Is Your Child the Family Bully?

For a lot of children, behaviour problems are targeted toward a particular person or persons such as a parent, a sibling, stepparent and so forth. A normally well behaved child can turn into an abusive and defiant little tyrant around these people. So what can you do if you have a child like this?

All kids recognize and deal with people in different ways right from infancy. Take a baby for instance. He responds differently to his mother or a family friend. This difference in response continues on through childhood and adolescence. They recognize the difference in adults and some may use this to their advantage.

They figure out which adults they can manipulate and which they can't. They figure out during childhood who doesn't follow through on consequences, who lets their bad behaviour go, who they can use excuses with for bad behaviour and who will buy them things to get on their good side. They learn who will set limits.

If the child targets a particular person, it means he has learned that he has some form of control over that person. It may be that he s abusive toward his mother. This may be a sign that he feels inferior and bullying his mother makes him feel more powerful. The behavioral dynamic is that he lacks self confidence and putting her down gives him self confidence.

So why does the child do this? Try to see it from his viewpoint. Imagine your boss is always picking at you and complaining about your work. Wouldn't you love to tell him where to shove the job? of course you would but you know you need the job so you have to accept it. It's the same thing for the kids. They are getting gratification from telling off people who are their bosses.

Children often notice that parents are divided in their approach to inappropriate behaviour. This sends differing messages to the child and they feel that they can gain power by targeting the weaker parent or confronting the parent they feel is being unfair by challenging them. These children normally don't have high self esteem. They fear confrontation and so they try to control the other person, thereby making that person a victim.

This targeted behaviour can divide the parents as they become angry both with the child and with one another. Unfortunately, this is the worst thing the parents can do. What they really need to do is to put up a united front and deal with the abusive child together. Don't blame one another or the other siblings. Make the abusive child take responsibility for the behaviour.

Children know who has authority and generally they show respect to them. However, if the child sees someone as not being authoritive, he feels free to bully that person. This should bring definite consequences which should be clear and quick. Parents need to take note of what works with the behavioral responses of the child.

When a child bullies people to feel powerful, he needs to learn the skills to feel this way in more age appropriate ways.

There are two things parents need to do:

1. Parents need to assist the child to develop social skills such as compromise and conflict resolution.

2. Parents need to set clear and well defined limits of behaviour management.


These things help the child to learn to manage his feelings without feeling the need for abuse against others. Learning these skills makes the whole situation a lot happier for all concerned.


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