So if we accept that having a 'good ' or 'easy' baby is down to luck of the draw, at what age do we start to influence our children's behaviour?

[Jojay]

Another thread got me thinking - many people say that having a good sleeper, or a 'contented' baby is purely down to luck, so when do the parents actions start to impact on behaviour?

Any thoughts?

Cory - I don;t know whether it's because she's still adapting to nursery. I hope so, but she's been a long time adapting.

I suppose the point I'm making is that myself as a parent of a single child have more time to observe my own daughter so that she naps before she melts down, I have time to resettle her if she doesn't nap for as long as she needs, etc. Whereas, each nursery staff needs to keep an eye on three other children so can't be so attentive and consequently DD's behaviour changes because of this lack of 100% attention she gets at home from an obsessive mother.

The more I think about it, the more I do believe that parents/carers have a huge influence on the behaviour of children. I'm not 100% sure, but have there not been studies about orphans in China, Romania, behaving in a subdued way because they are just left to cry and not have their needs met?

I think you can influence a babies behaviour. All human beings are programmed to need rewards and seek approval from other members of family, friends and outside influences. No different from a rat that learns to press a lever to recieve a treat (Skinner). My baby learned to stand up from lying holding my hands at 8wks old- I put this down to the fact that when she accidentally pushed her feet against my hands I said 'thats it, push with your feet", then I would sit her up holding her hands saying 'sit up", then I would say when she was sitting 'push up with your legs then' to which she would make her legs and body rigid and pull herself to standing. Believe it or not very young babies can learn from instructions as well as observations, when they do as we wish them to and give praise. I always rewarded her pushing with 'wow! You did it! Clever girl!' I smile as I say it but this makes her want to repeat the behaviour that gets this response. Consequently at 16wks she will take steps holding my hands under the direction 'step then, walk to x'. Due to her being rewarded with the phrases I use and smiles she knows what walk means and if I say 'do you want to walk then?' she beams at me.
The point being that parental response to the childs behaviour is key in their development.

I think parents influence a child's behaviour from very early on.
For example me and a friend both have dd's who are 9 months old My friend says her dd will only eat baby food from jars which she has fed since weaning and she finds it difficult to get her dd to eat homemade food. My dd eats anything I give her but on the few occasions I have tried to give her a jar for convenience she wont eat it.
Surely that's the behaviour of parents influencing the behaviour of children.

My dd plays peekaboo, if we had never played peekaboo with her she wouldn't do this so we have influenced her behaviour haven't we?

My friends dd loves being held by other people and is admittedly more socialised than my dd who cries if she's being held by anyone other than me and dp. Surely this the parents behaviour influencing the baby?

foxymolly I absolutely agree with the weaning thing. My dd1 was weaned on homemade puree and wasn't given jars and like yours mine refused to eat them when I went out. Likewise I had a mindee who was weaned on jars and didn't have homemade food until over 1yo (or finger foods). She struggled with chewing until she was 2.

Agree with juuule, cory and riven.

Would add that if a parents' 'actions' miraculously result in an easy baby or a good sleeper, then perhaps that baby was an easy one in disguise. Biddability is a function of 'easiness' - says me who still struggles with dd 4.10 and ds 1.10 and their take-no-prisoners personalities. You cannot change their temperament but as a parent, you can gently teach them coping strategies for life.

Also, I wouldn't say that having a difficult baby is necessarily a bad thing. It is hard work in the early years, but it does get easier. It is a joy to raise children who are so engaged with the world and determined to improve their circumstances. The discontented baby who never felt that anything was right and was vocal about it, is the adult with a fighting spirit that won't sit back and let life walk over them.

Yes, another example of parents influencing behaviour of their children is in food.
Only last night, we fed DD some roast chicken which she didn't even touch, until we sat down and ate some too. After which, she ate all the chicken! Surely, this is parents influencing the behaviour of a child.

If people don;t think a child's behaviour can be influenced, then why bother talking to babies, cuddling them, kissing them, responding to them, etc. if they truly believe that it would make no difference to the child's behaviour?

No, my ds was extremely well socialised, held by loads of people for the first 8 months, nothing about our behaviour changed but suddenly at 8and half months and ever since, my ds cries whenever people try and hold him other than me and dh.

It's not you influencing their behaviour, their personality will win at this age.

Peekaboo is not really behaviour. It's something that any baby will do and of course they 'learn' through repitition but this doesn't mean it affects their actual personality or the way they behave.

I think from very early. Although a baby may be predisposed one way or the other you can affect it, if for example you are over anxious or more relaxed you may unconsciously either accentuate or offset this. However agree much is in the perception of a child's behaviour and the parental response to it. For example a baby who cries for whatever reason and a parent who continually ignores it, eventually conditions the child not to cry.

ds was far easier in retrospect than he seemed at the time , only realised by arrival of a less than easy dd !

I'm finding this discussion increasingly interesting, and playing devil's advocate, I'd like to ask all those who believe they CAN'T influence the behaviour of their DC's - what do you feel is your role as a parent?

deviant, I cannot change my dcs' temperament, but I would not say I cannot change their behaviour . To change behaviour, particularly of infants, the question is at what cost. For easier children, they might respond quickly to sleep training. For mine, I would have to break their spirit first which to me for not worth it.

And I do believe parental influence starts from birth.

