Some kids are slow to warm up in company.  Some are content without too much interaction with others.   Other kids live in fear of having to speak or interact with others. It’s important that we understand the differences and preferences of children before we go rushing in to make them “come out of themselves” and be the “life of the party”.

From very early in a child’s life, we can get a sense of that child being a “people person” or not.  Some bubs love the smiles, noises and interactions from other happy faces.  Others are less sociable, perhaps even turning away from others and burying their face in Mum or Dad’s shoulder.  Some infants will need lots of social stimulation and love time spent with others.  Still others will be somewhere in between and once they have warmed up and feel secure they will turn out of their parent’s armpit and smile at others.

These ways that children interact from very early in their lives are referred to as temperaments.  Temperament is our own little style or our early preferences for interacting with the world.  Early in our lives we haven’t yet amassed enough aspects of ourselves to call it a personality, but we have our style of early behaviours and it affects us and the sorts of reactions we get from others.

If we are a sociable bub and our parent is more of a loner, we may be under stimulated or if our parent is really sociable and loves to entertain and spend time with other people and bub is not that way inclined, there can be distress.

We need to take into account a child’s temperament when we are planning how best to help them accommodate and feel comfortable in the big wide world. Those bubs with a less sociable temperament are often best paired up with other infants who are also a little slow to warm to others and they will need to be sure that they have their safe base with Mum, Dad or their carer being very close. Temperament can have a big impact on the sorts of adults infants will become.

A really big study of temperament was done here in Australia over a beautifully long period of time from around 1982 to 2000 called “The Australian Temperament Project”.  The project’s researchers looked at infants from their birth through to the ages of 17 or 18 to discover which parts of their temperament were sustained over the years and which styles and preferences faded or changes.

When it came to shyness, there were some factors that could lock in a shy temperament for a long period of a child’s life and some where a shy temperament disappeared over time.

Children who had been shy from very early in their lives but “grew out of” their shyness tended to have parents who did not make them feel guilty or anxious, were warm and nurturing, and, importantly, who did not push them to be independent too soon.

Others who were found to have not started off shy, but developed shyness over time, were those children who had been exposed to more physical discipline and were controlled with much guilt and anxiety.  Clearly, parenting style had some effect on the outcomes when it came to life long tendencies to be shy.

Some shy people are often referred to as introverts, but this is not always the case.  Introversion or Extraversion are aspects of personality and refer to our preferred way for taking information in from the world and the different things that give us energy or motivate us.

Introverts prefer going about the world with a focus on their ideas, memories and images rather than becoming excited or energised by being with, and interacting with, people in the world.

While shyness and introversion can both be associated with avoiding other people, with an introvert, it’s more a preference to go about the world concentrating on things and activities that do not always require contact with others.  It is very different from having a fear of socialising.

A child’s discomfort or distress with socialising has to do with how much they want or don’t want to be around others and how hard it is for them to actually be around others.

Introverts may not take up lots of social opportunities, but they can also tend not to actively avoid socialising.  Introverts are energised more by things and activities than they are by other people in a situation. They may prefer books or art or music, or even acting, to the actual social aspects of human company.

It also may be that some young people (and older ones, too) are shy or a little anxious in specific social situations and not with all social situations.

Some people may get extremely anxious in job interviews or in sporting situations.  Some avoid public speaking.  If a child’s happy lifestyle or personal goals do not require these things from them and they are happy, then these anxieties are not a big and chronic issue.  They may want to get some help and support about specific problems, like the job interview, as the need arises.

On the other hand, there is social anxiety, or social phobia, that is an excessive fear of speaking to or being with others.  Social anxiety or social phobia is typically something I start to see more in my practice as children become teenagers.  It seems the social burst that comes with puberty and the all-important focus shift to peers, seems to open any gap in shyness wider.  A teen brain brings with it the added harshness of being able to judge ourselves socially and, as if it is not already too hard for some kids to feel comfortable in social situations, this extra change in their biology and the biology of their friends, can mess further with their confidence.  It’s often the case that people who are very socially anxious may rely heavily on alcohol to relax them in social situations and this can be very risky.

The important thing about helping someone who is socially anxious is in understanding their perceptions of themselves.

Social anxiety often has a person caught up in their own thoughts about other people’s thoughts – the classic “I think that they think, that I should and they think…”.

Essentially, there is often a lot of automatic self talk that assumes that other people are judging them harshly and that they themselves are not going to meet a standard. The fear of making a social accident or slip-up becomes extreme.

Because someone with social anxiety finds it so hard to deal with their perception of others’ perceptions of them (it’s hard to write – image living with it!), they can start to avoid people.  It’s easier to try to get out of a social situation than it is to run the risk of doing something embarrassing.  People with social anxiety are often the ones checking the exits and thinking a lot about how they might be able to get away.

Those with social anxiety might fear the very signs that their body is anxious.  Many are concerned about blushing and what other people think about their blushing.  So much so, that their bodies normal anxiety reaction makes them blush. It can be a vicious anxious circle.

When treating social anxiety, it’s important that we get to the core idea that the person is concerned about – is it blushing, is it that they think they are boring, is it that they fear rejection???

Psychological treatment will help a young person with social anxiety to control the biology of their anxiety and then the flow of their automatic thinking.  Then we practice gently exposing them to some of the situations they may fear at a pace that is carefully planned.  If social anxiety gets so debilitating that it stops a person from functioning or contributes to them being depressed, then they should really seek professional help.

All up, if you have concerns about whether someone needs help with feeling comfy with others, first just check whether this is their preference or their fear.

If it’s their preference and you would like to spend more time with them, then plan something quiet and low key without too many other people.  If it’s a fear or if there has been a change in someone who was once bubbly and outgoing, but is now shy and avoidant, it’s best to get them to talk to someone professional.

Language specialists believe that swearing has been around since the dawn of human time.  In my thinking, if something has been with human beings for so long, it must be serving a jolly important purpose.

The thing is, though, that researchers are now telling us that profanity is on the rise.  Swearing and foul language can make other people feel upset or attacked, too.  So, can we, or should we, immunise children against swearing?

If we are going to replace something in a person’s repertoire of behaviours, psychologists first need to consider the function a particular behaviour is serving a person.  Why does the behaviour work for a person?

It turns out that swearing appears to serve a number of functions for us as individuals and as groups.

• Swearing can help us let big feelings go.

