reduced. During tempers, parents are advised to be patient and loving, although it is difficult.

It is wise to ignore anger of child instead of flaring up. Situations that cause undue friction should be avoided. It is necessary to see that the child does not develop a feeling of guilt particularly when the temper is an expression of hostility against parents, sisters or brothers. He should be reassured and not threatened of losing the love of parents which actually made him mad. That he will be loved in spite of these feelings is a great reassurance for the child — the basic thing that will enable him to bear his hostility.

2. Aggressiveness:

According to Symonds, aggression may mean self- assertiveness, or a desire to gain possession, either of another person or an object or a desire to harm or hurt someone physically or psychologically, or a desire to control and dominate somebody. It may, therefore, take such forms as beating, hitting, swearing, threatening, harming, destroying, profanity and snubbing or fighting. It manifests itself in all ages.

Aggression can serve some useful purposes as well. It expresses ambition, initiative, enterprise; it tends to eliminate or release tensions developed as a result of frustrations. It helps an individual in a competitive society, to get above or dominate other persons, situations or things in his struggle to go ahead. As such it needs to be cultivated; but when it means only hostility, or hatred against others, it needs to be brought under control.

The roots of aggression lie in early home life, with over-protective or dominating parents and a fear of not being loved. Intra-parental conflicts, strict and harsh discipline constant criticism or correction at the hands or parents, deprivations of various types add to the trouble and foster feelings of insecurity and inadequacy and a low frustration tolerance resulting in an inability to meet failure that is compensated for in aggression.

Aggression may also be caused by repressive atmosphere in the classroom, by aggressive parents and teachers and by chronic illness, inflamed tonsils on adenoids, endocrine imbalance and other physical handicaps. Sometimes the child shows aggressiveness as a sort of relation or uses it is a means of getting attention which is not being given to him by his parents.

The best way to deal with aggression is by reducing the child’s feelings of insecurity, inadequacy and guilt. He should be helped to express his feelings of anger and be reassured that it is normal to feel angry and hostile towards one’s parents and teachers.

Parents and teachers should provide the child with some avenues of release for his pent-up emotions such a games, hand-work, gardening, painting, wood­work, scouting, dramatics and the like. It is necessary to understand the motives behind aggressiveness and to mirror the child’s own feelings to reassure him that he is being understood. Let the child state his problems; let the teacher or parent explain reasons calmly why the behaviour is undesirable rather than lecture, nag, threaten or punish.

It is all right for parents and teachers to restrain the child from injuring another child, but it is necessary that the child should be reassured and told what “although he cannot permit him to behave in such a way, they still love and care for him.”

3. Stealing:

Stealing means taking things that belong to others. A child of two, three or four wants to have things whether they belong to him or to others. He has not yet developed a sense of property rights. He cannot understand why he cannot have a thing if he wants it or likes it.

Therefore, if he takes away other people’s things, he should not be dubbed as a thief. Later on, as the child grows into a boy he develops a sense of property rights. He can distinguish between things which are his and those which belong to others. Equipped with this sense and training, boys and girls steal things which belong to others.

This is real stealing. Some boys and girls steal because they have an unfulfilled desire for possession due to economically straitened conditions at home. Others learn this from members of the family who are free and easy about the family possessions.

Again adults take away children’s things when they need without asking their permission. Why should not the children follow suit? In some homes, the ethical morals and standards are rather loose. Parents do not mind or object if children steal and bring in money or things. Many a time, thefts of eatables, fruit, sweets, etc., can be ascribed to some physical deficiency. Stealing can also be a symptom of a maladjustment.

It can be related to unfavourable home environmental. It can be related to unfavourable home environment which causes emotional tension and aggression. Stealing may represent, thus, a sort of outlet for aggression or hostility against parents’ maltreatment and social castigation, against a sibling or a classmate who has been unduly favoured.

Aggression against the parents may be due to a continuous family friction, unappreciative parents, unreasonable denial of privileges, deliberate sarcasm and negative methods of discipline in the form of humiliating tongue lashing. Again stealing may be a manifestation of general insecurity or inadequacy.

Sometimes, a boy or girl who is not able to gain recognition and approval by success and accomplishments in activities at home or in school steals ; and thus gets a feeling of having achieved something. He or she may steal things or money to give away to others; he wants to be recognised.

