Psychologist about teenagers at school and in the family
The problem of personality traits and interpersonal relationships of children (adolescents) is a whole complex of factors.
The instability of the emotional sphere, the fragility of the boundaries of the "I", the tendency of self-esteem to significant fluctuations, the role of situational influences, the influence of "heroes" from reality and works of art that are different in their objective significance - all this creates - pronounced difficulties in determining the typological affiliation of the child. And yet, it is worth trying to identify the leading tendencies of the child's character, which lie at the heart of the personality that is being formed.
To study the individual typological features of children, a children's version of the individual typological questionnaire (ITDO) is convenient. The methodology is a concise questionnaire aimed at studying the individual typological properties of the child. The questionnaire contains 61 questions to which the child must answer "True" if he agrees, and "False" if he does not agree - for each statement. The questionnaire items do not cause defensive reactions, because they are aimed at the properties of temperament, and not at socially approved or disapproved forms of reaction. Approbation of ITDO showed that the technique allows to identify the main, predominant tendencies of the child's character.
According to the theory of leading tendencies, each child has an individual selectivity towards the phenomena of the surrounding world and his own style of assimilation of the information received, which creates the basis for the formation of different, in its own way, unique personalities even under the same conditions. The concept of "leading tendency" is more voluminous and dynamic than "trait", "property", "state". The leading tendency permeates all levels and stages of personality formation - from individual typological predisposition and character traits to the formed personality. In short, it is a consistent personal characteristic that manifests itself at all stages of personality development and at all levels of self-consciousness.
If the formed personality of an adult has stable characteristics of an individual style, then the features of the still immature personality of a child are more manifested as properties of temperament, on the basis of which they have yet to be formed in the process of socialization. Personality is a dynamic system open to external influences, reacting to changes in the environment within an individually defined range of variability, which makes the personality structure adaptive and resistant to stress.
However, it is the stable properties of the personality that do not allow society to completely absorb individuality, and situational factors do not lead to continuous changes. In a child, the influence of society as a moral censor mainly causes resistance due to the direct incentive to will and independence, and situational aspects in the form of a temptation to realize their desires and needs push them to impulsive actions. In the absence of developed internal self-control, children, to a greater extent than adults, manifest the type of experience and behavior that is determined by the leading individual-personal tendency.
The integration of the personality as a whole is realized through self-awareness, self-esteem and self-control, which constitute the real "I" of a person, while his ideal "I" determines the direction in which the personality moves in the process of self-improvement. In a child, self-awareness is formed through a comparative analysis of his feelings, thoughts and actions with the experiences, thoughts and behavior of others, but the personality is still poorly integrated, and therefore temperamental traits prevail in experiences and behavior. However, the individual-typological style as an innate character trait is already clearly outlined. In the formation of character, innate temperament acts as the basic properties, and the style of upbringing that comes from the surrounding adults: mother, father, teacher, is an integrating factor.
First of all, the mother plays a huge role in raising a child. If she herself is a pronounced accentuant of the hypothymic composition (a sensitive, with increased anxiety, overly responsible, altruistic person), then she is most often so afraid for her chick that she harms it with hyper-care and constant fears on any pretext out of fear that something will happen to it. At every step, the child hears a warning about danger. The mother strives to do everything herself, replacing the child's encouragement to independence with her actions. In this case, the feeling of anxiety inherent in nature, necessary for normal survival, swings and intensifies to a high level of anxiety and further complicates life adaptation, turning the child into a helpless, powerless being, dependent on stronger people around him.
If the mother is distinguished by a pronounced accentuation of the hyperthymic type, in which excessive features of independence, carefreeness, thirst for self-realization are combined with the suppression from consciousness of everything that complicates life, brings anxiety and anxiety, then her method of upbringing manifests itself as indulgence. The child in such a situation grows undisciplined, not knowing the limits of his whims and caprices; he does not get used to perseverance and work. In the future, his adaptation is difficult due to undeveloped self-control and the absence of developed norms of behavior in accordance with morality and the morality of society.
If the mother's character is distinguished by a pronounced imbalance, features of emotional excitability, inconsistency of the requirements made to the child, then her methods of upbringing are contradictory and inadequate: a bad deed may not be followed by condemnation or punishment, and for good behavior the child will not receive rewards or encouragement. The child cannot adapt to the maternal inconsistency on the basis of common sense, hence his own I cannot be formed on the basis of logical premises. Such a method of upbringing does not contribute to the integration of the personality; on the contrary, it can give rise to the splitting of the I, lead to complete disintegration.
The viciousness of the above-mentioned styles of upbringing can be attributed not only to mothers, but also to fathers and teachers, because their influence on the child is slightly less significant than the maternal one, but also great.
Let's look at those personal characteristics and style characteristics of the child's behavior that are revealed by the scales of the individual-typological questionnaire ITDO and allow us to characterize the main individual-personality types.
Elevated scores on the anxiety scale reveal a personality type similar to that described in adults as a personality with increased anxiety, and indicate a predominance in the child of such character traits as indecision, a pronounced sense of responsibility, an internal need to comply with the requirements of the environment - teachers, parents, class, as well as sensitivity, timidity, a tendency to unreasonable fears. Students of this type are more diligent in completing tasks for fear of receiving a bad grade, painfully experience reproaches and punishments, are very nervous before various kinds of control tasks and exams. They show loyalty and devotion in friendship, but, mainly, in the roles of followers, are devoted guides to the morality of their elders - parents, teachers, like to complain about their offenders, to nayadnychat. The phenomenon of nayadnychat is closely related to the need of a weak personality, unable to stand up for itself.