Turns out that swearing help most of us tolerate pain.  Research published in 2009 had scientists getting people to place their hands in very cold water.  One group got to swear, the other group had to say another neutral word.  Swearing increased pain tolerance, increased heart rate and decreased perceived pain compared with not swearing. (However, swearing did not increase pain tolerance in males with a tendency to catastrophize and I’m not going to comment further there for fear of upsetting any excitable male friends or family members – wink, wink).

It’s also important to note that more swearing did not reduce pain more. In fact, swearing seems to lose it magical, “feel better” powers the more that we use it.  Otherwise, I’m sure those who experience chronic pain would love being able to feel more comfortable by merely letting a few foul words fly through the day.

• Swearing communicates to others that we are in a certain frame of mind.

In fact, in a paper written at the beginning of the last century it was identified that swearing had origins in combat and over time it became used when someone was under threat.  So, originally, swearing was likely seen as fighting words and it still functions to show others how we feel about things.

• Swearing can be used to emphasise things.

When you think about, swearing can provide the ultimate exclamation mark!  It can add significant emphasis to just about any noun or verb.

• Swearing also has social purposes.

Swearing can create a feeling of solidarity and it can also be used in groups to create a sensed of informality. My husband tells me he thinks swearing is fun! My oldest, now adult, children swear when chatting via text or across social media.

Workplaces, schools, relatives, “paddocks” –  each place comes with a, predominantly unwritten, set of rules about swearing.  The most common contexts in which people report hearing swearing are sports-related – on the field, in the locker room – even the sports canteen!    People are less likely to swear in the absence of parents, our doctor (although medical professionals report being exposed to increased levels of swearing), people we are not close to, or people who we see as having a higher status than us.

It is swearing’s social function that makes swearing “catchy” and spread in social groups – including, crèche, kindergartens and school environments.

The different functions of swearing can also be understood by looking at the different parts of the brain that are activated at those times we are letting the taboo words fly.  In a review of the literature,  researchers found that different parts of the brain seem to be associated with different types of swearing.  Swearing to deal with pain or a big feeling is usually associated with activity on the right side of the brain.  Most people have their language centre on the left side of the brain.  When swearing is used in a purposeful and social context – to fit in and speak the local speak – the activity is more left-brained. Swearing can also be associated with tic disorders although for the most part, children who have tic disorders, including Tourette’s syndrome, are more likely to make involuntary utterances or grunts rather than full-on swearing.

The front of the brain is the bit that tells us when we should or shouldn’t swear.  This is the last bit that gets myelinated or insulated as a child develops so it’s not surprising that little ones will often get the rules about context incorrect. If the frontal cortex is damaged due to an acquired brain injury or a degenerative condition like Alzheimer’s, the swearing can become less regulated as the brain has less of a filter.

As adults, we are supposed to be able to scan the present environment, and maybe the present company and discern whether it’s okay to let a swear word rip.  Some children will pick this up over time, but most will need some guidance.

Not everyone, including some very important people in our society, value swearing.  Children need to learn that it leaves an impression and they need to learn to read others and actually learn to make some basic assumptions so that they can decide when to let a swear word slide out and when to hold back.

If you are living with, parenting or working with a young person and you think their swearing is concerning, there are a few implications of all the information I’ve outlined above.

If  swearing is about letting stuff go, then we need to ensure that a child  is learning to regulate their emotions and has more in their “letting go tool box” than just profanity.  An important task of a growing brain involves getting those frontal lobes to build the filters necessary to make sure we do the right thing in the right places.

If swearing is about fitting in, we also need to let children know other ways that they can do this or even to weigh up whether they need to fit in with any particular group. It’s important that they learn to draw the line and not use swearing and foul language as a put down or to be purposely offensive or attacking.

Swearing warns other people that we are in a certain mood.  Tell your kids to stay away from someone who is swearing and not to swear at someone if they are upset with them – it is best to try to use problem solving.

Have discussions about swearing in reference to context.  Where might you be able to get away with it and when should you try never to swear?

Yes  – Swearing is catchy and on the increase… and the more we use it, the less it works to help us with our feelings.

Rules about swearing will depend on your own values at home, but be mindful that too much swearing lessens some of the positive effects of swearing.  Swearing  works best when you save it up for just the right moment.  I like to save my swear words, the ones that don’t slip out involuntarily when I break a toe, for those times when I really want to make a maximum impact.  I like to think I do this mostly in context. Remember your children are watching and listening to you more than you know.

Can you immunise your child against swearing – maybe and it will take work to catch them, review the circumstances and respond with information about context and appropriateness?  It’s best to think about giving your child a framework to consider the pros and cons of foul language in certain places and with certain people.

Should you immunise your child against the use of swear words?  I’ve not heard of anyone who has never uttered a foul word – even inside their head.  It seems like we are biologically wired to do so at times and while the benefits may wear off with over use, we should not be too hard on children who swear infrequently and when something really hurts.

Moments where someone is caught swearing are great learning opportunities for everyone!

At some stage in each of our lives we will experience the loss of someone to…. death.  Despite death having been a part of human experience for all of documented history, it still feels like it is such a taboo subject to talk about.  This sense of wanting to avoid the topic is largely, I think, because it is one that comes with BIG feelings and, perhaps, with questions that even the smartest grown up may not be able to answer in easy ways.   All of this complexity and avoidance of big feelings can mean that, often, people do not get around to talking to their children about death and dying at all.  Children can get thrown in the emotional deep-end without some understanding of what is going on for them and for others when someone dies.

Grief is often used in psychology to talk about any loss – moving school, losing contact with a friend, or even losing a favourite toy or changing houses.  Adults may be a little more in tune with this kind of loss for children and find it easier to speak openly and offer support, strategies and distraction. When it comes to talking about loss due to death, we need to be just as open, sensitive, and supportive.

Many children experience their first big grief reactions in relation to the death of a family pet and this is a very good time to have more conversations about dying and death.

Back in the day, it was thought that grief had stages that people must progress through, but we are now much wiser to the ways people react to grief and loss and know that it is a way more complicated picture than a simple stage approach might have us think.  The size and shape of the feeling will depend on many different things – your relationship with the person, your last contact with that person, how you are travelling emotionally at any given point, how much other grief and loss you have experienced….the list can be long.   Essentially, though, if a psychologist or grief counsellor is involved, they will tend to focus on what the loss actually means for each person at a particular time.  Obviously, the more complex the relationships and lifestyles, the more complex the grief reaction may be and psychologists work hard to try to understand what the death means for the person in terms of their beliefs about themselves, their past, their future and their relationships.

