Tag: parent

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

Empty Nest Syndrome

Posted on by Jinavie

When children grow up and learn to become independent, parents must let go of their children and allow them to fly free. However, it is the inevitable human condition that the parents will be saddened by this change. For many parents, the moving out of their children can lead to depression and a loss in purpose. This phenomenon has been named empty nest syndrome as it happens as the children leave the metaphorical nest that is home.

As obvious as it sounds, empty nest syndrome can have a serious effect on the parent’s well-being. Common symptoms include depression, loss of purpose, anxiety, stress and a feeling of rejection. The suffering parent continues to obsess whether they brought up their child in a way to prepare them for the big world. At the same time, they feel that they are losing their identity as a “parent” – something they may have defined themselves as while they were bringing up the child. They may also feel rejected as they may believe that the child “does not need them anymore”. It has been observed that mothers are more likely to suffer empty nest syndrome (occasionally, menopause may be a confounding factor). Other factors that contribute are parents who find change difficult, have an unstable relationship with their spouse or those with an unhealthy obsession with their children or with the idea of being a parent.

Empty nest syndrome is a natural part of parenthood, but it is important to know how to prevent it from becoming too severe. The best way to cope with this syndrome is to keep in touch with the children and accept that they are young adults who are moving on with their life. Not only that, but the parents must also recognise that a new era has begun for them as well. This is important as failure to do so will lead to the identity crisis mentioned above. A good way to remedy this is through discovering hobbies and interests while maintaining healthy social networks with other people. Essentially, the parents have to “begin a new life”, just like their children. It is also worth noting that it helps if the children recognise this as well and try to keep in touch with their parents to make sure they are coping well without them.

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

Reverse Psychology

Posted on by Jinavie

If you tell a child not to do something, chances are he or she will do it. This is a simple rule of parenting that everyone has experienced at some point in their lives. People (especially children and teenagers) are wired in a certain way so that if they are told they cannot do or have something, they react by wanting it more. They then rebel by reasserting their freedom and express anger towards the person restricting their freedom. This is a natural response for a person that is beginning to develop a sense of self and ego, as they feel an instinctive desire to protect their right to free will. This psychological phenomenon is known as reactance.

Although reactance can be very troublesome and annoying to deal with, you can easily turn it around to your advantage if you understand the basic principles behind the effect. Under the assumption that a child will always react to your commands and advice by doing the opposite, we can deduce that if you say the opposite of what you want, they will end up doing what you want. This is reverse psychology. It is a surprisingly effective method of manipulation, especially in those with high reactance (usually children or those who are as immature and stubborn as children).

It has been scientifically proven that reverse psychology is extremely effective in children, as they would rather protect their (perceived) free will than avoiding study or not eating their greens. An example of reverse psychology would be telling a child to stay home when they actually want them to go out and play. However, reverse psychology is not the most ideal way of parenting as it reinforces the idea that it is okay to do the opposite of what you ask, thus undermining your authority.

Reverse psychology works just as well in adults when used right. For example, using a strong imperative tone against a person effectively assaults their ego, which provokes their natural instinct of reactance. If you are not in a position of authority and the person has the option to defy you, it is likely that they will revert to an irrational teenager and do the opposite of what you commanded. However, repetitive use of reverse psychology may lead the person to think that they are being manipulated, causing them to nullify it by reverse reverse psychology. Reverse psychology can be a double-edged sword if this happens, so it is important to know when it is most likely to be effective.

Psychological reactance is more likely to arise if the restricted option appears more attractive and important. The greater the restriction of freedom, the greater the psychological reactance. Also, arbitrary threats produce high reactance as they do not make sense, making people more rebellious. It is important that reverse psychology be used subtly and sparingly on people who are resistant to direct requests. Mastery of the above skills will help you manipulate a person into doing your bidding under the illusion that they are acting on their free will.

