Whatever the causes of challenging behaviour, there are ways of dealing with it effectively. This page outlines some useful approaches.
Ways to promote good behaviour
Children with epilepsy may experience problems with brain function and development.
This means they may need more support to learn self-control and acceptable behaviour than other children their age.
They may also be more sensitive to issues around them.
Whatever the causes of challenging behaviour, there are ways to promote good behaviour, including:
- Addressing the child’s needs to avoid frustration
- Ensuring appropriate, consistent expectations
- Model good behaviour and communication
- Rewarding desirable behaviours – as well as physical treats, this could be stickers, praise, time with you, privileges or responsibility
- Boosting self-esteem
Another way of promoting good behaviour is through play. Find out more about play and positive behaviour.
Should I punish unwanted behaviour?
There are pros and cons to punishing unwanted behaviour, with the cons outweighing the pros.
Punishing unwanted behaviour can result in your child behaving the way you want in the short term, because you’re in charge and show authority. Unfortunately, punishing unwanted behaviour does not address the cause of that behaviour, so you’re likely to see different unwanted behaviours as a result.
Punishment also teaches the child that it’s acceptable, so they may use it against others.
Working out the best way to tackle each behavioural problem is not easy, and won’t be the same for every child or on every occasion.
Reacting to challenging behaviour
Instead of punishment, a good approach is to react more positively to unwanted behaviour:
- If possible, remove the trigger that causes the behaviour
- Defuse situations by distracting your child, but make sure you discuss the behaviour at a later time when they are less emotionally charged
- Try not to focus on the wrong behaviour and, instead, state clearly the behaviour you’d like to see
- Give clear choices for how they can behave and explain the consequences for each choice
- Recognise the feelings behind your child’s behaviour and show empathy – that you understand and care
How to show empathy when dealing with difficult behaviour
To show your child empathy, first of all, try not to focus on ‘fixing’ the problem and instead use these practical approaches:
- Make eye contact
- Get down to their level
- Give them your undivided attention
- Find, acknowledge and validate the feeling behind the behaviour, e.g. ‘I can see you’re angry and that can’t feel very nice
Rewards vs bribes
As with punishment, there are pros to rewards and cons to bribes.
Rewards motivate your child to behave the way you want, and reinforce the fact they’ve done what you wanted.
You’ve made an agreement with your child and give rewards consistently once your child behaves in the appropriate way.
Bribes are inconsistent rewards for immediate changes in behaviour, often just to get bad behaviour to stop.
They can work in the short term but they won’t teach your child long-term good habits.
Bribes are often given before the good behaviour has even started, which teaches children that bad behaviour gets rewarded.