The anxious type is more common among girls. Boys belonging to this type look like "quiet", "decent", "well-mannered boys". With a sufficiently productive intellect, both of them can, due to diligence, systematically receive high marks for academic performance, teachers like them, parents do not complain about them, but a stereotypical style of thinking and compromise in behavior will not allow them to make a breakthrough in any interesting field of knowledge and they will always take a subordinate position in relation to strong personalities.
An increased scale of aggressiveness (stenichnost), on the contrary, indicates pronounced self-confidence, a desire for self-affirmation, motor activity and independence with low submission, and with high scores indicates excessive activity, impulsive behavior with low submission, a tendency to aggressive actions and absenteeism, negligence in completing tasks, up to obvious malicious hooligan actions. This type is more typical for boys, especially for adults in single-parent families. Among them, there are often boys who did not experience real parental love, warmth, kindness and care in childhood, who are accustomed from early childhood to oppose themselves to their surroundings, to fight for themselves. Although they cause the greatest difficulties for the teaching staff, firm measures of termination (expulsion from school, transfer to a special class or school, bad grades not so much for knowledge as for behavior) will only lead to even greater cruelty of the child and personal deformation will increase, because evil cannot be corrected with evil.
A high scale of extraversion is manifested by excessive sociability, which interferes with the purposefulness of actions, increased distraction, talkativeness, with an excessive number of friends and acquaintances, contacts remain superficial, shallow (many acquaintances - few real friends). In learning, material is better absorbed in a game, dialogic mode, than from textbooks. They are mischievous, funny, but quite realistic and enterprising. They can lie to get out of a difficult situation, boast to increase their importance in the eyes of others.
On the contrary, boys with a high introversion scale are distinguished by their taciturnity, isolation, and isolation. They are very careful in choosing friends, but constant in their affections. They are thoughtful in studying those subjects that they consider their favorite. They learn the material better when they are alone. Literature and humanitarian subjects are better for them than exact sciences. Verbal intelligence is most often predominant. They do not like to stand at the blackboard in front of the whole class, which can prevent them from correctly assessing their knowledge. Those around them may perceive them as gloomy and unfriendly, although in fact they often suffer from the rudeness and hardness of other boys, and isolation is a kind of protective reaction. They often have their own world of dreams, their view of life is characterized by impracticality, a tendency to idealization. Those of them who are distinguished by high intelligence can demonstrate extraordinary abilities due to their high concentration and tendency to deeply comprehend the material they are interested in.
High scores on the spontaneity scale are typical for boys with pronounced looseness, a tendency to free self-assertion, who strive for leadership or, at least, independence. Any regime framework that squeezes their will causes resistance and a desire for freedom. These are the most disobedient children, who violate all the rules and generally accepted norms of behavior more out of a spirit of contradiction than out of evil. They are attracted to everything forbidden. Hence the early interest in smoking, alcohol, and drugs. In a situation of family or school conflict, children of this type are prone to leaving home, to vagrancy. These are the most malicious truants and violators of the school regime. They learn unevenly, mainly rely on rich intuition, skillfully use hints, easily reproducing the whole from a small detail. At school, it is a scourge, but in their later life, many of them, thanks to their initiative, dexterity and courage, can achieve unprecedented success and brilliant discoveries, and then the teachers will be ashamed of their short-sightedness. Bad grades at school for the famous physicist Albert Einstein have already gone down in history. Perhaps, bad grades in themselves are not a sign of genius, but good grades are not a criterion for further success.
The sensitivity scale is high in boys with pronounced vulnerability, extremely vulnerable, prone to depressive reactions in case of failures. They have a pronounced desire to exaggerate their guilt in what happened. In relation to their classmates, they take a subordinate position, do not strive for leadership, feel more comfortable under the cover of a stronger personality in the class, or seek support from teachers and parents. In their studies, they are responsible and executive, react extremely anxiously to the exam situation, and are very worried when they are given low grades. They have a hard time experiencing brutality, infidelity, and insults. In conflict situations, one should be afraid of suicidal tendencies and prolonged depressive reactions on their part. In their studies, they are more oriented towards the humanities, they are better at literature and the Russian language, they are fascinated by poetry and lyrics, but they often do not get along with mathematics and physics. In love and friendship, boys of this type show considerable constancy and devotion. A thoughtful teacher spares such boys, relying on their responsibility and moral stability, that is, conscientiousness.
The lability scale with high indicators reflects pronounced emotional instability (lability, mobility). These are children whose moods change easily - from excessive cheerfulness, talkativeness, and laughter to a sharply depressed mood with tears, with violent reactions of sadness, accompanied by vegetative manifestations - facial redness, headaches and other pains, increased pulse, temperature, fainting, convulsive twitching, nausea and vomiting. These are quite impressionable children with a rich imagination, with a tendency to fantasize. They like to be the center of attention, are artistic, willingly engage in school amateur activities, sing, recite poems, dance, and play in performances. There is a lot of imitation in their behavior, they easily enter into any social roles. The main lever of pedagogical influence is an appeal to their vanity.
High indicators on the rigidity scale are characteristic of boys with pronounced perseverance (if it concerns achieving the goal) and stubbornness (if it manifests itself in defending their point of view). Their own status is extremely important to them - both from the standpoint of supremacy, power, and material well-being. They are extremely jealous of other people's fame and wealth, jealous in friendship and love, aggressive in defending their rights. In studying, they comprehend the material gradually, sometimes even too slowly, but, having mastered it, they hold it firmly, in their answers they rely on accumulated experience, they lack intuition and imagination, so it is difficult for them to use even a good hint. To study the material, such boys need cramming. Thanks to good perseverance, they can achieve good success, and due to the pronounced competitiveness in their character, they can fight to the last and win. This type of personality is often found in good athletes, especially in individual sports (not team sports) and martial arts. They also grow up to be disciplined and brave warriors. They are better at science with precise, concrete knowledge. They are far from poetry and sentimentality, and in fights they show firmness and aggressiveness.