Posted in History & Literature

Han Suk-Bong

Posted on by Jinavie

Han Suk-Bong is a famous writer from the Joseon Dynasty (Korea during 14th to 19th century), who was praised as “the master writer of the East” even in the Ming Dynasty (China during 14th to 17th century). His writing and calligraphy were partly thanks to his inborn talent, but also because of his intense training and practise throughout his life. There is a famous story regarding his training.

Han Suk-Bong practised calligraphy since a young age by himself, practising every day. The villagers all praised his talent and his mother sent him to a famous temple to study. After four years of studying, Han missed his mother so much that he sneaked out during the night and returned home. When he told his mother that he there was nothing more for him to learn, she told him to turn the lights off and said: “I will slice rice cakes while you write, then we will compare our skills”. After the two silently did their best work in the darkness, they turned the light on and it was evident that Han’s letters were all crooked and unsightly while his mother’s rice cakes were perfectly sliced in even thickness. Han deeply repented his arrogance and realised there was so much more to learn. His mother told him off and told him not to set foot in the house again until he could write perfectly even with his eyes closed, just as she could slice rice cakes perfectly. Thanks to his mother’s passion for his education, Han became one of the most well-known masters of calligraphy and literature in the Far East.

The best type of parent is one who identifies a child’s natural talents early on and helps them develop those skills. If the child becomes lost, loses their way or fall into the pit of arrogance believing they are the best, it is the parent’s duty to correct them. The moment you believe that there is nothing more to learn, you become a failure.

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

Parent

Posted on by Jinavie

Parents only have one duty: to bring up their children with love. The problem is that so many parents do not know this fact, or have a twisted understanding of the concept of “love”. Some never even hug their child, some abandon their child for their own lives and some even abuse their child. However, that does not mean one should obsess with their child either. Always teaching the child that “they are the best” is not love. Also, trapping a child and preventing them from leaving you is obsession, not love. Some parents tell their children that studying will lead to a happy, successful future, and compare them to other children who get better grades. This is a crucial mistake, as the children will probably live out an unhappy life with a deep wound in their heart for the rest of their lives. This is because the parents’ role is not to secure a successful future and instructing them how to get there, but to allow the child to independently plan their future, taste failure and develop their own values and philosophy, only supporting them from the side. A parent is not a leader who leads a child along a predestined path of life, but an assistant who supports a child while they pave their own path of life and walk down it. To support and respect a child’s decisions, dreams, talents and potential; to teach the wisdom and skills the child will need to follow their dreams; that is true love.

Of course, that is not to say that one should neglect and leave a child without any interventions. If a child clearly makes an objective error or misbehaves, it is a parent’s role to correct it. This kind of home education is not interference like obsessing about the child’s studies, but supportive intervention that helps the child follow their dreams and not be lost on the way. Home education is a very important form of love that imbues a child with skills such as social skills, ethics, morality, philosophy and love that will allow them to lead a happy and wholesome life.

Why is parental love so important to a child? Childhood is a critical period when the child’s brain is rapidly developing and when the child begins to form his or her personality and view of the world. Almost every mental illness (especially personality disorders) can be traced back to a childhood trauma, or at least be affected by it. For example, a child whose parents did not care for them will grow up lacking love and attachment, leading to constantly seeking love and attention from others, which may develop into dependent personality disorder. If a child has to live up to the parents’ great expectations, they will not receive sympathy and fail to develop a self identity. To fill this void, the child will continuously float from one person to another to seek this sympathy. A child with obsessive parents being led to believe that they are the best could develop narcissistic personality disorder, who becomes violent and enraged when someone points out a mistake they made. As one can see, parental love is a crucial nutrient that fosters a healthy personality in a child, helping them become a wholesome, independent “person”.

No matter how poor the parents are, a child who was raised on love is able to construct a plentiful, happy life. Then, when the child becomes a parent, they will know how to raise their own children with love as well. The best parents are those who respect the child’s decisions and allow them to be free when they set out on their pursuit of happiness. All you need is love.