Because we understand the reactions to death will be influenced by beliefs, it’s important that we consider what a person believes happen when someone dies – this is the case for kids, too!

Of course, this takes us right to the heart of people’s values, culture, practicalities or spirituality.

It’s natural that we all consider what happens next.  Children will likely consider this, too, so we need to be ready to gently share a range of beliefs about death.  It can be difficult to talk about complex ideas in simple ways, and if you are struggling, you could try my book “Life is Like the Wind”, where I’ve tried to cover some of the beliefs and offer children possibilities for knowing and accepting their feelings.

Be prepared for talking and questions as young children try to make sense of tricky new concepts.  Children, especially young children, usually ask very straightforward questions and many adults are concerned about given children straightforward answers.

Children may want to know the practical questions…like “why are they in that box”, “why do they put a cross on the ground”, “why do people have to die”, or even “if the body is being buried, what will they do with the head”?

It’s great if children want to ask questions – it can indicate that they are trying to nut stuff out and make sense of it for themselves.  If your child has questions about death, it can sometimes feel like you are being put on the spot and it may open up some tightly pushed down grief of your own, but take time to answer.  If you cannot come up with a good answer, it’s always fine to suggest that together you might do some research or ask someone who may know a little more about things

Other children may not want to know anything or ask anything and that’s okay, too…just keep an eye out for them and a heart open for them in case they are keeping their feelings closely guarded.

If a child is attending a funeral service, be sure to give them a bit of a guide as to what to expect.  They should know that other people at the service will be feeling a range of feelings and that some may be crying or very upset.  Give them some ideas about whether they might need to sit or stand at certain times, that people will be talking about the person who has died, there may be pictures of the person who has died, there may be a coffin and the coffin might be opened or closed, there might be photos and music and, importantly, be sure to let them know what to do if they themselves get upset.

The thing about grief and kids is that as well as dealing with their own feelings, it’s highly likely that a child’s “go-to” people are also affected by the same loss.  Often the grown-ups in the situation are also managing their own big feelings which can mean that they may be less emotionally available.

Sometimes the grown-ups can even be less physically available if there is a lot for the adults to do after a death – organising, meeting, phoning, greeting well wishers…all takes time away from routine.  So, as well as the person who has died, the child can lose access to their usual support mechanism.  It can be useful during a time of intense grief that adults make a routine time to be available for their child.  Often, it helps if the shared time is around bedtime – because we all know how busy our heads can get about our fears and worries when we stop and try to be still and quiet at the end of the day.

Despite being associated with strong feelings (even strong feelings of not feeling!) and affecting our ability to function, grief in and of itself is not in our mental health manuals as a disorder.  That’s because it’s actually “normal” or typical to feel a range of emotions and experiences at the loss of a significant other.   Of course, if the sadness, upset, heaviness or numbness continues for too long without gradually lifting, please be sure to ask a professional for some help.

Resilience.  We hear a lot about resilience in children and about the idea of being able to raise children who bounce back after tough times.  These days, when I ask parents what they want for their children, they are less likely to say that they want them to have a good job, marry well or “stay out of trouble”. They are more likely to say that they want their child to be more resilient – to rebound from disappointments, stresses and traumas, to get along with others, and to respect themselves.

Obviously, parenting is an important part of raising a resilient child.  To be proactive, work as a team, be consistent, and use the most positive forms of discipline is more likely to breed resilience in children.  These things are good to know….but….

 It never ceases to amaze me how some children bounce back from the most traumatic and unhealthy circumstances – even some who are mistreated by their parents!

In the late 1980s, researchers have looked at children who’ve had tough times and bounced back.  In fact, they had become healthy parents themselves.  Those maltreated children fared better or recovered more successfully when they had a positive relationship with a competent adult, were good learners and problem-solvers, were engaging to other people, and had areas of competence and perceived efficacy.  Being valued by society, having intelligence, social skills, strong community/religious affiliations, positive school experiences, and  participation in therapy all helped.

So, if children can be assisted to bounce back after tough times, even the really tough times, what about parents?  How well do parents cope with the everyday rigor of life stress or how well do they bounce back from traumatic events?

We’ve all had tough days when we know we may not be parenting the way we normally do.  It is also likely that we’ve all had bigger events that “just a tough day”.  How have these big events in your life affected you and did they change the way you parented at all, for awhile or even forever?

Researchers at Melbourne’s RMIT have started to get their heads together to explore the ideas around what it might take for a parent to bounce back after a traumatic situation or stressful time and how  a parent can continue to be a competent parent when times are tough.

The researchers at RMIT, have reviewed the literature to date and have decided that the key to resilient parenting lies across four main areas.

• Psychological well being – Parents who take care of their own mental health are best placed to bounce back from tough times. While this doesn’t mean that you leave your children alone at home because you need to have more good times with your friends, taking steps to seek treatment for any mental health concerns you experience and knowing your own pattern of coping and what you need to do in tough times is important.  Poor mental health can significantly impair parenting ability.
• It is thought that parental self efficacy is central to being a resilient parent – Self efficacy is the confidence we have in our ability to do something. If we doubt our abilities, it may be that we have a harder times dealing with stressors.  Believing that you are a competent parent appears linked to positive outcomes for families.
• Family functioning – Psychologists have long known the importance of trying to re-establish a routine in the lives of people who have been affected by trauma. Resilient parents provide their children with everyday activities and routines.  It seems that when we know what is likely to happen next (“It’s Monday, I have swimming lessons after school – I’ll need to pack my swimming gear”), we are more likely to settle back down into being able to do what we need to do.
• Social connectedness – Just like young infants need to have a healthy attachment to a safe, warm adult – connectedness plays a protective role in times of crisis for grown-ups, too. We all benefit from being able to access practical and emotional support from friends and extended family.  It looks like adults who have good quality social connections are more resilient.

At this stage, we know that resilient parents take care of themselves so that they can continue to provide routine and structure for their family as well as stay connected to friends and extended family.

While it has might been said that it takes a village to raise a child, it seems that it takes a village to support parents to raise a child.

Parents who take care of their mental health, keep family routines and structure going, have faith in their ability, and faith that they will be supported, look to be those who bounce back from life’s hassles, setbacks and traumas.