All these features are further exacerbated and become the cause of difficult socio-psychological maladaptation in the adolescent period of personality development. As soon as the contours have been outlined, the whole personality is subjected to bilateral influence from the inside and outside. A powerful surge of hormones is released into the bloodstream, the rapid development of signs of sexual identity, the awakened sexual interest in the absence of an instilled culture of love relationships leads to bad forms of behavior in contacts with the opposite sex. Representatives of the inhibitory type, withdraw into themselves, fence themselves off, behave angularly, awkwardly, show negativism in the presence of persons of the opposite sex, experience an inferiority complex; hyperthymic, excitable individuals behave in this situation either abruptly and demonstratively, or aggressively and hot-temperedly. But after all, this is happening to them for the first time, they have no experience and correct understanding of either the content and value of these relationships, or the physiological and social consequences. The same is true of their attitude to smoking and alcohol: the more forbidden these activities seem to them, the more they are drawn to them.
The change in figure and face, the breaking of the voice, characteristic of 13-15 years, violate the usual image of the “I”. No longer a child, not yet an adult - the teenager painfully searches for the image of his new “I” - and does not quickly find it. Excess physical energy, high search activity with a tendency to self-realization are faced with the problem of mastering a new social role associated with entering adulthood, the idea of which is based on book information, on impressions gleaned from movies or from television screens, and on the model of society that the teenager sees in his environment - family, school, yard. The model of an adequate attitude to life values, to himself and to the environment is formed gradually. What we receive in adolescence is laid in childhood. Just entering adulthood, on its threshold, a teenager experiences the contradiction between the "ideal" model of the world and real reality existing in his consciousness. The more they differ from each other, the more that cognitive dissonance manifests itself, which is experienced differently by teenagers with different personal characteristics. In most cases, this stress is accompanied by bitter disappointments, a breakdown in self-awareness, a change or restoration of the subjective image of the "I" in connection with a new understanding of one's place in the world around them, and reactions of protest against the authoritarian tone of adults appear, and a tendency to overthrow the ideals of the older generation.
In cases where information about life, about the history of their country, about current events is presented to adolescents in a distorted, veiled form, covered with a touch of sanctimoniousness, and the real behavior of adults does not correspond to what they preach in their instructive notations, the reactions of the teenager can be extremely sharp and harmful both for himself and for those around him. If adults - parents, teachers, politicians - preach decency, sincerity, puritanism, and in practice behave differently, then children - especially children - very subtly perceive these contradictions, which usually affects the school, as well as the family psychological microclimate and manifests itself in disappointment, nihilism, negative attitude towards surrounding adults, rebellious tendencies with denial of any authorities. These data warn that one can expect unforeseen actions. At such a moment, an antisocial personality may become a "hero" in the eyes of a teenager, and the values of a street peer group may gain the greatest significance and lead him into the sphere of illegal actions. Against the background of the cruel breaking of stereotypes familiar from childhood and a clash with the truth of real life, thoughts of suicide may arise, and bad habits may also appear. Therefore, adolescence requires a particularly attentive attitude to individuality and a differentiated approach from the surrounding adults.
Often, adolescents experience the torment of their own imperfection, a complex of ugliness up to clinical manifestations (dysmorphophobia): after looking at their reflection in the mirror for a long time, they find shortcomings in themselves, with which their categorical maximalism does not allow them to reconcile themselves, and this can serve as the basis for serious torments, which outwardly manifest themselves as irritability, brutality, aggressiveness. They painfully experience youthful acne, which plunges them into despair and a sense of hopelessness. It is also necessary to take into account the morbid pride inherent in this age. Great importance is attached to the opinion of others about their person, while at the same time emphasizing indifference to this opinion. Emotions of anger and admiration, pride and contempt in their maximum expression with fluctuations of exaltation and despair constitute the main background of the mood of adolescents.
The heightened sensitivity to disrespect for one's own personality, humiliation of one's dignity is extremely painful. At the same time, self-confidence, faith in one's abilities, hope to achieve happiness dominate. Suppressing all this, crossing out proud aspirations, clipping the wings of dreams at this age is not allowed, because faith in oneself and the realization of hopes are necessary for the personality to take shape.
Active, hyperthymic forms of reaction in children and adolescents generally prevail, but even against the background of the elevated 4th and 9th scales in the profile, more specific individual-personal features are already discernible, which are not yet fully established and tend to change under the influence of the situation, but with repeated studies they increasingly begin to manifest themselves as stable tendencies.
The most frequently observed variants of character accentuations in adolescents are described by A. E. Litchko and distributed by him according to the following scheme:
1. Hyperthymic
High mood, need for active activity, undisciplinedness, frivolity.
Early and strong sexual development, early sexual relations.
Impulsiveness, risk-taking, craving for an antisocial environment, tendency to drink alcohol.
2. Cycloid
Cyclic changes in the emotional background, periods of low mood alternate with phases of upswing.
The level of sexual activity fluctuates depending on the general mental state.
During periods of upswing - a tendency to alcohol, during periods of downswing - thoughts of suicide.
3. Labile
Richness, brightness and depth of emotional experiences, sensitivity to signs of attention.
Sexual activity is limited to flirting and courtship.
Lack of emotional support can lead to acute affective reactions.
4. Schizoid
Tendency to loneliness, inability to empathize, unexpected openness to strangers.
External asexuality is combined with rich erotic fantasies.
Reaction of withdrawal into one's inner world, surprise and originality of actions.
5. Astheno-neurotic
Morriness, timidity, increased fatigue, sensitivity, anxiety, irritability.
Sexual activity is limited to short, quickly exhausting outbursts.
Hostility and weakly motivated outbursts towards adults.
6. Sensitive
Timidity and shyness, avoidance of noisy companies, vulnerability, increased feelings of debt.