Posted in Science & Nature

Mitochondrial Eve

Posted on by Jinavie

We were all born from our parents. Our parents were all born from our grandparents. Everyone has a family tree and a root. If so, is it possible to find the beginning of mankind – our true “root”?

Our cells have an organelle (a part of the cell) called mitochondria. Mitochondria act as the cell’s engine and allow the cell to generate energy through respiration. An interesting fact about them is that they are not originally “ours”. About 1.5 billion years ago, there was an event where a prokaryote (cells without a nucleus, like a bacteria) invaded (or was eaten by) a eukaryote (cells with nuclei, like our cells). The prokaryote and the cell began a symbiosis and the prokaryote became a part of the cell.

Due to the external origin of mitochondria, they have a different genome to us. This is called mitochondrial DNA, shortened to mtDNA, which allows mitochondria to divide and synthesise proteins without the help of the host cell. It used to be a completely independent organism, but it has lost some of its functions to the cell.

mtDNA is inherited in a different way to normal DNA. Normally we receive half of our mother’s and half of our father’s genes, but we only inherit our mother’s mtDNA. This is because sperm keeps mitochondria in the tail which is lost during fertilisation, meaning our father’s mitochondria cannot be inherited. The only way to gain mitochondria is from those in the cytoplasm (the material that fills cells) of our mother’s egg. This is known as maternal inheritance.

Using this information, scientists compared a large sample of people’s mtDNA to turn back the clock. Knowing that a child and its mother share the same mtDNA and the mother and grandmother share the same mtDNA, we can analyse mtDNA to find the origin of mankind, or our first common female ancestor – also called Mitochondrial Eve.

Mitochondrial Eve is estimated to have lived 200,000 years ago in Africa, thus she is also known as African Eve. Her mtDNA is an ancient heirloom passed along generation after generation to us, as evidence of evolution. Every living person on the face of the Earth is a descendant of her. So in some ways, it could be said that we truly are one big family.

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

How To Calm A Baby

Posted on by Jinavie

One of the hardest things about being a new parent is how to quell the cries of a newborn. Since crying is their only way of communicating needs, babies cry constantly and this can be extremely distressing for the parents. 
Of course the best way is to deal with what the baby needs, such as food or changing their diaper, but the cause is not always clear. Most parents use the traditional method of picking the baby up and slowly patting or rubbing the baby’s back. By patting at a similar beat to the mother’s heartbeat, the baby feels at ease as it reminds it of the relaxing state within the womb.

There are some other less conventional methods that have been shown to work. For example, turning the vacuum cleaner on or any other white noise (such as the washing machine, rustling a plastic bag or even gargling water in your mouth) has an instant effect of stopping the baby’s cries (NB: usually only works on infants below 3 months of age). The reason being, these noises are at a similar frequency to the noises the baby hears in the womb, such as the mother’s guts moving, blood flowing through the vessels and sounds from the outsides being transmitted through the mother. As the brain remembers such relaxing states for the fist few months, these stimuli induce a relaxing response and calm the baby.
Similarly, turning on rock & roll music (not too loudly) calms the baby in the first few months as they are unable to recognise the words but can still feel the vibration from the rhythm, which again reminds the baby of the womb.

The same principle can be used to simulate other features of womb life. Rocking the baby slowly simulates the sensation when the mother is walking, wrapping the baby in a blanket simulates the warmth and cosy nature of the womb and giving the baby something to suck on like a pacifier induces the powerful sucking reflex which calms the baby.
As a last resort, touching the inside of the ear canal with your little finger causes the baby to become confused about the strange sensation, distracting the baby. Although this method is effective up to 24 months, it is not recommended as it can lead to an ear infection.

On a similar note, when a baby or young child is stubbornly holding on to something, the best method to get it back is for the mother to pretend that they are crying. The child, empathising with the mother and not wanting her to be sad, yields the object in their hand to make her happy. But this method may not work after a while when the child realises you are tricking them.