We have all likely experienced the agony of a broken heart and all found ourselves asking “why does it hurt so much?”  Humans are predominantly social creatures.  Even the most introverted among us can still crave intimate connection.  Our survival depends on being part of a group so it is not surprising that when we feel like we are excluded, rejected or someone is no longer a friend, we get strong signals in our body that can be quite alarming.

As infants and throughout our upbringing, we humans depend on secure relationships to meet, at first our basic need for food, warmth and shelter and, later, our more complex social, emotional needs.  It is well known that healthy parenting plays a part in developing adjustment.  Kids with a secure base from which to explore the world and explore other relationships are generally better adjusted than those without that secure base.

As we grow, we seek more intimate connections with others and, by the time we are well into our teens, we are seeking intimate relationships with what we hope might be a long time relationship.    Indeed many years ago, theorist Eric Erickson defined the teen years as those where the major developmental tasks is identity and then following that, intimacy.  It’s important that we work out who we are and what is important to us and then find connection.

It is perhaps a cruel twist of fate that adolescence is the time when we start to seek intimacy and also the time of our most strongly felt emotions.

It is very typical for teens to seek out the sweetest sweets, the dizziest risks and the most dramatic dramas.  Their brains and endocrines systems demand it.  I had heard that this drive to find more satisfaction is perhaps what eventually makes teens leave home and mix up the gene pool so we don’t get too inter-bred.

Biologically wired to find a mate, the teen is pre-programmed to seek out an intimate partner and to seek more adventure or take risks.  Feelings are strongly felt.  Love is dizzy and rejection is crushing.  One just has to review popular musical lyrics across generations to know that heartache and heartbreak are not new phenomena. Search for connection and dealing with rejections have long driven much human behaviour.

When you understand the biology and psychology of adolescence, it is clear that it is just cruel to dismiss the emotions of a heart-broken teen.

Indeed, it is actually problematic to not support young people through heart break – especially those teens who are rejection sensitive.

Researchers are telling us that some young people are more sensitive to rejection than others.  We don’t yet know why this might be.  Perhaps it’s linked to very early life events or even to individual temperament or as we get more aware about the influence of epigenetics. However, we know that those young people who are rejections sensitive are more prone to mental health concerns including depression and anxiety.  Some are more prone to get angry and some are prone to become more anxious.  The same researchers have learned that the association between rejection sensitivity and mental health concerns is affected by friends and family.  Outcomes are better when friends and family are supportive.

We need to help young people bounce back from romantic rejection and to help them know how to help each other when a friend’s heart is broken.

So, what to do?  Here are some tips….

• Allow the person time to experience and feel the emotions.  While there are many feelings we don’t like to have, feelings always make sense and we often end up in bigger messes when we try not to feel something rather than just let the feeling come (This is probably why I so love the movie “Inside Out”).
• Be sure the person has healthy means available to soothe themselves – some may need to talk about it repeatedly for what feels like forever, some might want to hide in bed (don’t let this go on for too long and try to encourage exposure to daylight), they may want to watch sad movies with you, listen to sad songs, go for long walks or if they are angry, encourage some vigorous exercise and some pillow punching.  While it may feel like the Aussie way, don’t offer alcohol.  Offer company – the “be with you” type not the “demand things of you” type.
• When the time is right (when they can talk about it without running off or shutting down), offer the chance to discuss the relationship and what they may have learned from it about themselves and about others and what they might take into the future.  Discourage revenge or stalking ideas. Encourage paying some attention to the things that are important to them in life or that they may be good at or that make them feel good.

Shona’s golden rule is “don’t make yourself feel better by making someone else feel worse – make yourself feel better by doing better things for you or others”

• Get practical, too.  Help them handle the likelihood of bumping into this person and come up with a little plan or even some personal growth challenges when this occurs.  Make sure that you include a plan to manage bumping into them on social media, too.
• If you think that they are at risk of doing something dangerous or if you think the heartbreak is taking too long to begin to repair, assist the person to access some professional help.  If they ever threaten to hurt themselves, even if it is a message you get on social media in the middle of the night, be sure to contact someone who can actually keep them safe right then and there (a parent or even an ambulance).  A psychologist can get to know them, understand why things might be taking longer and help them take steps to adjust.
• Try to avoid avoidance.  Keep an eye on them to make sure that they are not avoiding future relationships.

The joy of a healthy, loving and long-term relationship with ourselves, another or a community is well worth some practice runs along the way.

I have a cloudy memory of what I think was my first day of school. The memory is assisted by a first-day photo of me in a school uniform that I did eventually grow into. I remember my school bag feeling almost larger than me. My hair was cut short, especially for the purpose of being school-ready. I don’t remember if my mother was there. I have a feeling I may have been walked to school by my neighbour who was a year older than me so had a good 12 months of school experience up his sleeve. I remember buildings being huge, smells (lots of smells – gestetner fumes, stale apples, chalk dust), and meeting new friends. I distinctly remember being very surprised to learn that one of my new friends had just become an aunty – surely being an aunty was something only grown-ups could do!

I’m always delighted to learn about the things that grab a specific child’s attention and, more often than not, it’s not the same stuff that bothers or upsets grownups. Adults need to be wary of making anxious assumptions about how children may or may not cope.

In the treatment of children who are having troubles, we psychologists rely on a range of techniques when helping people deal with upset, anxiety or new things. Collecting information about something new or scary is a great place to start. If the upset is about school, then it’s useful to have gentle conversations about school, reading books about school, and spending time with other people who are about to go to school. Gentle conversations are very different from one-sided inquisitions. The idea is to gently explore the new thing together as the matter arises. If a child raises a specific concern in these conversations, then this can be honed-in on for special attention. A child may be worried about making new friends, being lonely or missing mum or dad. If they voice specific concerns you can curiously gather more specific information together and help then come up with a plan for what they might try. Some children may need more preparation than others and some may like to carry a little “attachment object” (like Mum’s hanky or Dad’s key chain) as a way of still feeling close.

When dealing with new or scary stuff, psychologists also use a technique called graded exposure (not the sort that people can get arrested for) where we break down the scary thing into smaller parts and try a little bit until we feel comfy, then a bigger bit, then an even bigger bit and so on. These are techniques that can be useful as a child approaches school. Children have probably already had some visits to their new school, but you may like to walk, or drive, past school over coming days. Wear that over-sized uniform and new shoes around the house so that it feels comfy. Make sure that all the books and lunch boxes are ready.

