We all know what it feels like to be ignored. When we ask a child or spouse to do something for us and they ignore our request — ouch! Not only is it frustrating it’s also hurtful. When we’re not responded to we feel invisible unimportant and uncared for. And yet we ourselves don’t always respond to others. We don’t intend to hurt or upset anyone; there’s always a good reason for our lack of responsiveness.

Responding to Babies

It’s hard to constantly and consistently respond to a baby. A baby demands attention 24/7 as if he or she was the only person in the world and the parent is some sort of personal slave. Mothers and fathers have other things to do besides interacting with the baby — they may be chopping vegetables for dinner helping a toddler on the toilet or speaking on the phone to a relative or business associate. Life must go on no matter what the baby needs.

And yet parental unresponsiveness impacts a baby whether it is intentional or unavoidable. Like us babies who are not attended to feel ignored unimportant uncared for frustrated and upset. Their unhappiness about the incident is evident only during the minutes they are waiting to get adult attention. For instance a baby may wail loudly for five minutes while trying to get a parental response. 

Crying for five minutes may not be a big deal. But what happens when a baby experiences frequent fairly consistent non-responsiveness? In that case significant learning occurs. What would you learn for example if your new friend almost never responded to your telephone calls? You might learn that you must not be that important to her or that people don’t always want to nurture friendships and that it’s probably best to give up trying to reach her. In fact this “giving up” process is the cornerstone of getting babies to sleep through the night. With consistent parental unresponsiveness to their nighttime cries babies eventually “give up” calling in the night.

It might seem then that giving up is a good thing. And at times it clearly is. The ability to respond to unresponsiveness this way helps us to maintain healthy boundaries. Instead of trying and trying to get attention when none is forthcoming we turn away from the unresponsive person and look elsewhere for responsiveness. While giving up on a high-quality nighttime relationship may be fine for a baby turning away from daytime relationships is not a good thing. Consistent parental responsiveness is important in the establishment and maintenance of a strong bond.

Responding to Children

But there is another factor to consider. When a baby cries and a parent responds the baby experiences his or her personal power. Similarly when a child expresses a feeling and the parent responds the child feels that he or she can make a difference. Consistent parental responsiveness empowers a child. When for instance the child complains that he finds the homework too hard and the parent responds by acknowledging the feeling and when practical trying to do something about it (i.e. get a tutor ask the teacher for less homework or whatever) the child learns that he has some control over his life. Consistent non-responsiveness on the other hand (where the parent regularly ignores the child’s complaint) leaves the child feeling powerless helpless and ineffectual. 

This doesn’t mean that a parent must in every single case respond to a child’s communication. Establishing a general trend is sufficient. When a parent regularly (not necessarily always) responds to a child the child gains a healthy sense of control and emotional security. It’s as if the parent is communicating “I see and hear you. I care about you. I’ll give you feedback. I’ll address your needs.”

The non-responsive parent communicates “I neither see you nor hear you. I’m attending to things more important than you. I don’t really care about your childish concerns. I’m not interested in you or your problems.” Most parents have no conscious intention to communicate such harsh or destructive messages to their child. They do it by accident when they’re too busy or when they don’t take a child’s concerns or feelings seriously. They do it when they decide that what the child is saying or feeling is “silly” “exaggerated ” or “manipulative.”  They do it when they decide that they know best and their child’s protests don’t need to be taken into account.

The Golden Rule

The rule in parenting as in all other relationships is “don’t do unto others what you don’t want done unto you.” We don’t enjoy being ignored for even one minute. Our babies and children feel the very same way. Trying to be responsive most of the time strengthens the parent-child bond and contributes to the child’s emotional wellbeing.