Feelings of inferiority, rejected affection cause despondency.
Feigned resolve, brutality of others cause outbursts of aggression.
7. Psychasthenic
Motor awkwardness, indecision, tendency to introspection, uncertainty in making decisions.
The realization of the desire is complicated by fears and fear of possible consequences and failures.
Emphasized thoroughness, discipline.
8. Epileptoid
Affective explosiveness, pedantry, increased sense of accuracy, thrift.
Strong attraction to the object of affection, jealousy.
External adaptation is combined with severe conflicts.
9. Hysteroid
The need to attract attention, egocentrism, claims to the role of leader, brightness and expressiveness of emotions.
In sexual behavior, there is a lot of theatrical play, a tendency to invent non-existent relationships.
Unwillingness to study and work, absenteeism, no desire to be an adult.
10. Unstable
Lack of will in achieving goals, restlessness and disobedience, a tendency to laziness, easy to obey.
Attraction is not strong, early sexual experience.
Craving for an antisocial environment, drugs, group forms of offenses.
11. Conformist
Subordination to the opinions of others, dependence, banality of judgments.
The realization of the craving is largely determined by the environment.
Susceptibility in combination with uncriticality to the actions of others can lead to involvement in a criminal group.
These accentuation options are logically correlated with maladaptive forms of manifestation of leading individual-personal tendencies. The hyperthymic type of accentuating personality is characterized by relaxed, sometimes impulsive behavior, a desire for self-affirmation, offensive activity, non-conformity of statements and actions, a tendency to lead, sociability and aggressiveness, and is based on the so-called "strong" version of the nervous system. With pronounced external manifestations of activity (mobility, talkativeness, irritability, sociability), individuals of this type communicate with their surroundings less differentiatedly, without subtle nuances. At the same time, the circle of communication is quite wide, but relationships are superficial, without a tendency to deep affection, contacts are easily broken, without sincere pain they are replaced by new ones.
Among hyperthymic individuals there are various subtypes. Among them - epileptoid and close to it - excitable. The first of them is manifested by especially pronounced stubbornness and persistence, pedantry, ardent attachment to the adopted idea or cause, an increased sense of rivalry, a jealous and envious character, a tendency to accumulate negative emotions with the subsequent explosion of affect. If these qualities are involved, for example, in sports, then they will not hinder the adaptation of the teenager: on the contrary, they will contribute to his own self-affirmation, and will also cause encouraging reactions from the environment. Aggression in sports activities is less condemned, and moreover, it is mainly transformed into sports activity (boxing, wrestling, etc.). If the properties of this type of personality do not find worthy application in socially acceptable types of activity, then the reactions of teenagers can result in vengeful and hostile actions, therefore accentuants of this type are characterized by increased sensitivity to critical remarks, they easily flare up and aggression suddenly flares up. In a state of affect, the behavior of such teenagers can be especially cruel and destructive. An accidental fight can result in serious consequences, and a teenager can suddenly find himself in a situation that is regarded as an illegal act. With a shortage of material resources, he may resort to robbery with a complete lack of understanding that his actions are criminal: due to his own ideas about justice, he may think that by this act he expressed a protest against social inequality or compensated for what fate denied him.
The excitable type is characterized by a tendency to impulsive reactions, to ill-considered actions and statements, poor assimilation of experience, maximalism of views, unstable emotions that quickly replace each other with polar reactions of anger and delight, instability of self-esteem with excessive ambition, lack of orientation to generally accepted norms of behavior and moral foundations of the environment. At the same time, there is an increased susceptibility to antisocial influences, a primitive-necessary motivation aimed at satisfying one's own desires at any cost, which ultimately can also lead to illegal behavior.
Hypothetical variant of personal accentuation is manifested by greater passivity of external manifestations; instead, internal mental activity is actively manifested, there is an increased tendency to self-observation with increased sensitivity to environmental influences, with an orientation to an authoritative, strong figure in the immediate environment. This emphasis is based on the "weak", inhibitory version of the nervous system. If accentuants of this type are involved in a criminal environment, then most often they take a leading position in relation to "strong personalities, not being able to resist them, being fascinated by their vividly declared ideas or simply adhering to them for reasons of greater security. At the same time, it is important to emphasize that any leader among peers is always more attractive to teenagers than an adult family member or teacher, because most often in the family and in the pedagogical environment they rarely find understanding, even more so if conflicting relations and mutual rejection have already developed in these spheres of communication.
Cyclothymic personalities are characterized by mood swings from elevated to inadequately depressed, occurring without apparent reasons or for minimal reason. The hysteroid type of accentuation is manifested by the desire to constantly be in the center of attention of others; distinguished by emotional persuasiveness and artistry, teenagers of this type attach too much importance to what others think and say about them. Vanity and imitation of behavior is the lever that anyone can use to drag such a teenager to their side, and it is a pity if it is not possible to do this to a positive, constructive environment, but to those forces that are on the other side of good. Psychasthenics are distinguished by an anxious and distrustful mood, they are characterized by conformity as an inability to form their own opinion and a dependent position on authorities. Adherence to superstitions and ritual actions, which supposedly "prevent misfortune" and protect against "evil fate", can develop into stupid habits (for example, biting nails), obsessive actions or fears (phobias).