Teachers well know that establishing and sticking to routine helps children settle. I suspect teachers have known this a lot longer than trauma psychologists.

An upset or frightened brain settles more quickly when it knows what to expect. Routines help us to know what comes next and when we stick to them, one activity just seems to roll into the next. Early learners may need routines spelled out or visual representations of routines. At home, you can help by trying to switch from the holiday bed-time and breakfast time routines to the school-night/morning routines.

Be mindful that routine is less common in the playground and some little ones can come unstuck in the playground when there is no set task to do and other children are more energised. The playground can be a jungle! Be sure to get some holiday practice in playgrounds, too.

While I’m sure it’s purely in the interest of helping a little sibling, older brothers and sisters may say things that frighten little ones about school. Just keep an eye on these interactions and be sure that you provide perspective for your child

Oh, and on providing perspective for your child, it’s important that grown-ups try really hard to keep their own anxieties to themselves and make sure they get specific grown-up help if they start to leak out these anxieties and affect little ones.

If you are worried about how you might feel about your child starting school and the child not being “little” anymore, be sure you plan a way to acknowledge and deal with these feelings – make a time to catch up with other parents in the same situations (some schools are lovely enough to provide welcome coffee for parents on the first morning). Don’t make a big deal about what great fun you will be having without your child (they won’t want to miss out) and don’t make a big deal about how sad you will be without them – children can easily feel responsible for their parents’ moods.

Overall, when it comes to a smooth start to school, it’s really important that children know that they have all they need (inside them and around them) and that they can always ask for help or speak up about problems. Pack them off with a sense of pride, excitement and wonder. They will have amazing experiences ahead!

In the holiday period here in Australia, many young people get casual work. For many, that first causal job flipping burgers, wiping tables, or swiping groceries at the checkout will be their introduction to life in the workplace. The transition to work is a really important part of human development.

Back in the day when I was learning to be a psychologist, I was exposed to the work of a theorist called Erik Erickson. Apart from having a cool, DJ-type name, Erickson proposed a stage theory of human development that extended beyond childhood and well into the adult years. For Erikson, getting work was a sign that a person was moving from the stage of their identity formation through to a stage of developing intimacy. Crucial in his theory about a child becoming an adult was the concept of a child growing to know themselves and then being able to commune or relate with others. Working and the relationships the young adult has with others at work were, to Erikson, very important to their ability to have healthy adult relationships and avoid feelings of isolation.

The age at which many young people get full time work has certainly increased over the years with most Australians now staying on to complete Year 12 education, but I believe that some of Erickson’s ideas still make a lot of sense. Entering the workplace is a whole new world for a young person. They begin to take on a level of responsibility, deal with strangers, negotiate colleagues and have to advocate for themselves in a new environment.

How a young person deals with challenges in their workplace environments can have repercussions for their overall psychological adjustment.

Entering the workplace is likely a whole new experience for a young person. Just as they did when starting kindergarten and school some years ago, young people starting work are entering into a whole new jungle – a new landscape, new rules and new groups of people. Most of the people will be reasonable, but there will always be a need to manage difficult customers, coping with occasional tricky workmates and, sometimes, even dealing with dodgy bosses.

Over the years, our society has learned to take more time orienting young people to start school or transition to high school, but we still have a tendency to just drop youngsters into the thickest part of the workplace jungle and hope that they survive unscathed. Most of them will survive, indeed, they will flourish, but some may have some bad experiences and need some additional assistance.

I have heard of some dodgy workplace practices in regard to young people over the years – unpaid trials that last a long time, not being allowed to go to the toilet all day, having to run errands for your boss and report back to him (at the pub), no breaks….

Issues can arise with regard to safety, fairness, mental health issues, work-life balance as well as communication and interpersonal hassles.

Young people can be fearful of asking questions or making reasonable requests because they are concerned about a range of things – upsetting others, being seen to cause problems, making a scene, or losing their job. Many are concerned about being a disappointment to their parents more than to their boss. Young people are more prone to being embarrassed or socially fearful. Some can still be quite impulsive as their frontal lobes catch up with the super-fast development of the more social parts of their brain.

How can we assist young people to negotiate the workplace environment in healthy ways?

• Ensure that young people have a workplace that is physically safe. Clearly, in Australia, this is an obligation that all employers should meet. There are some excellent resources on communicating and supervising young workers safely here.  Also, be mindful that many young workers are still dependent on others to actually get to work and get home again. It’s wise to check in on how safe a young employee might be getting to, and from, work as well.
• Recognise that some people may have different ways of taking in information. Be sure that information is provided to them clearly, repeatedly if necessary and that is demonstrated as well as told.
• Make time to listen to a young person’s experiences at work.
• Encourage interpersonal problem solving if needed – help them to identify the problem, brainstorm solutions, then pick the best possible solutions and follow it through
• Support young people to pursue the correct avenues if they feel that their situation is illegal. There is some great information on ‘fairness’, pay, and the issue of unpaid work trails at the Fairwork site.
• Be mindful of our own workplace values and check in to see if they are healthy and serving you, your family and your workplace well – you don’t want to give a young person a bad view of working life before they even get to try it for themselves
• If you know a young person with a mental health concern, work can offer many advantages if they are ready to try. The decision to tell a workplace about a mental illness should lie with the young person themselves. Be sure to remind them that you are available to assist them if they would like company when they tell their employer. Also keep an eye on the work life balance and encourage the young person to know their early warning signs, their most common triggers and their personal safety plans.

Young people have much to add to the workforce and the workforce has much to offer young people. Young people can bring an energy and spirit to a workplace and they can learn so much from those around them.

Working can offer young people such broad experiences and expose them to all sorts of walks of life that they may not otherwise experience in their community. There’s a sense of accomplishment associated with learning new things and with increasing responsibility.

Entering into to workplace “jungle” can provide young people with a sense of identity, assist with the development of social skills, provide new friendships, bring some routine and some financial reward.

Supported exposure to the work place can be the making of some young people! Bring on the next adventure!

Oh, for younger kids starting at school or kindergarten this year, “The Playground is Like the Jungle” and “Friendship is Like a Seesaw” can be useful ways to start conversations about getting along with people in different places and in different friendships.  It’s good to get in early!

