There's really no short-cuts in breaking the cycle of violence. Better parents will raise children who will become more functional members of society.
A BRAIN OPEN and receptive to new information during the first two years of a child's life presents a window of opportunity for parents mother and father to nurture and pass on societal norms and values, so argues many researchers on child development. Once missed, this opportunity can hardly be recouped.
Dr. Earl Wright, psychiatrist goes even further to say that any serious effort to stop the cycle of violence must place more emphasis on encouraging parenting that is capable of taking advantage of this window of opportunity to lay the correct foundation for children and raise them as successful and functional members of the society.
"We know much more now about how the brain develops and about how children develop...The mother's influence on the child's behaviour and outlook, in fact, begins even before the child is born, when the child is still in the womb. Intrauterine, whatever the foetus is exposed to also influences his personality," he said.
The studies show that babies, still in the uterus, can recognise their mothers' voices and are sensitive to environmental changes through their mother. For example, a mother under stress produces abnormal amounts of specific body chemicals that will impact the foetus. The mother-child bond, Dr. Wright said, is therefore a very important one but the father also plays a crucial role in the development.
"The mother cannot perform her role effectively if the father is not performing his critical role of providing emotional and physical support, intervening and providing for the nucleus family. The correct foundation is for there to be a mother, father and child, that's how we were made and if this foundation is not there, then there needs to be an alternative... what we have now is a lot of people who are biased towards aggression they are killing people over a few crackers or they will kill a bus driver because of an accident," Dr. Wright said.
The first two years are the critical ones but the "concrete" of the child's personality is being set up to age 10, the period of rapid brain development :
in the first six weeks bonding is taking place between parents and child. The blue-print for future relationships in the rest of the child's life is written in this brief period.
0 to three years old much of the child's time is spent in the family unit learning values and norms.
three to 10 years old he is in the external environment, school, day care. Specific skills should be taught for adoption later on; reinforcing and hardwiring of attitude and personality take place in this period.
"We have to recognise that emotions are always in the loop of reason. We can't only focus on the child's IQ. We have to train emotions in the same way that we train the intellect. The violence will continue until we have a system that will teach children early in life, the emotional skills. The PALS (Peace and Love in Schools) Programme is one such effort," he said.
Emotional intelligence
THE BRAIN consists of two complementary intelligences the cognitive problem-solving rational mind located in the cerebral cortex and the emotional mind located in the limbic systems.
Dr. Earl Wright, psychiatrist, says that the latter is the older mind in terms of evolutionary development; it acts quickly without pausing to consider all the consequences, often sacrificing accuracy for speed.
The development of the emotional mind has mainly been left up to families and to chance. During the 1990s 'the decade of the brain', there emerged a scientific model for teaching specific skills to make us emotionally competent.
SKILLS OF EMOTIONAL
COMPETENCE
Personal competence
self-awareness becoming in touch with one internal states, emotions, your strengths and limits; recognising the link between feelings and what we do and say.
Self regulation/self-management this competence relates directly to decreasing interpersonal violence. This is about managing internal states and impulses; self control; dealing effectively with emotional hijacking; delaying gratification; self-motivation.
Social competence
empathy this is about the way we handle our relationships; awareness of the feelings and needs of others; taking an active interest in the concerns of others:
social skills developing an ability to induce desirable responses in others; developing ones influence and skills in communication, conflict management, leadership and in team capabilities.