To this gallery of accentuations it is worth adding sensitive and expansive schizoids; both are distinguished by the originality of interests and statements, the unpredictability of actions, and pronounced subjectivism. Often, the source of the formation of the personality of this type is the lack of a warm attitude towards the child in early childhood, the cruelty and brutality of the methods used in his upbringing. But in the first (sensitive schizoids) introversion dominates (withdrawal into the world of dreams and fantasies), there is no active opposition to the environment, there is an increased sense of resentment, which is accompanied by isolation and unsociability. In the second - expansive schizoids - a sharply marked individualism manifests itself externally as emphasized independence and intolerance of other thoughts and views, the style of behavior is distinguished by the paradoxical nature of statements, the unexpectedness of actions and the emphasized non-conformity of views. If such a teenager embarks on the path of illegal behavior, he rarely becomes an ordinary member of a criminal group, more often he is a “steppe wolf”, a lone predator. The basis for his involvement in the criminal environment may be an increased sense of independence and disregard for the generally accepted morality of society, as well as emotional hardness and coldness. If there is good intelligence and abilities, teenagers of this type could manifest themselves as outstanding personalities in the field of creative activity, but often it is the non-recognition of their unique talent by others that causes them to react with protest and counteraction. Initially, these protest reactions may not go beyond hooligan behavior, but in the future, an increase in personal deviation can lead to serious criminal actions, which, as it were, compensate for the teenager’s non-recognition by society of his right to his individual style of self-affirmation.
Accentuation of personality in a teenager is only a predisposition, and how it is realized in life depends on timely recognized individual characteristics and skillful direction of these properties in a socially useful direction.
In adolescents, self-understanding has not yet reached the necessary level, and control of emotional and behavioral reactions does not have sufficient strength, extremely labile self-esteem, which is characterized by either excessive ups and downs of ambition. This distinguishes the immaturity of the personality, its incomplete formation. Therefore, emotional outbursts and protest-aggressive reactions of 13-15-year-old boys and girls are so bright and uncontrollable. Among them, tendencies most characteristic of the male and female sex are also found. In girls, sensitive, cycloid and hysteroid types of reaction are more common, which are rooted in the inhibitory and labile properties of the nervous system. Among boys, impulsive and epileptoid (explosive) types of reaction (excitable, active and rigid properties of the nervous system) are more often observed.
Most often, difficult adolescents are those boys and girls whose personality accentuation is manifested by the hyperthymic (excitable) type. They are too mobile, very emotional, stubborn and persistent, irrational and subjective in their inadequate demands and impatience with other points of view. A careful analysis of their properties with the use of psychodiagnostic tests revealed that the situation is most difficult where, within the framework of one personality, signs are combined that correlate with opposite types of reaction. Thus, the combination of characteristics associated with both rigidity and lability, or hyperthymic (excitable) and hypothymic (inhibitory) traits, or increased anxiety with increased aggressiveness, creates a rather contradictory personality pattern, which significantly complicates a person's social adaptation. Such a contradictory combination often serves as the basis for a pronounced internal conflict and reveals a predisposition to disharmonious personality development.
If the leading tendency is subject to the control of the intellect (at least in socially significant situations), then we are talking about a clearly outlined, pronounced character. Accentuation of character complicates the teenager's contacts with the environment and social adaptation is carried out only under certain conditions:
1. Those around him yield to him in everything, but at the same time are forced to largely abandon the realization of their own interests.
2. A special social niche is created for the person in this circle.
3. The surrounding society is forced to resort to measures of intersection and allocates a special type of training or work under special supervision.
If the socio-psychological maladaptation is so pronounced that the teenager's behavior becomes incorrigible, and repeated behavioral reactions acquire a brutal (uncontrollable) character like a cliché, then we are talking about psychopathic traits or a psychopathic personality. However, such adolescents should not be considered hopeless, it is necessary to try to fight for their socialization, warm their cruel hearts, warm their souls with love and patience by any benevolent measures. Hard measures will only cause them even more bitterness and will force them to finally break with the law-abiding layers of their environment.
Of course, differentiation of different degrees of adaptation (character, accentuation, psychopathy) is possible with a sufficiently long observation of the adolescent, while psychodiagnostic tests reliably and quickly allow us to assess the degree of expressiveness of certain individual and personal tendencies in quantitative indicators.
In the context of the problems discussed, it is also worth dwelling on some features of the modern style of teaching in school, where “repressive” pedagogical techniques are often used. One of them declares the need to lower grades for students. “This will force children to show the will to achieve higher results,” say teachers. And students who have not received encouragement for their successes and efforts completely lose interest in learning. In most students, endless threes and twos cause apathy and aversion to learning. At least 30% of high school students who study give an anxious-depressive reaction to bad grades, while some try to relieve neuropsychic tension by various means; among them alcohol, drugs, toxic substances (“wheels”). The lack of positive experiences at school, “laying out” and punishment at home create an atmosphere of general misunderstanding and rejection, a subjective feeling of “dead end”, which is fraught with suicidal tendencies. The last straw in addition to this is often unrequited love, which adults, as a rule, do not take seriously, and teenagers experience this first feeling tragically.
There is also a serious misconception that teenagers should experience a conscious craving for knowledge and understand the prospective significance of education in their lives. First, they live with problems and they still cannot understand the philosophical truth that “will is a conscious necessity”. This wisdom comes even to an adult with age. It has been scientifically proven that only a hypercompensatory mechanism, triggered by the frustration of others - urgent, vital needs - can cause such a focus (Lomonosov, Gorky, etc.). In adults, who have already formed a hierarchy of values with a mature, integrated “I”, the desire to gain knowledge appears as a need for self-realization mediated through consciousness. Basically, no one likes to learn, especially children, because in doing so they have to suppress their laziness and limit themselves in other needs. Secondly, the learning process requires mobilization of attention (and children have shaky attention) and perseverance (and children are restless by nature). Therefore, it is necessary to use various techniques to awaken their interest in a particular subject. There are no untalented children. There are untalented teachers. Given the specifics of childhood and adolescence, the lesson should be interesting, the material should be presented using visual aids, every 15-20 minutes of intense work should be interrupted with jokes, the inclusion of permitted motor reactions and the opportunity to make noise and shout. The changes should be all the more active and loud, because the best type of rest is the change of one type of activity (intellectual) to the opposite (motor) and vice versa: after a noisy, mobile-active state, some physical fatigue comes, which must be skillfully used for calm and thoughtful work.