Do you become one of those grown-ups at Christmas?

Yes, it’s that time of the year! The time when we may be lucky enough to get some time off work and spend it with family. It’s kind of ironic, that the very things we take time out to celebrate at Christmas are often the things we let bring out the worst in us.

Christmas is a time for button-pressing. We all have psychological buttons that are learned, for one reason or another, during our upbringing. Our buttons are triggered by ideas, looks, situations, images, memories or words and, once pressed, seem to bypass our logical thinking and have us acting with fury, alarm, or withdrawal when perhaps there is no need for these reactions. Buttons may have worked for us in some way some time ago, but they can linger and cause all sorts of issues when we perhaps should have rewired them long ago. Christmas, gathering with family and friends and enjoying some time out of routine is rife for button exposure.

We need to be on the lookout – Perfectionism buttons, family buttons, worry, grief, separated families and young adult family issues can all rise to the surface and bring out really poor behaviour in some of the most mature grown-ups.

Christmas can sometimes see people trying to outdo themselves (or each other) in delivering some delightful and delicious Christmas perfection. It seems to be one day of the year that we raise expectation of how things “should” be and yet we also try to celebrate. That’s a lot of pressure. We expect our children to have fun with all of their additional treats and we also expect them to behave. That’s a lot of expectation. If, we take away the boundaries, routine and predictability and we add in all of that “sometimes” food and drink then we can expect for kids’ behaviour to be more unsettled than usual. Perhaps let go of the concept of a perfect Christmas and replace it with a great opportunity to be with people who are important to us and do all of those “sometimes” things we might deny ourselves at other times of the year.

Be prepared for some behavioural fallout – and not just from the kids!!!!!

Spending time with certain sibling, in-laws or uncles can definitely mean that Christmas is a time for family button pressing. Adults holding in long held resentments and old buttons pressed years ago are fraught with dangers for grown-ups behaving badly. Are you going to model the kind of adult you’d like your child to be when your relatives and in-laws press old buttons in you? Are you really going to steam inside about who doesn’t eat quinoa salad? Are you going to let “that look” or “that tone of voice” cause an internal explosion in you that your children know only too well? Christmas is also a time for children to get a sense of who they belong to and who they are important to on a broader scale than just the people they live with on a day to day basis. If Christmas has a spiritual meaning for you, then it’s a day to enjoy this. If Christmas has no religious meaning for you, perhaps it’s time to consider what Christmas means to you in terms of the values that are important to you.

Be careful if you are planning on coping with Christmas day with alcohol. Alcohol can disinhibit you so if you are choosing to hold things in then too much Christmas cheer in a glass, can or stubby may erode your plans.

If you have lots of buttons that may get pushed over Christmas then perhaps you could try something new. Perhaps you could try becoming more of an observer. This means, trying to take a broader perspective of the day, like it’s a TV show or a movie set. Step back and watch things unfold rather than pop yourself at the middle of everyone’s behaviour on the day. Think about the happenings like they are a script that you have little control over, rather than a day where you are the target or are responsible for the feelings of everyone else on the day. Even if you just try it for a moment – “I knew she’d say that – that’s hilarious that I could so see that coming”. I don’t recommend that you laugh out loud at each predictable moment, but it’s perfectly okay to have a warm smile to yourself.

If you really don’t want to be with someone on Christmas day, then perhaps you should check in with the reasons why you are spending time with these people. Is it because you think it’s the “right” thing to do? Is it because it will make someone else who is really important to you happier? Again, knowing the values that are really important can help guide your behaviour, your reactions and your decisions. I think perhaps Christmas, rather than New Year, could be a time for resolutions. It is much easier to keep a goal or promise to yourself and others for a day than for an entire year.

Be careful not to travel back in time and go with those old buttons when they are pressed. You are an adult and you have much more available in your coping stores than you ever did as a child.

Spending time with family members can take you back in time to your childhood buttons. Try to stay present and focus on being the healthy grown up that you have become and interact with others according to your adult values – not the righteous, tit for tat, “it’s not fair” values of childhood.

In addition to avoiding time travel, Christmas is also a good time to check in with your catastrophe scale. Try to keep your reactions an appropriate size based on how important or life threatening the issues really are. If someone else has also brought a potato salad, is that really a catastrophe? If someone says that the roast is too dry, is that a disaster? Sometimes it can help to think of others who are less fortunate. Indeed, some people have values that see them making sure they actively work to do something for the less fortunate at Christmas. Some volunteer to help with meals or to deliver presents.

For those who have lost a loved one during the year, the first Christmas can be particularly difficult. There are no rules that say you cannot grieve on Christmas. In fact, it might be useful to actually make some formal time to grieve on Christmas day. Many families stop off at the cemetery or the crematorium. If an important person has passed away, it may be nice to keep some of their traditions going. My grandfather used to jump into the swimming pool with all of his clothes on most Christmases. We don’t always jump in to the pool fully clothed in remembrance of him, but the legend of this often comes up on Christmas day as part of a fun legacy that remains for him.

For those blended families with children who have care shared across locations, Christmas can bring additional issues. Who gets whom for which part of the procession of gift giving/food sharing moments? Why not spread them out over time? There is too much emphasis placed on Christmas being a calendar date rather than Christmas being a festival of celebration. Separated families who measure fairness on a per calendar basis really need to have a re-think (see my previous blog).

Christmas is a day where you to get to do a lot of those “not just now I’m too busy” things and eat a lot of those “sometimes” foods. Be sure to actually spend time with your children. It helps if they have scored presents that teach them turn taking, winning and losing, how to laugh at themselves and when to say, “That’ll do, I’m out”.

Go easy on the young adults in your extended family. As young adults, your children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews will be making choices about which relatives, in-laws, family, friends they choose to be with. This is often a liberating time. They should be supported to spend the day doing whatever is in line with their values and they should not be made to feel guilty for not spending time with you on Christmas Day.

Remember, your children listen to the whole of you – not just your words – you need to be sure that you are not passive aggressive in your conversations with them about their Christmas choices because you are a little wounded that they have chosen to be elsewhere this year.

Before you know it, children will be voting with their own feet at Christmas time. Despite my warnings about time travel, they will take with them the ghosts of Christmases before them.

You may well be someone’s in-law or lonely uncle one day. It’s in your best interest to model the kind of Christmas behaviour that you would like in the future.

