True discipline will teach, not punish, Discipline That Works, True discipline will teach, not punish

D iscipline (which shares a root with the word “disciple”) is a teaching tool. An effectively disciplined child must learn something.

Punishment is a form of justice. Someone who has done something wrong shouldn’t be allowed to “get away with it.” Whether he learns anything or not is almost irrelevant. Instead punishment may be a vehicle for the expression of anger (or even revenge) an opportunity to right the wrong and an action meant to make a perpetrator “pay.” As such punishment has no place in healthy family relationships.

Anger-free discipline on the other hand has an important place in the parent-child relationship. When applied correctly it helps a child learn how to refrain from inappropriate behavior.

Applying Discipline

Discipline always requires follow-up to see if the child is learning the desired lesson (“We don’t walk through the house with mud on our shoes.”). After the child has mopped up the floor on three separate occasions the parent should see fewer muddy mishaps. If the misbehavior doesn’t lessen the parent should select a different negative consequence in the hope that the new one will be more effective (“I see mopping up the floor isn’t helping you learn not to wear muddy shoes in the house so from now on when you track mud inside I’ll mop the floor and you won’t get cookies for snack.”). If the lack of cookies leads to lack of mud then the parent has successful disciplined her child.

New Neural Pathways

How do negative consequences work? They help break up patterns in the brain. When a parent applies a negative consequence to the misbehavior of name calling a pain signal occurs at the end of the name-calling neural pathway. The circuit is now altered. Instead of running along the pathway of feel-annoyed-at-sibling-call-names it now follows the pathway of feel-annoyed-at-sibling-call-names-experience-pain-from-negative-consequence.

A painful ending to the circuit causes the child to want to avoid using that circuit altogether. The parent will observe a decrease in the frequency of the misbehavior. Since emotional pain is the magic ingredient in a negative consequence it’s essential to ensure that a negative consequence actually produces sufficient discomfort. Sending a child to her room rarely generates sufficient discomfort to alter a circuit. School suspension may be perceived as a vacation rather than a painful experience. Taking cookies away from a child who can get more from another “supplier” won’t provide enough discomfort either. Reprimands tend to be more annoying than hurtful.

Overly severe pain on the other hand is not only unnecessary but is actually counterproductive. In addition to harming the parent-child relationship and inflicting psychological trauma it is likely to worsen rather than reduce misbehavior.

In selecting negative consequences parents need to get it “just right ” avoiding consequences that result in too little or too much discomfort. Negative consequences need only be sufficiently disturbing to make the child want to avoid them in the future. Each child is unique. What’s painful for one will not necessarily be painful for another. Parents have found the right level of discomfort when they actually see a decrease in the misbehavior.

Maximizing Teaching

Two issues may arise when parents attempt to implement this. Understandably most parents don’t want to inflict pain on their child. Unfortunately negative consequences must generate discomfort to be effective. But even more important parents must understand the limits of negative consequences.

A misbehavior can be weakened through negative consequences but not eradicated. In order to eradicate it an entirely new behavior must be wired into the brain to replace the old circuit. If the child calls siblings names when he feels annoyed he must be taught to do something appropriate instead. Teaching a child what to do therefore takes priority over teaching him what not to do. Only when this step has been completed should parents begin to consider applying discipline (if it’s still necessary).

Fortunately for parents teaching a child what to do can be accomplished with loving pain-free techniques such as providing a positive model establishing a warm relationship using stories acknowledging appropriate behaviors employing praise positive labels rewards and other gentle strategies. Discipline can be minimized when teaching is maximized. (Originally featured in Family First Issue 565)