Bright & Quirky Child Summit 2021: Tame The Overwhelm was a 5-day free online summit which aimed to help twice exceptional (2e) children - gifted children with ADHD, autism, learning differences like dyslexia, anxiety and/or depression. The conference featured 28 educators and psychologists who shared science-informed actionable strategies that promote social, emotional, and academic thriving even in tough times. The summit was hosted by Debbie Steinberg Kuntz, a licensed marriage and family therapist as well as the Founder of Bright & Quirky. Day 1 focused on taming stress, anxiety, and worry.
Quick Tips for Dads on Challenging Behaviours: Push Harder, Walk Away or This New Science-Based Option? - Mona Delahooke, PhD & Stephen W. Porges, PhD
Mona Delahooke, PhD is a licensed clinical psychologist with more than 30 years of experience caring for children and their families. She is a senior faculty member of the Profectum Foundation, an organization dedicated to supporting families of neurodiverse children, adolescents and adults. She is the author of Beyond Behaviors: Using Brain Science and Compassion to Understand and Solve Children’s Behavioral Challenges, and Social and Emotional Development in Early Intervention: A Skills Guide for Working with Children. Her popular blog covers a range of topics useful for caregivers and childhood providers. She has a new course Beyond Behaviors: Effective Neuroscience-based Tools to Transform Childhood Behaviors.
Stephen W. Porges, PhD is a Distinguished University Scientist at Indiana University where he is the founding director of the Traumatic Stress Research Consortium. He is a Professor of Psychiatry at the University of North Carolina, and Professor Emeritus at both the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University of Maryland. He served as president of the Society for Psychophysiological Research and the Federation of Associations in Behavioral & Brain Sciences and is a former recipient of a National Institute of Mental Health Research Scientist Development Award. He has published more than 300 peer‐reviewed scientific papers across several disciplines that have been cited in more than 35,000 peer-reviewed papers. He holds several patents involved in monitoring and regulating autonomic state. He is the originator of the Polyvagal Theory, a theory that emphasizes the importance of physiological state in the expression of behavioral, mental, and health problems related to traumatic experiences. He is the author of The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation (Norton, 2011), The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory: The Transformative Power of Feeling Safe, (Norton, 2017) and co-editor of Clinical Applications of the Polyvagal Theory: The Emergence of Polyvagal-Informed Therapies (Norton, 2018). He is the creator of a music-based intervention, the Safe and Sound Protocol ™ , which currently is used by more than 1500 therapists to improve spontaneous social engagement, to reduce hearing sensitivities, and to improve language processing, state regulation, and spontaneous social engagement.
Debbie began by observing that parents, especially fathers, are often unsure what to do when their children have challenging behaviours, not knowing whether to push or whether to let go. For example, their children may be unable to sit still, have meltdowns about things that do not seem like a big deal, or may refuse to do chores or homework or even go to school.
Dr. Delahooke highlighted that when she worked in the field of infant mental health, Dr. Porges's work shifted her way of looking at behavioral challenges by elucidating the role of our body in our behaviour. Oftentimes, we are accustomed to thinking that a child with challenging behaviours needs more discipline, needs to be toughened up, or needs to get with the programme. However, through Dr. Porges’ Polyvagal Theory, she learned that challenging behaviours signal something in the nervous system, and that signal gives us a roadmap as to how to help each child differently. This new way of thinking takes some of the pressure off, because it gives a reason for parents who find that their punishment does not work well when their children are misbehaving. (The Polyvagal Theory was also explained in the blogpost Takeaways from Autism Explained Summit 2020 Day 4: Understanding Autism featuring the talk Reframing Autism With Polyvagal Theory - Holly Bridges.)
Dr. Delahooke explained that we used to view all behaviours as willful and voluntary, and focused on eliminating behaviors. Dr. Porges’ work allows us to translate neuroscience into practice in order to change our systems. The paradigm shift in our thinking is understanding that there are some behaviours which are automatic responses to stress or states of threat. Hence, parents need to focus on providing signals of safety and security to the nervous system that is causing the behaviours in the first place. Dr. Porges identified the ventral vagal pathway of the autonomic nervous system, called co-regulation, which allows social engagement behaviours to unfold naturally and enables children to be cooperative. The pathway involves sharing the parent’s calm nervous system with the child's revved up nervous system. This is in contrast to how parents typically discipline, punish, or yell at an upset child, as well as how the education system typically seclues or places an upset child in time-out or quiet rooms. Dr. Porges elaborated that the education environment is a system of evaluation and has an agenda of controlling children’s behaviour, which means it is a system of constant threat. When children do not want to go to school, what they are telling us is that their bodies do not want to be in states of threat anymore as it is unpleasant to them and compromising who they are.
Debbie noted that the behaviour we see on the surface is actually a signal of what is happening in the body. However, it is hard for parents to tune into their children’s signal when they themselves are getting triggered. When parents are not calm, this just leads to a volcano escalating to the point of eruption. Parents should develop the self-awareness to know what state they are in, and what state would actually be helpful to move through the problem.
