The content of children’s mental health mainly includes

The core content of children's mental health is essentially three mutually nested dimensions - age-appropriate emotional expression and regulation abilities, flexible social interaction skills, and a positive and realistic level of self-awareness. Many parents tend to equate "being good, obedient, and not causing trouble" with mental health. This is actually a big misunderstanding.

I worked as a resident psychologist in a public primary school for three years. The most common situation I encountered asking for help was: parents dragging their seven or eight-year-old children into the door and asking, "Our child has been losing his temper recently. Is there any psychological problem?" ”If you ask more carefully, the plot often comes out to be the same: a child who has just entered first grade cannot sit still and is criticized by the teacher. When he gets home and is about to express his grievances, his parents block him with the first sentence: "It must be your fault that the teacher scolded you. If you just listen to the class, everything will be fine." The emotional outlet is directly blocked, so can we only vent our emotions by throwing tantrums and throwing tantrums? You have to know that the prefrontal lobe of the brain, which is responsible for regulating human emotions, will not be fully developed until around the age of 20. It is essentially against the laws of physiology to require children as young as six or seven to be as emotionless as adults.

In fact, academic circles have always had different views on the priority of this part of the content. Psychoanalytically oriented counselors pay more attention to the establishment of a sense of security between the ages of 0 and 6, believing that this is the foundation of all mental health. I met a 4-year-old boy before. He always liked to snatch toys from children and would bite them if he couldn't grab them. His family scolded him and hit him, but it was of no use at all. Later, during a family interview, I found out that his mother went out to work when he was over 1 year old. She didn’t say hello to him before leaving, and disappeared for half a month. After she came back, she would always joke with him, “If you don’t obey, mom will leave again and don’t want you anymore.” You see, when he grabs the toy, he is essentially confirming "whether what I want can be firmly held in my hands." The root cause is a lack of sense of security. But behaviorist counselors don't see it that way. They pay more attention to the immediate behavioral feedback. They say that every time this child bites, adults will stop what they are doing and pay attention to him. Even if they scold him, for him, it is "I can get attention as long as I do this action", which in turn strengthens his Biting behavior - both of these statements are actually correct. Later, we asked my mother to never say "I don't want you" again and spend an extra 20 minutes a day playing with him and cuddling him. At the same time, we asked the family to treat him coldly after he bit someone and wait until he calmed down before communicating. Within two months, he never bit anyone again.

Last week, I was walking downstairs in the community, and I met a grandma with her 5-year-old granddaughter. When she met an acquaintance, she asked her child to say hello. The child hid behind the grandma, clutching the corner of her clothes and said nothing. The grandma slapped her on the spot and said, "Why are you so rude? You are less courageous than a mouse." I saw the little girl's eyes suddenly turned red, and I felt very distressed. Many parents always complain that their children are "socially anxious" and "don't like to play with others." In fact, if you think about it, when your child took the initiative to say hello to others for the first time, did you praise him, "My baby is awesome, he knows how to call people", or did you roll your eyes and say, "Why is your voice so quiet, as if you haven't eaten?" Social skills are never innate, they are cultivated through positive feedback: only children who have been responded to well will dare to speak again next time ； Children who have been accepted that "it's okay if they don't want to say hello" will not develop fear of social interaction.

What is most easily overlooked by parents is actually the part of self-awareness. Last year, I took over a fifth-grade girl. She was in the top three of the class every time. She still shed tears every time and said, "I got 98 in the math test this time, which is 2 points less than last time. Am I particularly useless?" Her parents thought it was "a good thing to be strong", but later they found out through careful discussion that the first sentence every time her parents got the report card was always "Why did you deduct 2 points?" Are you being careless again? ”I never praised her for doing well in the exam. Gradually, she formed the perception that "I only deserve to be loved if I get perfect marks on the test, and if I do something wrong, I am not good." If this cognitive bias is not adjusted, she will be particularly prone to depression and anxiety when she encounters setbacks in adolescence.

There is a lot of talk about parenting on the Internet right now. Many people say that we should "unconditionally accept all emotions of children", and many people criticize this as "poisonous chicken soup that will teach naughty children." In fact, both sides are a bit biased. Accepting emotions does not mean accepting wrong behaviors. For example, if a child acts up in the mall because you don't buy a toy for him, you can't scold him, "If you cry again, I'll leave you here," or you can't just compromise and buy a toy. You can carry him to a corner where no one is around and tell him, "I know you really want this toy. You're sad that you can't buy it, right?" I understand, but we agreed before that we have bought toys this month and we have to wait until next month to buy them. If you are sad, you can cry for a while and I will be here with you." You see, the emotions are caught and the rules are kept. This is really helping him learn how to deal with emotions.

In fact, after all, children's mental health is really not a profound knowledge that requires a certificate to understand, nor is it something that only needs attention when there is a problem. Just usually use less "you should" and more "what do you think", and don't always ask children according to adult standards. After all, we ourselves are in our thirties and forties, and we still feel depressed for a long time because the milk tea tastes wrong. Why should we ask children not to have any emotions at all?