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By Suzanne Day
Learning and attention difficulties are a growing educational concern for educators and parents. However, emotional and social problems are deeply rooted within these weaknesses and are less understood. The success of a person is greatly linked to their social abilities and not only to their intellectual or academic skills. Studies show that when a person's emotional connections are severed in the brain, s/he cannot make even simple decisions. Why? Because he doesn't know how s/he will feel about his/her choices.
The emotional impact of learning and attention difficulties on the person and those in relation with him/her, and some of the solutions to start addressing the problems, will be the subject of this short article. I do not pretend to cover the whole subject but to provide food for thought in this misunderstood area of learning and attention inefficiencies. The term "he" will be used from now onto refer to a male or female child in order to facilitate the reading of this article. The list of references provided at the end only includes the most important ones.
An electro-biochemical understanding of emotion
First, let's look at what emotions are. Although "experts" disagree about a definition of emotion, they do agree on clear scientific experimental evidence that facial expressions for anger, fear, sadness, enjoyment, and disgust are universal. I personally like an electro-biochemical understanding of emotion: every thought we think and every emotion we feel is an electro-chemical event with physiological consequences. Our body reacts to every thought we have. Hand temperature and sweating, breathing rate and muscle tension as we experience emotion or think certain thoughts are good examples of the influence of our thoughts on our body. When we have a positive thought the body release “good” chemical that contributes to health. When we have a negative thought, a harmful chemical is released that may lead to weaken the immune system. Every cell is affected by our thoughts, whether negatives or positive.
The seat of emotion is now recognized to be not only in the brain, but in psychosomatic networks extending into the whole body, including the heart, the gut, the hormonal system, and the immune system acting in concert. Emotional processes operate faster than thoughts, bypassing linear thinking. Mental and emotional coherence are of the utmost importance. It is recognized that emotion and memory are closely linked. In real life terms: we will remember more easily the facts that we have to memorize when we are in a state of positive emotion rather than when learning is done under stress. However, under stress, our body often learns too well to react in an automatically negative mode, like tension. Physical symptoms develop such as headaches or stomachaches. Unmanaged emotions (producing a "fight or flight" reaction) burden the whole body and leave less energy to work on areas of learning or attention weaknesses. I desire to draw your attention to the physiological impact of our thought life in order to help you understand what I am about to present.
The psychological aspect of emotion
Every human being has three primary psychological needs: a sense of belonging (being accepted and secured), a sense of self-worth (being valued), and a sense of competence (a sense that “I can do it”). When our primary needs are met we feel happy. When these primary needs are not met (UEN-unmet emotional needs) there are “cracks” in the foundation of our emotional structure resulting in emotions of fear, anger, guilt and shame, and anxiety. The child may try to fill these “cracks” with destructive means like temper tantrums, eating too much food, eating high concentrated sugar, headaches, disobedience and/or inappropriate behaviours like destroying or hitting somebody. Later, as an adult he may get into smoking, drugs, alcohol, stealing and/or hidden addictions.
Some authors use the terms primary and secondary emotions. A primary emotion is what we feel first, the emotional pain. The secondary emotion is what it leads to. For example: the child’s feelings of being mistreated, rejected, or abused will lead to anger or/and depression. The main negative emotions are: anger (from being neglected or mistreated), guilt (from expectations being too high or from divorce), fear (from insecurity), and grief. Observing or questioning yourself and the child, and helping him to slow down his mental process and may help you (and him) to determine why he came to feel the secondary emotions.
The emotional and social profile of individuals with learning and attention disabilities.
Let’s look at the emotional and social profile of individuals with learning and attention disabilities. Research shows that these individuals will have a tendency to give up easily because they depend on others to solve their problems. They will be considered "immature", having a hard time growing up. They are more likely to be the object of negative and non-supportive statements which reinforce their lack of self-esteem. These individuals are less able to solve social problems or accomplish complex social interactions successfully (like persuasion and negotiation). They are more likely to be rejected or isolated by their classmates. They also have less tolerance for frustration and failure.