My role is to guide their behaviours gently, whilst taking note of their readiness to move to the next stage. One difference with the parent of an easy child is that I have to choose my battles carefully.

Blueshoes - yes, completely agree you can't change temperament. But the OP asked about BEHAVIOUR and not TEMPERAMENT, which was why I posed the question.

I just could not imagine a parent truly believing they are unable to change a child's BEHAVIOUR.

Without having read this thread in huge detail, I don't recall which poster actually said they could not influence behaviour, as specifically distinguished from temperament, other than tongue-in-cheek.

People don't always make the distinction between temperament and behaviour. Indeed as they are closely linked in many ways. It is helpful for the OP to make this distinction.

I read an interesting book recently by a behavioural psychologist. His argument was that all the research shows that personality is innate. Twins raised apart are more like each other than they are like their adoptive siblings raised in the same household, for instance. Adoptive siblings are no more alike each other than any pair of random strangers, apparently.

He also argued that of course parents treat different children differently - so you can't really say 'my ds is easy going and my dd hard work yet they've both been treated the same'. Partly environment - being the second child is different to being an only, as the first was for some years. And your parents are older if you are the second, etc. etc. etc. BUT that this is down to the parents reacting to the different children, not down to the parents preferring one or the other. Something to do with genotype, IIRC.

I agree with the statement that "personality is innate". I think this is totally separate from behaviour though, which is really just the manifestation of a personality's interaction with the environment.

You can definitely mould behaviour from a very early age but temperament comes pre-installed. I think the fact that personality ot temperament is a foundation for how the child interacts with the world means you can only influence it to a degree. I also think the degree you can influence a child is probably related to the temperament too - some personalities are more malleable than others, some children are more naturally eager to please and some come more independent from birth.

My dd (9 months) is not the most contented baby. she is fiercly independant and very vocal. On a normal day, she won't want to be held and she won't want to be put down either, she can be really frustrating.
Dispite not being an easy baby she has a rountine, eats three meals a day and sleeps 12 hrs a night.
My friend often says how difficult my dd is compared to hers, who is very laid back and can be left to play by self quite happily. Yet her dd has no routine, is a fussy eater and is a bad sleeper.

So I agree that temperment cannot be changed but I believe parents directly affect behaviour from an early age.

OP never mentions temperament, only behaviour - both in thread title and posting. Huge difference between behaviour and temperament. IMHO your temperament is part of your personality and is innate and won't change unless you suffer from a traumatic experience.

I suppose one of the bees I have in my bonnet about this is that when DD has on occasion cried, a couple of people have said to me that nothing is wrong, and that's what babies do - cry. I'm a huge believer in there being a reason why a baby is behaving in a certain way (ie crying or whingeing) and it's my job as a parent to find out why and act accordingly.

Edam - quite agree that children in same family are not treated the same. I'm fully aware that my next DC may behave completely differently to DD because I won't be 100% there for him/her.

Although there will be variations in the way children from the same family are treated, I would have thought that generally they would be treated from the same philosophical standpoint. Obviously it's possible that parents viewpoints might change over the years, too. But if a parent has believes in child-led parenting then surely that's quite likely to apply to all their children but with slight adaptations to allow for the personality of the child.

what's child-led parenting?

I have a nine month old and I've come to the conclusion that I can't easily influence his behaviour at this age.

Like others including VioletSmile have said, one parent can try a sleeping method for example with one child and feel proud when they have success, this will lead them to think that it is the method and their parenting skills which have changed the behaviour ... and this will be partly true.

However, another parent can try just as hard with the same method and have no success at all.

Is it the method that is wrong? Is the second parent just not as good at following the advice? Or is it down to the baby and their innate temperament?

When I tried the controlled crying technique on my DS he was so upset within 5 minutes that he had gone purple and made himself sick. I am NEVER doing that again. Another friend had a sleep through baby after one attempt.

I have had problems with weaning too ... and before any of you with easy babies wonder, I use all my own homemade organic food, make meal time as fun as possible and reward him with all manner of high jinx when he eats any of his dinner at all.

Maybe when he is older I will be able to influence his behaviour ... but at the moment I have to accept that he will take the lead.

FeelingDeviant this sort of thing.

Joanna, you are right that the readiness of a child for certain behaviours can be dependent on age - and the later you leave it, the easier it is to influence it. For example, sleep - babies' sleeping patterns mature, they are able to understand limits with greater comprehension. I understand what you say about your ds going purple - my dcs are the same. dd 4.10 now sleeps like a dream, all through my ds' 1.10 night antics. It will get better.

Deviant, I cannot imagine what a parent is supposed to do if they are not allowed to find out what is distressing a baby. A baby cries, you go to it. It is not rocket science. Of course you are right. Those people who tell you to leave a crying baby sound most strange.

Joanna, also want to say that good eaters don't always stay that way. And fussy eaters can get better. 9 months is still very little. I would say that weaning only starts to get established from now. My niece was a champion eater until she turned one. Now her parents are happy if she eats an olive. My dd would gave me no end of trouble as a baby (is still no champion eater) but generally has a varied diet over the course of a week!

Ah but Joanna, if you find out that when you investigate your crying baby they really only want to be left alone then why pick them up and fuss around?

Sorry meant Blueshoes

In fact, I think I've replied on the wrong thread Getting confused with this one.