To win the child's attention to the learning process, so that children love this or that subject and treat it with respect, it is necessary to spend a lot of effort, to show real skill and artistry.
Adults should place the child at ease, try to please him, and then attract his attention and tell him what he should remember so that it remains in his memory by itself, and not by force, on command. And not to demand a literal retelling of the material studied, as if memorized, but on the contrary, to awaken the imagination and highly appreciate the creative presentation, in which the child will express his understanding of the main essence of the problem in an arbitrary form. The creative beginning and originality of thinking in childhood manifest themselves with particular force. This has long been noticed and confirmed experimentally. Therefore, the pedagogical process should not so much impose a template approach to solving problems as respect and develop the uniqueness of each child's individual style.
It is bad when the pedagogical process turns into a struggle of ambitions: the heightened egotism of teenagers clashes with the ambitions of teachers who, acting from a position of strength, seek to suppress the rebellious mood of teenagers who experience dissatisfaction. A real teacher will not take out his grievances on difficult-to-manage children and lower the grade in the subject for bad behavior. He understands that any deformation of the teenager's personality is the result of improper upbringing. But it is bad when each party that educates (school, parents) attributes the defects of upbringing to the expense of the other, thereby, as it were, removing responsibility from itself.
It is a pity that in modern pedagogical methodology, Sukhomlynsky's call for respect for the child's personality still remains a voice crying in the wilderness. The fact that the child himself has not yet learned to show respect for adults is not a serious argument for justifying pedagogical aggression; This defect in education can be eliminated, but not by directive measures, but by personal example.
A feeling of great gratitude and even adoration is caused by that teacher who, taking on the difficult task of teaching and educating children, goes to it with love in his heart and is not afraid of disappointments, understanding that these “stupid and evil little animals” can become people only thanks to his kindness and efforts. I had the opportunity to know such teachers. When Yulia Vladimirovna was sick in the nearest school, where the children of our house studied, her students, without consulting adults, bought a bouquet of flowers and a cake with their own pocket money and with anxious concern ran together to visit her. And this while the illness of other teachers caused only relief - “There will be no lesson!!!”
Many problems of adolescence are transient, especially with a flexible and reasonable approach of adults. Given the age-specific characteristics, parents, educators and teachers at school should not break the child's character, but build their approach to his individuality, developing his self-understanding, contributing to the development of his abilities.
The role of school psychologists is manifested in establishing optimal interpersonal communication, including the correction of conflict situations. This takes into account both the horizontal direction of communication (class) and the vertical (teacher - class, teacher - student). For a more complete understanding of the problems of the student and his inner world, in recent years the study of the family and its psychological microclimate has been increasingly used. The desire to focus on a certain model of the average (average) student has already brought a lot of harm to pedagogy and has especially affected the students themselves. Often, teachers are able to reproach the child for his dissimilarity to others, his originality. This is a direct manifestation of disrespect for individuality.
Forensic psychological and psychiatric expertise often has to consider cases of unlawful behavior in pedagogically neglected adolescents, whose misfortune is that neither their mother nor their teachers have the strength to tolerate them, emotionally unstable, restless in their studies, as a result of which they were classified as inferior. Their further fate is a boarding school for the mentally retarded and a special, secondary position in society, an increased risk of their choosing a criminal path of self-affirmation. It is interesting to note that during the examination of such adolescents in a psychological experiment, good learning and workability are often revealed, which indicates the lack of training of many fully represented genetically, but not developed in the process of upbringing and formation of mental functions.
Experience shows that some individual characteristics that manifest themselves in an acute form (character accentuation, psychopathic traits) are better able to be self-controlled and do not cause social maladjustment of a teenager if they are taken into account in the context of an individualized approach, that is, if teachers, parents and peers treat the characteristics of a teenager with understanding and patience. To abandon a differentiated approach to schoolchildren means to abandon pedagogy. The role of a teacher (educator, pedagogue) is not only to teach this or that educational material (just as the task of parents is not only to feed and clothe the child). Learning that takes place taking into account the child's temperament, his individual style of thinking, is able to truly arouse interest in the subject, coincides with his motivational orientation and does not contradict his type of response, that is, is consonant with his constitutional characteristics. This is what is meant when talking about methods of upbringing, using the catchphrase: "Do not fill the vessel, but light the lamp".
The percentage of unbalanced children who deviate from the strict norm with difficulties in concentrating, increased distractibility, which easily gives irritable or even aggressive reactions, or, conversely, withdrawn passive, unsociable, tearful, has increased in recent years due to many problems of a medical and environmental nature. Does this mean that such children should be removed from the general group of students to boarding schools or hospitals? Life shows that such measures bring even greater harm. They can be resorted to only in isolated cases. Basically, such children need a more pronounced individualized approach, taking into account their characteristics. Only in this way can their socialization and adaptation to ordinary living conditions be promoted, so that they grow up to be full-fledged members of society, and not complexed "outcasts". Otherwise, we will multiply the army of disabled people and criminals.
Even children with real mental retardation diagnosed by psychiatrists grow up to be socially useful members of society, receive a certain (according to their capabilities) specialization, if they are approached from the standpoint of a humane, differentiated, benevolent pedagogical approach. At the same time, a healthy, absolutely normal child, in the absence of such an approach (if the best, strong sides of his personality are not noticed, and the critical attitude of others will emphasize the weak ones), can grow up to be a moral freak and a parasite.
