Encouraging Psychological Autonomy

Raising An Independent, Responsible Teenager

Parents who expect that children will sometimes act in ways that are inappropriate or undesirable, but prepare for such behavior by involving their children in the formulation of rules and consequences, may discover that the joy is in the journey, and heaven is found along the way.

Parents need to encourage the development of psychological autonomy in their teenage children.  Psychological autonomy is nurtured in children when parents genuinely respect their teen's ideas, even when the ideas are contrary to their own.  Encouraging independent thinking and the expression of original ideas and beliefs, validating feelings, and expressing unconditional love are ways to nurture psychological autonomy.  The opposite of psychological autonomy is psychological control, which is characterized by changing the subject, making personal attacks, withdrawing love, or inducing guilt to constrain intellectual, emotional, or psychological expression by the adolescent that is incongruent with the parent's way of thinking.  Adolescents who report that their parents are likely to use techniques associated with psychological control are more apt to struggle with depression and to exhibit anti-social behavior.

Demanding a certain level of behavior of children does not exclude allowing, or even encouraging them to think and express opinions different than one's own.   

Too many parents get caught up in focusing on controlling their child, believing that controlling the way their child thinks will translate into controlling what their child does.  By using guilt, withdrawing love, or invalidating feelings or beliefs, the parent hopes to make the child see things the parent's way, ensuring compliance with parental expectations. 

There is a fine line here; one of the roles of parents is to help children make sense of the world by offering explanations or interpretations of events.  It is when these parental offerings take on the tone of exclusiveness -- when parents cannot respectfully consider and discuss a teenager's interpretation of his or her own experience -- that psychological control has taken over.

Parents should also be aware that it is the teenager's perspective on the forcefulness of the suggestion which counts.  Psychological control is damaging if it is perceived by the teenager, regardless of parental intention.   While a parent may feel that a discussion has taken on the tone of a healthy debate, to a teenager the same interchange can feel absolutely crushing.  

Interestingly, boys are more likely to report that their parents squelch their psychological autonomy than are girls.   Whether this is a difference in the way parents actually relate to teenage boys versus teenage girls, or whether it is a difference in perception of boys versus girls is unclear. 

When discipline becomes a matter of calmly enforcing family rules about behavior, many of the problems associated with psychological control are alleviated. 

When children have a problem with delinquency, parents generally  tend to respond to it with less behavioral control, and more psychological control as time goes by. This appears to set up a vicious cycle, as teenagers respond to both lack of monitoring and the presence of psychological control by acting out, or becoming more delinquent.

If parents can break this cycle by treating delinquent behavior with increased monitoring rather than attempting to control it by inducing guilt, withdrawing love, or other means of psychological control, teenagers are more likely to respond with better behavior. 

In short, parents who concentrate on trying to control their child's behavior rather than trying to control their child are going to have much more success and a lot less grief.