Cases cited below were referred to our Child Guidance Clinic and will be pertinent in this connection:

(a) The first case is that of a girl, 10 years old. She is studying in the 5th class and is the daughter of a successful Medical Practitioner. She has started stealing money and things for the last 6 months. She gives these to her friends. The psycho-social history shows that she was an un-wanted child from the day of conception. Her mother did not want her.

For 3-4 years she was brought up by her grand-parents who love her greatly………………. She does not demonstrate much affection for her parents or her brother who is very much favoured by the mother………. Mother believes in strict control and does not allow the children to have their way. She is quite sarcastic and harsh to the girl and tries to humiliate her in the presence of others, although she is anxious that the child should get over the habit…………… The girl gets her pocket money almost regularly.

She is not doing well in studies due to double promotion in the last standard. She is finding the studies rather uninteresting and does not care to put in hard work in spite of her mother’s warnings and father’s persuasion. Parents do not agree on certain fundamental issues such as discipline, children’s recreation……………………..

Here is a girl who suffers from feelings of insecurity and inadequacy who feels rejected and unimportant in the home. She has to repress her feelings of hostility against her brother who is much favoured by her mother. She feels confused and rejected because of mother’s sarcasm and tongue lashings. She has resorted to stealing because this compensates for her feeling of insecurity.

She is perhaps trying to steal her mother’s love. It helps her to compensate for her feelings of inadequacy (failure in the class) by giving her a sense of achievement. Moreover, stealing is a method of gaining popularity and of getting even with her mother, who is harsh and unloving.

(b) The other case is that of a boy eleven year old. He was referred to us for truancy, lack of interest in studies, aggressiveness, lying and stealing. Father has scolded him, beaten him, has even shed tears, but the boy has shown no improvement. Mother too beats and gets irritated with him.

The psycho-social history and various diagnostic techniques show that the boy does feel neglected and rejected because of father’s harshness, mother’s irritability, and the unfavourable comparisons to which he is frequently subjected. Again in this case the inter-parental relationship is not a happy one. The father has no faith in his in-laws whereas the mother is greatly attached to her parents.

Financial difficulties cause frequent quarrels between the two. Quarrels occur in the presence of the children. The house where they live has one room and one kitchen, both very small and there are nine people to share these. Again, the boy is suffering from chronic tonsils and adenoids which cause slow fever daily besides lowering his frustration tolerance.

Thus the second case is also of insecurity and inadequacy. To overcome this, the boy tells lies, steals and shows aggression. One accentuating factor that plays an important role in his case is his physical illness that weakness his interest in studies and keeps him emotionally disturbed.

The best way to deal with children, who steal, will be through giving them feelings of security and adequacy by recognising them for what they are worth. We have to build up their self-respect. We should pull down their wall of distrust and resentment by reassuring them that we trust them and are trying to understand them.

Positive training in developing a sense of necessity for social conventions and a feeling of respect for others and other’s belongings will go a long way in helping them. Positive rather than punitive discipline and opportunities for recognition and approval should be provided both at home and in school. We should also arrange for proper recreational and leisure-time facilities and enjoyment and see that they maintain good health.

4. Stuttering and Stammering:

These refer to repetitious speech and hesitant speech respectively. They are the manifestations of one and the same disorder which engenders much suffering and fear in the speaker. It is one of those handicaps which are ever-present, difficult to conceal, embarrassing, degrading and crippling.

Stuttering and stammering may be due to some organic or neurological defect for which a complete physical checkup is necessary. At, times the problem may be purely mechanical and good lessons in articulation breathing and the like may help. But this may be due to deeper personality reasons such as frustrations or deprivations of love of parents, neglect, fear or actual loss of love from the loved object — mother, father, brother or sister or friend.

One of the frustrations that is intimately connected with speech defects is due to the deprivations of oral activities in infancy and early childhood. Forced feeding, sudden weaning, wrong handling of thumb-sucking, or rigid schedules of feeding may be the causes leading to deprivations of oral satisfactions.

The situation may become aggravated with the arrival of a new body. Further frustrations follow and the child may have inter-personal conflict which may leave him lonely and broken. It is also suggested that the child develops stuttering or stammering as a means of punishing his parents who have made too heavy a demand on him and who have restricted his activities by a rigid and harsh discipline or who have made him feel ashamed of his attempts to gain sensory gratifications through sucking his thumb; It is also believed that stuttering is a symbolic act. It is symbolic of biting the person who did him harm, thus it is an aggressive behaviour-pattern.

