So, this is an ABA toxic abusive BS thing.. so don’t worry if you’ve never heard of it – it probably means you’re not a toxic a-hole.
Let me explain….
Example: A child is denied a cookie, so they cry. When they are given the cookie, they stop crying.
To avoid the child crying to get the cookie – you escalate your behaviour (the parents behaviour) – more denial of the cookie, more punishment, more planned ignoring, more pain, more everything you can think of to deny giving the cookie…..This actually forces the child to escalate their behaviour in return. This is what you are teaching them through modelling – you are showing them that you are escalating your behaviour until YOU get YOUR way…. So, they’ll copy you and escalate their behaviour in a similar way to ‘out do you’ (well that’s the theory anyway).
Eventually, you reach a point of “Extinction Burst”: this is where the child has one last burst of ‘defiance’ or anger/ aggression/ violence etc – before stopping and giving up.
This is not you winning. This is you teaching your child that an adult can act like a child until one of you wins. But because you are the adult – you will always win. It doesn’t teach respect, values, how to communicate a need, or how to regulate emotions etc – it only teaches a child that once their an adult – they can also act like a pre-Madonna ass hat to everyone around them until they get what they want.
It teaches that one person always has the power, and whoever has that power will win – usually whoever is the oldest, or most money or prestige etc. It teaches that children have no autonomy or choice or control – that no matter the need, the adult will impose their will over the child. And not kindly, respectfully or with understanding – but in a childish and retaliatory way. In a way that confirms for the child that the adults in their lives have never been taught kindness, respect or understanding.
The extinction burst is a last-ditch effort to be heard and understood…. It isn’t bad behaviour!
It’s an attempt for them to be heard, for you to understand and to listen to them. You aren’t “extinguishing” the ‘bad’ behaviour – you are extinguishing hope, you are extinguishing equity and refusing to listen to a distraught child. It’s called neglect and abuse in torture situations. Eg: the victim (persecuted) will plead and beg one last time before being extinguished forever. The perpetrator/ abuser will ignore them and keep doing the thing that harms the victim.
Relief from this isn’t ‘giving in’ or ‘reinforcing bad behaviour’ or whatever sick f’d up thing you think it is. It is abuse – it is neglect, it is torture, it is you being a callous dick. When you give relief in the form of stopping what you are doing and listening – or trying to understand the need – you aren’t teaching them to act badly to get their way. You are teaching them that kindness and calm begets kindness and calm. That a person being rational and regulating, and trying to help isn’t increasing bad behaviour – they are literally teaching a child how to cope the next time this happens.
What you are really doing is escalating a child to the point of exhaustion. You are pushing them into burnout for your own satisfaction. What kind of person does that??? Answer me – seriously – why do you think this is a good thing? Is it because in the end you got what you wanted: like what you think the child is – “a petulant child?” who just wants to have CONTROL all the time.
The child is not usually seeking control in the way you think. They are connection seeking – understanding seeking, not control seeking. And if they are control seeking (like PDA’ers often can do) – it’s not what you think. It’s not control in order to put you down or to ‘get their way’. It is ‘control’ in order to feel safe. To gain ‘control’ of their own nervous systems and brains.
Rethink it! It’s not a petulant child – it’s a struggling child who needs to learn how to calm their nervous system and learn to cope next time.
When you force a child into an extinction burst in order to regain your control. What you are doing is torturing the child. It’s like a chained abused animal. You’ve probably seen the ads on TV. The ones where horrible jailers (animal cruelty people) hit, whip, chain and starve animals into submission. They let the animals cry it out until they can cry no more. They purposely ignore the animals or hit them and use positive and negative reinforcement until the animals stop crying for help. The animals cry is a cry for help. It’s the same for children – they are crying for help – but you are being the same as someone who is eventually locked up for animal cruelty – you are ignoring them or beating them into submission. You don’t have to lay a hand on someone to ‘beat them into submission’. You can do it through this extinction burst method. You can do it by ignoring their pleas for help, you can do it through PBS and ABA methods. It’s truly cruel.
You are using abusive tactics to get what you want – a subservient, do what you say child. This isn’t good parenting or good adulting – this is bullying, this is abuse, this is torture.
Also a child that escalates to a (what you wrongly call a) “temper tantrum” that goes on for a long time is actually child abuse. It’s neglect. A child screaming and crying for a long time is in danger of doing real harm to themselves. They are in desperate need of co-regulation, not ignorance or ignoring.
Stop believing that ignoring a child is teaching them anything except learning how to take abuse. We don’t need to learn how to take abuse – that only ever leads to mental health issues, suicide ideation and possibly heightened aggression or violence in the child. Just stop!