We know that most, not all, learning disabilities have some type of language difficulty. Language difficulties are deeply involved in social acceptance. The child worries more about not being invited to the birthday party than missing the spelling test. His difficulty with logical cause and effect analysis, like understanding "my aunt's father's son" will limit his interpretation. This in turn will interfere with his ability to communicate. His frequent interruptions with "What do you mean, I don't get it!" will eventually exclude him from conversations. When, with friends, he may fail to laugh at jokes because he just doesn't get it, he may lose the relationship that comes through the emotional state that laughing together brings. Asking questions is a very social skill that he needs help to master. He tends to observe more than interact and will usually play alone or with younger or older people. He will be "the last picked, and the first one to be picked on".
The feelings of guilt and shame, coming from acting inappropriately, and the feelings of self-doubt, depression and anger often lead his “self-talk” and his decisions. He may turn his guilt into a form of anger toward his parents: he blames them because of his condition but also because they keep pursuing, rightfully, expectations of him to accomplish what he can. These emotions will weaken his whole body and he may complain of headaches, tummy pain, feeling tired or lacking energy, allergies, and asthma which are just some of his common physical problems. Generosity, willingness to help, and high sensitivity to the emotions of others are positive aspects often found in his personality. As long as the child (and adult) with a learning disability denies his learning limitations, he will put the blame on other people: the exam is not written properly, the teacher does not explain well enough, my mom does not understand, etc. It is only when he humbles himself and takes ownership for his limitations with its consequences and frustrations, that he can be free from the bondage of putting the blame on somebody else, find helpful strategies to improve his learning skills and grow to be emotionally mature.
A child with attention problems, the inattentive type, will tend to be "spacey", caught in his own world. He will feel easily "bored" if the conversation is not directed in his field of interest. He may leave the game in the middle of the action or he may try to control the conversation and direct it on himself. If he becomes a "motor mouth" he may not recognize the signs of boredom or annoyance of his listeners and find himself left behind... speaking to himself. The impulsive type will speak out of turn and interrupt, making the conversation feel "out of joint". The hyperactive child will intrinsically need to move his body and may leave in the middle of the conversation. These children will be more accident prone and you will find them visiting the emergency unit of the hospital more often than other children. Their positive traits like spontaneity, creativity, and zest for new experiences, can produce the "energy flow" in relationships that is delightful.
The parents of these children
The parents of these children often react with impatience: "If you can do that so well, you should be able to do this!", "Smarten up!", "You are lazy!!!” This child will feel ashamed and guilty, and very often his anger will grow as he doesn't know "how else" to be. These parents are often resentful for not having the "ideal child" and not being able to a present a "good social image". Yet they need to come to accept that this child is "theirs". The root of these problems is generally genetic. One of the parents will often come to realize that this child "is just like me when I was young". Deeply buried emotions will be rekindled in this parent's heart. So too will be the internalized unkind reactions of adults toward him when he was younger. The child's behaviour may "push buttons " in the adult's repressed emotional make-up. It is like a “triggered mechanism” for the parent. Unfortunately, too often the parent may first react to the child in the same manner s/he, the parent, was treated when s/he was young, with the reasoning “I got through life…he will have to!” The child experiences similar emotional pain that the parent has suffered. The other parent may become protective of the child which may foster bitterness and anger toward the spouse and bring pressure on the couple's relationship. The child with learning disability or attention difficulties is very unconsciously to the lack of "emotional marital harmony". This child may also become a scapegoat for a dysfunctional family: the marital and/or the personal problem of one parent is projected on the child. The child seems to be the main problem when in reality the parent’s dysfunctional relationship is one of the main causes of the problem. These problems have solutions that can best be addressed as each member of the family is involved.
Some recommendations : what to do
How can parents intervene? Nobody can efficiently address a problem before recognizing it for what it really is: accepting the reality. The child’s learning and attention problems may be identified through a psychoeducational testing. This may be the first step to provide an objective analysis of the child's learning strengths and weaknesses and to better understand the nature and extent of his learning difficulties. Proper learning strategies will be essential to address his weaknesses in order for him to experience success in his basic skills. This has been discussed in other articles and workshops. Recognizing his strengths and providing the means and the encouragement to develop these strengths is essential to “feed his pleasure center”. Too often so much time is used to focus on the skills that need to be improved (and rightly so) that little attention is left for the child to do what he is good at. It is in his area of ‘strengths’ that he can find the emotional energy to keep working at improving his areas of weaknesses. I always recommend that parents plan at least one hour per day for the child to develop his strengths: playing with Lego, collecting stamps, taking care of an aquarium with different types of fish, etc.
