Saturday, November 22, 2008

Mistaken Goals of Behavior

In order to help parents understand the reasons that their children act out, Rudolf Dreikurs categorized those reasons into what he called the Four Mistaken Goals of Behavior:

Attention:
Every child strives to find a sense of belonging and significance. One way that children can feel important and cared for is by gaining the attention of adults. Children learn at a very early age that acting out is one way to receive attention, and even if the attention is negative, it can still give the child a sense of belonging.
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Power:
The acquisition of power will foster a sense of significance for virtually any human being. Children are no exception. When a child is not getting what she wants or needs, that child may attempt to create a power struggle between herself and an adult in order to gain a feeling of significance.
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Revenge:
When a child does not feel that he belongs, or is significant, it is inevitable that he will feel hurt. Sometimes, children try to hurt those who have caused them pain, because they feel they have the right to give back what they have received.
Assumed Inadequacy: If a child gives up hope that he can ever feel a sense of belonging and significance, he may change his behaviors from positive to negative, because he simply does not believe that his behavior matters to those around him.
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Assumed Inadequacy:
If a child gives up hope that he can ever feel a sense of belonging and significance, he may change his behaviors from positive to negative, because he simply does not believe that his behavior matters to those around him.
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Note:
When adults are assessing the goals behind certain behaviors, they should evaluate the setting and circumstance, to find out why the child is not getting a need met. For example, if the child was receiving enough attention, he/she would not need to misbehave in order to receive more. This does not mean that adults should pay special attention to individual children every waking moment, it simply means that determining where the deficiency lies will be the first step to solving the problem and eliminating the behavior.

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