How Behaviourism undermines Behaviour

If you’re using Rewards to Build your Relationship with a child, you’re not following a Relationship Based Approach.

If you are caring for a child with behavioural challenges, it is even more important to ensure you are following a relational approach with fidelity.

Those kids need to have an opportunity to develop secure attachment to their caregivers. That means they need genuine relationships, based on connection and safety.

The challenge for us as caregivers comes from the fact that most kids like things like stickers, and in the short term they seem to be helping. Kids may be more likely to express a positive view of the adult who gives them stickers, and they can be a very effective way of helping kids to stay on track in hard tasks - this is especially the case if we’re asking children to do things that are not quite in their skillset or developmental zone of readiness.

The critical thing to understand, is that the mechanism driving a child’s compliance, is very different in a behavioural approach, versus a relational approach. In a relationship-based approach the behaviour we see is driven from a place of nervous system safety. This is what we want as a true foundation for growth, development, learning and behaviour. When extrinsic motivators are used, we tap into the sympathetic (fight or flight) nervous system, which has the opposite effects long term.

Even if it’s not externally visible, stickers create stress and anxiety in the nervous system.

Kids with behavioural challenges are the ones who are struggling with regulation. They are already functioning with an elevated baseline level of stress in their nervous system. They don’t need more stress.

They need support. Strategies that focus on the behaviour and in many instances, a transactional approach to participation, fall short. What a relationship based approach does instead, is build a child’s capacity to behave. We do this by ensuring they can access connection and coregulation with trusted adults.

What about the other kids - those who generally have the capacity to do what we ask? Take that as evidence that kids are all wired to do well if they can, and they are wired to be guided by us when a secure attachment exists. They don’t need anything more than that. The advice here - Don’t undermine the capacity of a ‘well behaved’ child to keep doing the right thing. When you throw in extrinsic motivators for kids who are already showing signs of steady natural development and maturation, you risk introducing anxiety, and once a child’s body starts to feel stressed about something they were already wired to do, their capacity next time will be lower.

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