A period of "mourning" may be necessary for the parents. Accepting the child for "who he is" will allow the parents to make the child "feel" accepted and loved. It is one thing to say "I love you" to a child but what is more precious is to make him to "feel" loved. Looking at him with a heart full of blessing thoughts while he speaks, will allow him to feel accepted and loved. The physiological reaction of “feeling loved” presents heart rhythms from the parasympathetic nervous system which influences efficient perception and calm behaviour. Debra Burton, who wrote a chapter in a booklet written by John Regier, states “It is vital that we as parents make it our passion to be linked to our children emotionally. (…) walls are built to keep others out because no one cared about our pain. Since our children will experience pain in their life, it is important that they know we will always hold their heart so gently. This keeps them from locking their heart against us, God, and others.” An adult who has been lacking this experience of "feeling loved" must first, from the heart, forgive people who have damaged him in his own childhood in order to let love and patience flow from the heart, to his spouse and especially toward a child with learning and attention problems. The child also will have to be trained to keep forgiving those who have hurt him voluntary or involuntary and not let any root of bitterness grow in his heart. Family therapy and/or marital counseling may be necessary to better understand and improve some emotional root causes of the problem.
Learning to control his negative thoughts about himself will be of prime importance. Some of these thoughts may be “I’m so stupid”, “I’m always messing things up”, “I cannot do it”. As these negative thoughts are played and replayed as a recorded tape, the brain experiences these thoughts as a reality. You can, by now, imagine what this does to the person’s self-image and body chemistry. Dr. Daniel G. Amen in his book “Change your Brain, Change your Life” compares such negative thoughts as ants and gives prescriptions to kill them and to develop positive thinking. To insure that the child will develop the positive attitudes, these attitudes have to be first of all practiced by the parents. Parents should take time to listen to themselves as they speak to themselves (self-talk) and as they speak about or to their children. In order to gain awareness of their own self-talk, it may be beneficial to make the effort for one whole day to register their thoughts and comments to themselves, to their spouse, and to their children. The ratio should be no more than one negative comment or thought for every four positive ones. Working at re-establishing the balance is crucial for their well-being and the well-being of their loved ones. Children model themselves after their parents.
The "gift of time" is also part of the solution: the "permission" to play with younger children may give the child the practice he needs in getting along with others while it is safe; repeating a grade may allow the child to mature and feel more confident among "younger peers". Encourage and teach him how to ask questions and which one to ask for precise situations, like meeting a person for the first time. Listen attentively while he is struggling to explain ideas that seem disjointed. He needs somebody to listen well to him in order for him to experience the relationship aspect of speaking and asking questions. Richard Lavoie in his excellent video "Last picked, first one picked on" explains a helpful strategy called "Social Skills Autopsy" for impulsive children. The "mistake" is analyzed in the attempt to discover "how it could have been done differently" in order to fashion a better response for the next time. He also points that "we need to prepare the child for the situation and the situation for the child".
Teaching him to deal with his angry emotions will be crucial. There are different programs that can be used. They are usually leading the person to learn to ask himself these questions: How am I feeling? Is it a healthy feeling? How do I want to feel? What would help me feel better (that I can control)?
In the past few decades our understanding of learning disabilities and its remediation has greatly improved. However, we now need to pursue the research to better address the emotional needs of these individuals. This article is trying to guide you in your own process. There are many other aspects of emotional needs of these children. Individual consultation with a professional and reading on the subject is recommended.
“...whatever things are true... honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report...virtue, praise, think on these things.” Philippians 4:8 |
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References
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No One to Play With, by Betty B. Osman
The Last Picked, The First One to Be Picked On, video from Richard Lavoie
The Molecules of Emotions, by Candace B. Pert, Ph.D
Heart-Brain Neurodynamics, by Rollin McCraty, Ph.D
Neurocardiology, by J. Andrew Armour, M.D., Ph.D.
Change Your Brain, Change Your Life, by Dr. Daniel G. Amen
Healing ADD, by Daniel G. Amen
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