Unsafe children: symptoms and causes
Some children develop during their childhood certain insecurities and inferiority complexes that make it difficult for them to relate normally with the people around them.
Some insecure children they are because they have certain real or figurative defects; others, because they are so demanding that they end up distrusting their own personal worth. The problem is that the child ends up feeling insecure and incompetent to face many situations of daily life.
Unsafe children: main symptoms
These feelings of emotional insecurity are usually accompanied by a series of easily identifiable signs:
1. Constant search for attention. The boy tries to draw the attention of others, often by means of negative behaviors.
2. Hypersensitivity. He can not stand criticism or comparisons with others. He usually experiences jealousy and feels envy of his brothers and companions.
3. Perfectionism. Live continuously afraid of doing things wrong, of not measuring up.
4. Isolation. He avoids group activities and prefers to work and play alone.
5. Compensation. Try to hide and compensate their feelings of inferiority developing a lot of their person to awaken the admiration of others: for example, getting very good grades, highlighting in some sport ...
6. Criticism. He frequently criticizes any person and may even come to avenge his shortcomings on others by subjugating those he considers even inferior to him.
Looking for the causes of insecurity in children
Oddly enough, the origin of most of these insecurities tend to be physical. Some children worry be more chubby than your friends and others have to carry appliance in the mouth.
For other children, on the other hand, their fears focus on their myopia, stuttering, the incipient acne who are not able to control ... any of these small setbacks can be the starting point of a lack of self-confidence or a complex. Especially if the brothers or classmates tease or laugh frequently for it.
Children at these ages are very cruel and any feature a bit strange, like the boy is especially short or have a weird last name, can serve so that it becomes the target of the jokes of others, when what they want is to feel accepted. Such teasing is often accompanied by cruel "motes" from which the child finds it difficult to detach. In fact, in most cases, in the end the boy ends up believing that he is really like that.
Unsafe children: too many demands
Other times we can be ourselves who inadvertently generate in our son certain insecurities by demanding more of what he can give. When we ask too much of him, we are never satisfied with him and he never manages to content us, the boy ends up thinking that it is not worth anything and that nobody cares. Our disapproval, coupled with his sense of dissatisfaction, convinces him that he is inferior to other children.
It is also common for some parents to try to project their own ambitions, interests and dreams into their children without understanding that the children are different, that they have their own personality and aptitudes.
Frequent punishment, overprotection, parental comparisons and perfectionism can also give rise to this type of situation.
María Viejo
Advisor: Teresa Artola. PhD in Psychology and Master in Family Education.