So, tips?

• Don’t try to make Christmas perfect or make too many rules in your head for how Christmas “should” be and how people “ought to” behave. Get in touch with the values that are important to you, not the rules. Remember that your values may not be the same as everyone else’s values. Some useful values exercises can be found here.
• Enjoy the “sometimes” food and activities. Change of routines, different venues, relaxing of boundaries will mean an increased likelihood of meltdowns in younger children. Prepare your mobile meltdown capabilities (recognise possible triggers or warning signs and think about how you might react to contain meltdowns in someone else’s home). Make it clear what behaviour crosses a line and react in a way that is true to your parenting values. Don’t be too worried about others’ reacting to your parenting – they may well have different values to you (remember the screen play/movie set technique)
• No time travel – if you know there are old buttons that might be vulnerable, prepare to go with the distancing, screen-play, script writing, camera person role/technique rather than pop yourself in the lead actor role.
• Remember to pack your catastrophe scale – don’t make little things into giant problems
• Time trumps gifts – not clock time (“you had them three hours last year so this year I should have them three hours”). Time should be about sharing activities, not watching the clock or calendar.

Remember your children are watching…always watching. Try to keep your behaviour in line with the values you want them to hold central to their lives.

One day, you might even get invited to Christmas at their place…if you behave!

It has been said on numerous times in many contexts and by wiser and more eloquent beings than me (?I/?myself), that there’s nothing as constant as change. Change is inevitable. Indeed, a life without change would be catastrophic because unless we adapt, alter or develop (all changes) then our very survival is at risk. Perhaps less alarming, but also true, is that without change, life would be just be terribly boring! So, why, then, do so many people find change difficult?

Change can rock the most grown up and mature among us. Our general day to day anxieties are allayed by predictability and routine. When we mess with the predictable things in life, our brains can become a little more hyper-aware of possible new threats. Of course, there are some variables which will determine how different adults cope with perceived threat and this variability is exactly the same for children.

We know that the sort of change that might upset someone has to do with how important they think the change is. When I talk to children about change, I usually like to talk to them about the changes they have already made, without even noticing – the change in their height, their change out of wearing nappies, and the change when they used to like Thomas the Tank and now it’s Minecraft. The change from not being able to tie laces, to be able to tie them in the dark or with your eyes closed. We actually cope with many changes on a day to day basis and it is good to remind ourselves and each other about our history of coping with change.

The beliefs someone has about how important the changes are will affect their coping and, as we know, the things that are threatening to individuals vary from person to person.

When it comes to change, if someone thinks that the change will bring more negative consequences than positive one, then it’s clear that they may not be so happy or excited about it. We need to check on what people are predicting may happen and weigh up those chances realistically and keep them in perspective.

What is important to an individual child, and therefore, what might be most threatening, will likely depend on their age. A pre-school aged child will place more importance on themselves and their immediate care givers. They may be more possessive about objects. Primary aged children place more emphasis on friendships and school happenings. Moving schools can be a big change for a primary schooler and a change of classroom teacher can be a big thing. As children move into their teens, we see that peers and friendships start to be the factors that influence the changes that might be tolerated and the changes that may be harder to cope with. As young adults, more important change has to do with leaving home, finances, careers and perhaps even more “serious” relationships ( but, please don’t tell younger children that their relationships aren’t “serious”).

A child’s ability to cope will also be affected by their mental health and their mental health will be affected by their ability to cope. If your child is struggling with mental health issues, you may find that they become even more distressed about changed. Their already stretched bank of coping goes into over draft. Children who have a history of poor coping will likely need additional, and perhaps professional help, to assist them to manage big change.

Research psychologists have long been looking into the different ways that children cope in different scenarios and they have devised various tools and measures. Adults tend to have a wider array of coping that comes with having full independence, being more mobile, and having more say in their day.

Let’s face it, most children cannot rely on alcohol, shopping, over-working or affairs to get them by, but children are observing adult coping all of the time and they are taking all of this information in, even if they are not consciously aware of it.

According to researchers, children in “their middle years” tend to cope with many problems by using five main categories of coping:

1. Support seeking – asking others for help and depending on the child’s age this could be asking parents, asking a teacher, asking friends, or asking any random stranger on social media.
2. Humour – laughing or joking about the change
3. Active coping – coming up with stregies to fix perceived problems and putting these strategies into action.
4. Acceptance – acknowledging the change and getting on board with it
5. Avoidance – trying not to think or have to deal with any aspect of the change whilst perhaps just hoping it goes away – a real “head in the sand” way of dealing with things

Gender seems to have an influence on coping styles with boys more likely to use humour and girls more likely to seek support. Children also tend to use humour when they think things are not very important and they will more likely seek support from others if they think it is an important problem.

Some interesting research has also discovered that a child’s coping style is affected by how their parents feel about the expression of emotion. Some parents believe that emotions are wrong or bad. Other parents might think it okay to express positive feelings, but they are less okay about encouraging children to express their negative or sadder feelings. Still other parents encourage healthy expression of all emotions and believe that all feelings are good– positive or negative. What the researchers found was that children who were raised by parents who believed that all emotions were good were more accepting. Their children more easily accepted changes. The children who had parents who did not believe that negative emotions could be good were less likely to seek support because they believed that their feeling should not be discussed or expressed.

Some parents are high in expressing negative emotions – these parents may tend to have more parent-centred rather than child-centred goals and they may be too stressed to teach their children about emotions.

If we want to maximise a child’s coping potential, we need to create healthy spaces where they can get a balanced view of the change and where they are able to talk about the bad feelings as well as the good.