Childhood years shape our soul. Therefore, adults, in particular, parents and teachers, are responsible for what their children will grow up to be, what will come of them. Hence the conclusions:
in a child, one must respect his individuality, not try to fit him to an average model. If he has stable individual-typological features, it is worth considering this and not to “break his character at the knee”, to show respect for the fact that he is “such a tree”. A nimble, mobile child cannot be made quiet, sedentary, consistently pedantic. And a quiet, sedentary, selective in communication cannot be presented immediately, under the influence of upbringing principles, which have turned into a quickly reacting, enterprising, sociable child. One can only gradually teach a child to cope with the weaknesses of his character, successfully using his strengths.
Childhood should be happy. Once a grandmother was asked: “Why do you spoil your grandson”, to which she replied: “And who should I spoil then?”, she answered as if it were self-evident that a grandmother was created to spoil.
At the same time, you should not pester the child with excessive caresses, endless kisses, especially if you have already noticed that they irritate the child: this can cause a backlash and even rejection.
At the same time, the child's desire to cuddle should always find an adequate response. The coldness of adults causes deep resentment in children. There is nothing worse when a child (small or large - it does not matter) believes that he is not loved, that he is lonely and no one understands him. It is in these experiences that the roots of problems lie, which can later be the cause of many disasters in his adult life. The arsenal of these disasters includes suicidal tendencies, a tendency to violence, alcoholism, drug addiction, criminal behavior.
Of course, an excess of well-being, extra money provided to a teenager can hopelessly spoil his hierarchy of values, shift it to purely material values. But depriving a child of the elementary joys of life, and, punishing for some offenses, taking away the opportunity to play, watch TV, take away the clothes he likes, not giving pocket money, treats or generally restricting food is far from a constructive method of upbringing. This can only embitter the child, develop a sense of envy in him, push him to theft.
You should never force a child to do something he does not want, does not like, even if it is a whim, although much more often it is a negative experience that is fixed. Otherwise, violence against human nature will later turn into gastritis or an even more serious disease of the digestive organs. Even if the child refuses to eat at all, you should wait until the feeling of hunger declares its rights. No child has ever died of hunger in such a situation, but caring mothers often lack the patience for such an experiment out of fear for their child, which causes irreparable harm to the child's psyche and health.
Children often consider the punishments to which adults - parents, teachers - subject them to be unfair. And if the anger that has fallen on them is really excessive and not always fair, then the resentment remains in the child's soul for a long time, and sometimes for a lifetime. The more often he has to experience such resentments, the more hostility and hostile feelings grow in his heart. And there is no need to wonder where children get so much aggression, even cruelty, and where criminals come from, merciless and cynical in their atrocities.
Even if it doesn't turn out well, try not to sow the seeds of hatred in the child's soul. After all, you want to raise a friend, not an enemy. Therefore, the punishment should not be perverse in form and delayed in time. It is better to quickly blurt out an angry reaction, not exceeding the degree of guilt of the child. An adequate angry reaction must be followed by reconciliation, forgiveness, caressing. Then a grateful child's heart will remember the joy of reconciliation more than the hardness and, as it often seems to them, the injustice of punishment.
Of course, you can't beat a child. The one who rushes to such measures shows his pedagogical ineptitude. Bad children are the result of your bad upbringing, both in the family and in the environment of the surrounding society (school, yard, street). Therefore, measures aimed at the improvement of society and the general improvement of culture are indispensable conditions for the formation of a child's soul.
The child should not consider himself bad in your eyes. Children have unstable self-esteem and at the same time unjustifiably inflated harassment. He is looking for recognition. If he is labeled as a bad student at school and a bad child in the family, he will go to the place where they will tell him "You are good". Most likely, it will be court or street company, where he will be praised for his ability to smoke, drink and steal.
Respecting the dignity of the child, at the same time one should not fall into familiarity and, not wanting to overburden oneself with worries and worries, show condescension. This is the path of permissiveness, which can lead to unruly behavior, perhaps even criminal, and will necessarily form egocentrism, selfishness, and narcissistic traits in the child. Such consequences are fraught with laziness and lack of patience on the part of parents who hope that the child will be educated by school, society, and life itself.
Protecting a child from the danger of alcohol abuse, one should not start with categorical prohibitions: the forbidden fruit is sweet. On the contrary, on major holidays, a drop of wine during a feast can remove an unhealthy interest in drinking and gradually get used to the culture of alcohol consumption, as an antidote to drinking in the backyard - without a snack and observing basic sanitary and hygienic conditions - and from drunkenness. But in no case should you use a teenager as a drinking companion: someone who drinks in the company of children is either extremely frivolous or immoral.
It is worth avoiding didacticism and boring notations: this is not the language in which you should talk to children. They have a life-saving shutdown protection mechanism at this moment. If you want to instill in your child the correct communication style and relationship to the surrounding reality, give him the opportunity to copy your interpersonal relationships in the family and with friends, give them the opportunity to see an adequate model of relationships between people of different genders and ages. Show by the example of your family how a man should behave towards a woman and vice versa, how to respectfully address elders, how to control your emotions and solve complex life problems from the standpoint of a reasonable, rational approach. Let the children see how you communicate with your friends who like books, movies, sports, music, etc. They should respect you not out of nowhere, simply because you gave birth to them and feed them. On the contrary, they should like you and make them want to follow you. Otherwise, I'm sorry, nothing good will happen.
You can't reproach children for their excessive mobility, talkativeness, sociability, and love of games: these are normal qualities for this age period. You should put up with this skillfully, without violence, regulating the degree of expressiveness and the place of application of these manifestations.
As early as possible, start involving your child in joint cooperation and friendship, so that he believes that you are trying to see him as a more adult person than he actually is. Children are humiliated by the condescending tone of adults. This does not mean that familiarity should be allowed. It is just about forming a positive self-esteem and self-respect in the child.
