We promote what we look for, spotlight, and highlight!

We promote what we look for, spotlight, and highlight!

It is human nature to focus on the negative. Maybe it is our survival instinct to hyperfocus on the negative, out of fear and anxiety. As a behavior specialist, one of the principles I learned over the years is we tend to inadvertently promote what we focus on; that which we throw our attention at. This is very evident with our children who display challenging behaviors. Everyone gets anxious and excited, analyze and strategize! We meet, brain storm, problem solve, program and document. We are hyperfocused on the challenging behavior; on high alert for it to happen, and ready to jump on it when it occurs. The challenging behaviors bring out the emotion in us, and we react with high intensity. What we often do not realize is the more we react and give attention to the negative, the more “value” we give to it. The more we focus on it, the more we see it. The behavior and the emotions tend to spiral out of control, with all parties getting frustrated and angry. Sometimes the more we try, the more behavior we get! 

This is not just with children on the spectrum. This principle applies to everyone. Whether it is marriage conflicts, employee/ employer relationships, parent/child conflicts, etc. When we focus on the negative, throw our attention at it and intensively react to it, it tends to increase. When we hyperfocus on the negative, we spotlight and highlight it, and inadvertently foster it. As the vicious cycle continues, both the adults and children become more frustrated, angry, and controlling. Unfortunately for all, the problem often escalates.

What people often do not realize is the “attention” and “emotion” given to a behavior will often reinforce it to occur more frequently. This is often evident with giving praise for good behavior, but also for giving negative reactions to challenging behavior. Whether the child likes the negative attention or not, the attention often increases the frequency of the challenging behavior. Either the child feels the control they see in the emotional reactions of others, enjoys manipulating what he wants by creating such attention, or hates the negative reactions and acts out more out of frustration. Regardless of the reasons for the challenging behavior, our attention to it often fosters it. 

Another concept in psychology is we tend to identify with what others highlight in us. If others tend to spotlight and highlight our negative qualities we tend to identify ourselves with those qualities. If we are labeled and treated like a bad, lazy, oppositional, inadequate person, we will become that person. Our self identities tend to mirror what others project on us. When we label a child a bully, we focus on his bad behavior, expect it out of him, and he identifies with those expectations. If we expect the child to act out when working with him, we will look for the behavior, are quick to interpret all behavior in a negative light, expect it to occur, and then give added attention to it when it happens. The child begins to see himself as “being that way”, because that is him!

Often when meeting with parents, teachers, administrators, and professionals , about 90% of the discussion is centered around the child’s challenging behaviors (why is it occurring, what are the triggers, what consequences will reduce it, etc.) as if these behaviors define the child. I can get caught up in this myself. After listening to this discussion for some time I usually have to interrupt the discussion and ask “what does the child do right?” What are his positive behaviors and attributes? When he is not acting out, what positive things does he do, say, and engage in. We are often so focused on the negative behavior we fail to notice the positive. We start to define the child as a problem. This is because of our natural instinct is to reaction to the negative. It colors our vision, and directs our focus. 

In behavioral language we often “baseline” the negative behavior (document how often it occurs, for how long it occurs, and how intense it is). We immediately start looking for it, expecting it, and sometimes inadvertently creating it. I find that it is often better to have parents and teachers first start with documenting what the child is doing right! What his good attributes are, when he is being good, and under what conditions is he at his best. “Catch him being good, attend to it, and document it.” Track throughout the day what things the child is doing right, when is he doing them and under what condition does he do well? We write them all down, list and compare notes on what behavior we want to see, when it is occurring, and how are we attending (or not attending) to it. 

People are at first annoyed by this, because of their hyperfocus on reducing the negative behavior. They want to turn the attention back to the negative behavior, as if that will somehow stop it. However, if they take a few weeks to simply focus on the good behavior, making an emphasis to praise and attend to it, and learn to create conditions for the good behavior to occur, not only does the good behavior start to occur more frequently, but the negative behavior starts to decrease significantly. When we tend to change our focus to “spotlighting and highlighting” the positive in the child, we actually become less reactive to the negative, stop hyperfocusing on it, and reduce the expectation for it to occur. When our attention is turned to the positive, what the child is doing right, what helps them feel “safe, accepted, and competent”, there is little time, energy, or need for the negative behavior. When others feel good about you, and you feel good about yourself, there is little value in the negative behaviors. 

Keep making your lists of all the good things you see from the child, and how you are praising and attending to them. Define your child by the good qualities in him, and more good things will come from him. Spotlight and highlight these good behaviors by creating a “Me” photo book of all the great things the child does. Take a digital camera and take pictures of times when the child “shines”, doing good things. Make a “Me” picture book of these events. Turn these events into “we-do” activities; doing them together, having fun, and sharing the experience together. Sit down with this “me” book and review and highlight the positive moments. Reminisce and share the experiences. By valuing the positive, the child will begin to gleam, and aspire to meet the expectations. He will begin to define himself by the positive, become more competent and confident, and build stronger self esteem. Children with strong self esteems rarely find the need to be negative. 

When the negative behaviors do occur, stay calm, minimize your attention, give little emotional reaction, support and redirect as needed, then turn right back to accenting the positive. You will find when there is four times more attention and emphasis on the positive than given to the negative, you will start to see a good turnaround, both in your child and in yourself. Positive breeds more positive, and all benefit. This all sounds much easier than it often is to implement. In actuality, this can take a lot of practice to change our focus and attention. But you will find that you are happier, and so is your child!

I found this article from a blog a follow and think it is such a humbling reminder to focus on the positive things about my children, instead of always looking for ways to "fix" the negative things or problem behaviors.  And this goes for ALL children...not just special needs children!