So, some tips:

• Consider the impact the change will have on your child. I’m not saying “never change because it will upset your kids”. On the contrary, change brings opportunity, but it does also bring stress. Moving house, arranging to blend a family, and changing jobs are all very stressful tasks, but you need to manage your stress sufficiently to not skew your child’s view of the change. Remember, too much negatively expressed emotion about the change is your warning sign or your “note to self” that you need to do something more active to cope.
• In your list of busy jobs associated with the change, make time to check in with your children. Don’t expect that they won’t cope. Just enquire about what is going on for them in relation the change.
• Don’t assume that the bit about the change that is worrying you might be the same bit that is worrying them. Remember, the things that are important to us will vary, especially with age.
• Provide children with as much real information about the change as you can. Like adults, without sensible information, they will tend to worry about worse case scenarios if they don’t have the facts. You could even give them some things to research about the change. If they are moving towns, you might want to ask them to research where the local ballet schools or football clubs might be.
• Encourage your child to express their feelings about the change. If they express some negative feelings or some worries, don’t just try to override these with the positive feelings. You need to acknowledge (listen and feedback so they know you have heard them) their negative feelings. Encourage them to actively address any of their concerns if they can to minimise the impact and then consider the possible positives. It might be that they will miss their friends so don’t just override them and say that they’ll make new ones. Instead, listen, acknowledge the negative feelings, discuss ways they might say goodbye, ways they might stay in touch, and then, perhaps, the possibility of other friends.
• Establish a new, predictable routine as quickly as you can to help soothe anxiety.
• If your child relies heavily on social support, make sure they have some. If they have supportive friends, a family relative they lean on, or some other supportive adult, encourage them to spend some more time with them.
• If you suspect you child maybe relying too heavily on social media for support, check. Be sure they know the health places online that they can find help. Kidshelp line has a chat space.

If you are a psychologist or mental health professional working with a child about coping, you might consider the COPE a handy tool to add to your toolbox.

Last weekend, when I heard about a group of 100 “hoons” doing speed trails down the M1 from Brisbane to the Gold Coast and reaching speeds of over 200km per hour, my heart skipped a beat.

I know I’m not the only one whose heart skips a beat when they hear or see people driving fast, losing traction (doing donuts and burnouts) or driving dangerously, but I also know that the reasons people’s hearts are skipping are very different. For me, when I think or hear of fast cars, my head goes back to all of the people I have seen who have been affected by a motor vehicle accident. I have worked for many years with those who have been injured on the roads and families who have lost a loved one in a motor vehicle accident. I’ve also seen many young people who have been convicted of culpable driving – those who have killed someone (usually their best mate or their girlfriend or even a pedestrian) because they have been driving too fast and lost control. My heart beats in despair at the danger and the ripple effect among family and community.

For many people, though, the sounds of hooning make their hearts race for a different reason.

Their hearts race with excitement. Their eyes open wide and their mouths just grin. It’s almost the same dizzy look on the face of a young person in love.

There are some people who are very attracted to driving (or riding a motor bike) at crazy speeds and putting a car through its paces. How do we help these people, often teens and young adults, enjoy their passions but also stay safe? To do this, we need to understand what drives (pardon the pun) their passion and how they are thinking.

A lot of the things we know about a teenage brain, we can see really clearly when we look at their driving behaviour. We know that the teen brain goes through various structural and chemical changes over the adolescent years that explain much of their behaviour.

We know that a brain going through the teen years undergoes changes to its pleasure centre. During adolescence, it can take more to stimulate or make a person happy and excited. It takes more to make something register as pleasurable. It’s like things need to be turned up. Music needs to be louder. Sweets need to be sweeter and dramas need to be more dramatic. For some, driving a fast car registers as pleasurable and turning up the pleasure means driving faster or driving louder. Some dangerous drivers do it for the thrill and for the adrenalin. They love living on the edge and driving fast or doing tricks in a hotted up car.  It takes them to the point where they feel absolutely thrilled – even more so if the young person might be depressed or grieving.

Another thing we know about the teen brain is that it is wired to be social. Risk taking behaviour is much higher in the presence of someone that a teen wants to impress. The other tricky thing about having a very social brain is that it is wired to prioritise social things. If we look at reaction time (the time a person takes to see something, think about it, and react to it), a teen’s reaction time is very quick. This means that a teen will get their foot to the brake quite quickly if needed. As we age, our reaction time gets slower. Elderly people have the slowest reaction time. However, if we put another teen near our fast reacting teen, their reaction times will become slower – slower even than the elderly.

The teen brain is more interested in what’s happening on the inside of the car than what’s happening on the outside of the car. That’s part of the reason there are special rules for people on their “P” plates that limit their passengers. Lives have been saved by these changes.

Rules, definitions and consequences of hooning vary from State to State in Australia.  Consequences generally involve fines and vehicle impoundments and serious and repeat offending can result in a prison sentence.  In Victoria, VicRoads run a Safe Driving Program. If someone is convicted of a hooning offence, their vehicle is impounded and they can be mandated by the Courts to do the VicRoads Safe Driving course. The course is designed to help them consider their unsafe driving, to look what motivates it and helps drivers to come up with a plan to reduce risk and drive more safely to avoid further expensive or lethal consequences.

As part of the VicRoads Safe Driving Program, drivers go through exercises to look at the purpose or function that motivates their unsafe driving. Young people (in fact not just the young) drive fast for many different reasons. Like many troubling behaviours that humans engage in, driving cars of motorbikes fast, replaces something that is missing in their life or helps them to avoid unpleasant feelings. In this way, unsafe driving is akin to many other things people do to try to make themselves feel happier or competent – substance use, alcohol, or gambling.

Some drivers take to the road to wind down or to let off steam. Nothing says “I’m really angry with you” like spinning the wheels and taking off noisily and rapidly down the street.

Some, but certainly not all, may drive dangerously because they are anti-social and angry with the world and it’s their way of demonstrating that they don’t care what anybody thinks.

Some youngsters (and perhaps some who are not so young) enjoy being a hero in their vehicles. They enjoy the adulation from friends or flocks of girls/guys. Sometimes it’s the way they bond with other members of the family. Often, if they’ve never had this feeling of being adored or belonging, it’s very attractive.

Others drive fast or ride their motorbikes fast because they feel “at one” with their vehicle. It’s almost like the vehicle is an extension of themselves – almost meditative. As the sway and glide, they feel a peace and a joy.

Some love to handcraft, build a vehicle from scratch, modify it and then take it out to see what it can do. They enjoy the mastery of a craft. Sadly, though, they can have an over-inflated sense of how much control they have on the road. There are many things that happen on our roads that are outside of our control, no matter what your driving skills.

In all, hooning and fast driving seems to meet some of the social, identity and risk-taking needs that are characteristic of the teen years –especially if young people have no other ways to meet these needs, bond and belong.

We need to ensure young people don’t put all of their interests or pleasure sources in the one basket. We need to help them with ways to express and manage their feelings without needing a motor vehicle to do so. We need to make sure that we have places where young people who love cars can exercise their passion safely. We also need to have rules that help keep all road users safe and consequences for people who break those rules.