If you are afraid for your already quite old child, you have lost contact with him and are afraid of the stupid influence of the street, alcoholism, drug addiction, criminal behavior, - step on the throat of your own selfishness, give up complete home comfort for a while and let all his friends into your house. Let them litter a little, make noise, in the worst case, drink (less than in the yard), bite (so that the effect of alcohol is minimal), spoil something, even steal something. But gradually, the company of your son or daughter's friends, under your not too obvious, but friendly influence, will "squeeze" out of their environment those who are not in harmony with the morals of your family, you will establish friendship with the children, and with your own child. Direct opposition and prohibitions are completely useless and will not lead to anything.
You should not take too seriously the fact that children do not take care of their clothes, are careless with other people's property and money. A child who stole money from his parents is not yet a thief. He simply did not have pocket money (and he must have it in a small amount), and at the same time he really wanted something tasty or very necessary. Children have not yet formed moral criteria for behavior and an adequate attitude towards material values, children do not know the real price of money and things (happy) and only over the years do they gradually come to understand the dependence on these values, along with a more sober and cynical attitude towards life.
When teaching a teenager to work, turn this “activity” into a joint joyful activity, encouraging and praising him. There is nothing more disgusting and humiliating than forced labor, which distorts the human soul. Scolding and swearing can cause a lifelong aversion to work, whether it is cleaning an apartment, arranging a garden, vegetable garden or anything else. You should not expect a child to strive for order and accuracy: these traits are acquired later, sometimes only with the finding of their own family and housing.
Independence is instilled and brought up not by notations, but by trust mixed with risk. It is necessary to give children the opportunity to show this independence, realizing that the first steps will be a failure. But this is how a sense of responsibility for one's own actions is instilled, although adults have to be very nervous at first.
When making demands on children and young people, it would be nice to remember ourselves in ancient times more often, without demanding the impossible from others. In addition, each generation bears the imprint of a new era: the standard of normative behavior and morality at the beginning of the century changes its shades in its middle, especially at the end, and the new century brings us completely different criteria of morality and ethics; value orientation, attitude to family, to sex, to life and death, to the role of art in our lives change. Just like fashion in clothes, people's views on various phenomena of life around them change. The development of science and technology brings a certain novelty to the worldview and leaves an imprint on human relationships. Therefore, one can often hear representatives of the new generation respond to the previous generation: "How can you not understand us and not want to understand!!!" The reproach is fair, which makes one think, maybe even listen and try to understand. After all, this is an existential problem, repeated from century to century. And the one who is older is the one who is called upon, first of all, to think about how to find a way out of this eternal confrontation between parents and children. After all, "happiness is when you are understood..."
When it comes to adult children (although for parents, a son or daughter remains a child forever), do not belittle their age, do not demand more respect and love than they deserve. If you manage to instill such feelings and cultivate respect, then they will remain and will be more and more manifested as they grow older (age). But you cannot demand this from them in vain. On the contrary, it can cause a backlash. It is worth humbled and understand that “the golden ball of love always rolls forward” and that love for a girlfriend, wife and friends is more significant in youth, the more they confidently (and not without reason) believe that parents will not go anywhere and will love forever. At the same time, they - not always consciously - feel behind their backs a strong rear in the person of parental love, and this is wonderful, and this is how it should be. Parents should feel themselves in front of the accomplished fact - the child has become an adult, and feel some will, realize the opportunity to live for themselves, to some extent even feel the forgotten carefree youth. And let children learn life from their own mistakes, because even the most intelligent rarely succeed in learning from other people's mistakes. You cannot speculate on your poor health and a sense of loneliness, tying an adult child to yourself with an invisible bond: this way you can bring hatred on your head and ruin your child's life. According to all the laws of the existing universe, an adult, whose child he is, must independently solve his problems and live his life, in which parents are no longer given the first place. Such is the philosophy of life and it is worth understanding this in time.
At the same time, each of us is also an adult child who insists on complete independence, who demands independence and shows irritation in response to parents' attempts to still teach and protect. Understanding how wrong we are comes only when we ourselves grow old and begin to receive sharp and firm retorts in response to our caring advice, demonstrating the desire of our growing children to isolate themselves from intrusive care. And then it will be too late. But, before it is too late, let us tell our elderly parents in response to their pestering (to eat on time and dress warmer, to drink less, to walk more quietly, which come from love, from the desire to protect) - something not firm, not rude, maybe even - affectionate, and at least pretend that we are going to follow their advice, because they need so little!
The infantilism of the modern generation of youth is the result of improper upbringing, and the blame for this lies with us, adults: on parents, school, and the influence of the surrounding society. To ensure that the formation of personality takes place in a timely and harmonious manner - re-read everything from the first point to the last and try to implement it in your life.
Life is complex and full of sorrows, childhood is the most carefree time. Why overshadow this period of life, if there is an opportunity to protect the child from unnecessary negative experiences. Sometimes they talk ironically about blind maternal love. This means that the mother does not notice and does not want to objectively assess the shortcomings of her child. But only thanks to the fact that there is such selfless love in the world that a mother is capable of, humanity has survived. Only a mother is able to love not for any merit, but simply - to love, because she cannot do otherwise. This is a very special, selfless and selfless love, the highest form of love that grows out of the maternal instinct. It protects the child from premature cynicism, preserves illusions that form trust in people and the world around her. These good relationships will form the foundation from which the ability to love oneself, and then others, grows. Deprived of maternal warmth in childhood, growing up, a person from the very beginning does not believe in the kindness of other people, becomes an evil egoist who does not experience love for himself or for others.
Only love and patience can give a good result. The personal example of significant people around is of great importance. This is sometimes difficult to achieve: teenagers are sometimes extremely pushy and prickly. And it is difficult to orient them to bright ideals in our time. But all other paths are destructive, only one is constructive: the path of love and patience.