In a few cases of stammering and stuttering that have been referred to our clinic, we have found in their personality pattern such variables as emotional insecurity, repressed aggression and repressed anxiety and fears. In one case, where stammering is of very recent origin, it was a reaction against a trauma consisting in the temporary loss of the loved object — sister, who was a mother substitute.

The mother was very demanding and anxious, created lots of fears and phobias in the child’s mind and stimulated his aggression against a community which was responsible for killing his father during the riots without providing an outlet. As soon as outlets for piled up hostility and aggression were provided, fears and phobias were verbalised and demands of the mother became less severe and she again took the place of the former loved object, the child’s stammering gradually diminished.

Conclusion: A Mental Hygiene Approach:

The modern approach to the solution of behaviour problems and personality maladjustments is a mental hygiene or preventive approach which consists in the promotion of certain patterns of living and in the practice of certain principles in succeeding stages of human growth conducive to the development of wholesome and socially adequate personalities.

The preventive approach is based on the principle that the best way to ensure well-adjusted individuals is to surround them with such environmental influences as will enable each person to develop his full potentialities to attain emotional stability and to achieve personal and social adequacy.

We have already referred to such principles and patterns of living in the previous sections, but in conclusion we should like to emphasise some of these principles and points:

1. The infant needs to gain satisfaction and love through close physical contact. He needs to feel secure and to be recognized consistently. His physical needs should be adequately satisfied.

2. During early childhood and in all the succeeding stages of human growth, the feelings of belongingness, security and achievement should be engendered through affection, love and care. During early childhood, the child needs to be encouraged in his adventures to explore the world and he should be provided with tasks that will increase feelings of adequacy, achievement and status.

Parents should provide space, materials and opportunities as well as encouragement to help the child in his gross motor development. An adequate home in which the atmosphere of love and understanding prevails, in which there is no place for favouritism and inter-parental bickering, and which each child is treated as an individual is of paramount importance.

3. During later childhood physical needs of the child should be properly looked into both in the home and in the school through games and exercises. Let the school-going experience be made as pleasant as possible; let the teaching bear in mind the individual differences when deciding about techniques.

Provision should be made in the home and in the school for emotional expansion and self-expression and repressive behaviour in every form should be reduced to a minimum. Let parents and teachers encourage and have respect for friendship made by children and vitalise their desires to be members of groups by organising ‘clubs’, ‘scouts’, and ‘girl guides. Let not the child develop inferiority feelings in any way. Let parents and teachers work together for the welfare of the whole child.

4. During adolescence, boys and girls still need experiences which will give them feelings of security and adequacy. The adolescent should be helped to accept his body with all the changes and instabilities. Proper games and exercises in school, proper rest, good diet, sex education given in a scientific and objective manner — all are necessary for the adolescent. He wants independence and emotional emancipation from parents.

It is necessary for proper growth towards adulthood or maturity. Let him make his own decisions. Permit him to differ from you but do not deny him your friendliness, love and affection.

Let him have opportunities for legitimate release of his emotions in conversation, dramatics, music, hobbies, scouting, debates, discussion ; let him have a sense of adequacy. The adolescent should be provided with suitable vocational guidance and a healthy philosophy of life which help him in facing the realities of life rather than withdraw from them—a philosophy of life that helps him in achieving socially responsible behaviour.

Again both school and home should help the adolescent develop healthy peer-age relationships and friendships. His views and opinions and his hetro- sexual interests should be respected.

In short, let our children, from infancy onwards to adolescence, have satisfactions of two types:

1. Affectionate, warm, security giving satisfactions.

2. Self- enlarging, ego-building, adequacy giving satisfactions.

The former will build within them a feeling of security without which they have no safety, no anchorage and no peace. It is a feeling that comes through affection, response and belongingness. The later will build within them a feeling of adequacy without which they cannot meet the demands that each day brings, without which they cannot meet the demands that each day brings, without which they lack faith in themselves, in their own abilities — the feeling that comes through a sense of achievement, recognition and independence. Equipped with these satisfaction, the possibility of their succumbing to behaviour problems and deviations reduced to a minimum.