As a father of 2 unusual children himself, Dr. Porges knows what these fathers go through, and agreed that it is not easy. When a child does not speak to parents with a prosodic voice or does not look at parents with a smile, parents’ bodies become defensive in response. Parents produce the same type of vocalisation and facial expression, as well as get even more ramped up with the intention of containing and regulating the child through a behavioral modification strategy - even though the child’s behaviour tells us that their body is dysregulated. The paradox with behavioural modification strategies is that they work fine when the child is in a calm physiological state, but are inefficient when the child is in a reactive mobilising physiological state. Dr. Porges shared how he told the Association for Behavioural Analysis International that B. F. Skinner’s Stimulus-Response behavioural model should be updated by calling it the Stimulus-Organism-Response model. This acknowledges and respects the organism’s physiological state, and promotes the use of calming interventions that are more efficient strategies in helping the child and adult process stimuli and give responses.
Parents usually see their children’s behaviour as being intentional, and evaluate the behaviour on a dimensionality of good/compliant or bad/oppositional. When parents lose it and get angry at their child, their personal narrative often has a moral veneer to it. They say they are doing it because it is tough love. However, they are not really understanding the physiological reaction of their child's body and nervous system. They do not see the behaviour as a reflection of the children's adaptively reflexive physiological state, which is dysregulated and mobilised because they are too threatened. Parents have to stop for a moment and realise that although the children want to be good kids, their bodies are not enabling them to do that. Parents need to engage in role reversal, imagining what their child experiences. How would a child feel, with a towering person using an angry booming voice to shout at them that they have to do something? Moreover, upon reflection of how their own parents treated them, parents may also realise that if they had not been yelled at growing up, they would have been a lot more bold, secure, and expansive in their lives. Therefore, parents’ real job is to be present and supportive of their children. This means that their approach to their children has to be broadcasting cues of safety, love, and trust.
Dr. Porges underscored that fathers, in particular, tend to think of their role within the family as the individual who creates boundaries, making sure that their children do certain things. For instance, fathers often say, 'Just suck it up. Just get it going. What is the big deal?' Furthermore, they think the boundaries are set by their words, rather than by their intonation of voice or facial expression. In general, male voices are lower pitched than females, which can be detected by the nervous system as predator sounds. Thus, children's can become worked up and in a state of threat, to the extent that they are no longer even aware of what their fathers are saying to them, and they do not want to be around their fathers. Instead, children may gravitate to their mothers whose voice project cues of safety and trust. It can be hurtful to fathers when their children get frightened of them, but fathers have to understand that they are projecting these negative cues. Fathers may make some progress by considering how they often talk to pets with a singsongy voice, using prosody and intonation which communicate that they are safe to come close to.
Dr. Delahooke pointed out that fathers are usually raised with value being placed on being a consistent alpha male who does not back down, socialised into becoming leaders who help their children toughen up. Although she understands that parents want their children to succeed in a difficult world, she emphasised that fathers should let themselves off the hook. Dr. Porges' theory, neuroscience, and the resilience literature now suggest that we should shift our thinking. It is not overpowering the child that builds strength; it is something else - the relationship. Connection builds resilience and executive functions for children to better control themselves, have the bigger picture, and make autonomous decisions. One real-life example is the football coach Pete Carroll, who was previously the head coach at USC, where he won bowl games and a BCS National Championship Game. He did it not through yelling and screaming at his players, but through relating with them and gaining their love. He was able to maximise his players’ potential by being gentle and respecting their nervous system. Another real-life example is Brené Brown, who has spoken to executives from Fortune 500 companies regarding the importance of vulnerability.
Dr. Porges added that creating a good relationship also builds visual images that the child can borrow under times of duress. This becomes a neural exercise which allows children to shift their physiological state by going back to positive visual images in their mind. For example, a child might recall positive days in his life in which he went to a water park or ate ice-cream with his father. These might be moments he carries with him that makes him feel good when things are rough. Conversely, children who do not have those mental images of safe trusting relationships, such as foster children who are taken away from their biological parents, tend to have poorer developmental outcomes.
When parents are in that moment of facing a child's challenging behaviour and not knowing what to do, the first step for parents is to be calm. Debbie likes to think of the mantra, 'Calm and connect.' Dr. Porges also recommended breathing strategies as a way of calming down. If parents feel like the interaction with their child is getting too intense, they should take a slow exhalation, which allows the ventral vagal calming system to come on board. In fact, both the parent and child can take a few breaths together, which creates a degree of connectedness. In addition, parents can also calm themselves even in dialogue. If parents extend the duration of their phrases when talking to their children, the breathing intervals become longer.
Both speakers' take-home message was for parents to realise that it is not about the words one says, but about how one says the words. How we talk matters, because the first thing that another human notices is our emotional tone. Dr. Delahooke said that although vulnerability and self-compassion are concepts we might be fearful of, we should learn to be easy and gentle on ourselves. This will not only give a powerful cue of safety to the child, but will also improve the parent’s own inflammation markers, stress level, and physical health.
All blogposts on Bright & Quirky Child Summit 2021:
Day 1 Talk 4 A Quick, Shareable Overview of Twice Exceptional (2e) Kids - Dan Peters, PhD
Day 2 Talk 8 Understanding High IQ Kids With ADHD and Co-Occurring Diagnoses - Thomas E. Brown, PhD
Day 3 Talk 13 How to Know When It's Time to Change Schools or Homeschool - Colleen Kessler, MEd
Day 4 Talk 17 How to Help Bright Kids Avoid Autistic Burnout - Kieran Rose
Day 4 Talk 19 How Different Kinds of Minds Can Become Inventors and Engineers - Temple Grandin, PhD
Watch this space for more blogposts from the Bright & Quirky Child Summit 2021!