Emotional Abuse

What Is It ?
Coldness
Corruption

Cruelty
Extreme Inconsistency
Belittling

What Is It ?
Lots of us tend to find this term vague or elusive. Well, here is definition that could sum it up by stating that "A Child Emotional Abuse" may be defined as a pattern of behavior that attacks the child's emotional development and sense of self worthiness. Any body intentionally or unintentionally practicing such pattern against his own children or other peoples children would fall under the category of "Child Emotional Abuser". This emotionally distractive behavior could involves words, actions and indifference. It becomes active when the abuser systematically practice harsh behaviors ageist the child such as: rejection, names calling, putting down, terrorizing, isolating, humiliating, corrupting, ignoring, making fun of a child and /or always nitpicking.

As you see, Emotional abuse is more than just verbal abuse. It is in fact more of an attack on the child's emotional and social development, and is a grave threat to a healthy human development. Emotional abuse can take many forms:

Coldness
At the early stages of their lives, children learn to interact with the world through their basic interactions skills and senses with their parents. Children are normally in need of warmth and love for them to sustain a healthy mental growth. Only when parents show their love, the child can see the world as a safe and secure place and therefore would gradually become keen for exploration and learning. Also, love and affection gives the child the necessary ingredients for intellectual and social development. Children whom are subjected to consistent coldness tend to grow with the idea that this world cold and uninviting place, and would likely develop seriously impaired relationships in the future. They may also never feel confident to explore and learn.

A simple example of coldness is when the child draws a picture and rush to a parent with great thrill and enthusiasm to show him or her "his achievements" and what they do? Yelling at the child for distracting his\her concentration on rubbish and useless childish drawing !? Overall, this is a realistic event when the parents tend to be careless towards the child interests and the child feels this undermining act. Another example is when the parents do not attend when they are invited from school or any other activity that the child is participating in without explaining to the child a reasonable reason for not attending which leaves the child with the idea that "They just do not care about me as I am not important"

Corruption
This behavior against the child is more related to the nature of the upbringing. For example, when the parents or the care-givers teach and encourage their children to get involved in antisocial activities, or to behave in a way that encourages the child to develop false social values that reinforces antisocial or damaging behavioral patterns. In such in house educational effluence, the children would grow up unfit for normal social experience. Corruption of the Childs values is reinforced further when the child do or say something wrong but the parents do nothing to try to correct the situation simply because they do not want to upset the child or think that "The child will not practice such false behaviors when he or she are grown ups".

Although it might seem that the child likes this situation and is happy because he/she is free to do whatever they likes without anyone interfering, but in fact the child does not feel so. The child feels unsecured because the he is left on his own to decide what to do without having any guidance. The child feeling of insecurity and stress my have negative effects on his\her personality especially when the society or the people around the child do not welcome or reject the child for his\her unacceptable behaviors.

An example of corrupted values and lack of guidance may be noticed when the child goes to a shopping mall and starts to act in a way that disturb others or apply damages to the mall properties. It is also noted when the mother asks the child to come home after a play with friends, and she insists, but the child rejects and the mother just give up and leave the child to decide when to come back without any further action.

Cruelty
Cruelty happens when the caregivers are too tough with the child, to the extend that the child does not feel safe or loved. Although cruelty is more severe than coldness, but it may have similar effects on the child. The child experiencing cruelty may have difficulties to learn and form healthy relationships both in childhood and in adulthood. This is due to the lack of love and safety that cruelty will leave in the child heart. The problem with cruelty is that it makes it difficult for the child to "find sense" of the world and it may affect all areas of learning, emotional and social developments of the abused child.

An example of cruelty is sever punishments for mistakes that are minor or applying punishments where the child does not know exactly what went wrong or whey he\she is getting punished. Another example of cruelty, which is a mane one, is making unrealistic expectations form the child or expecting the child to act in a way beyond his\her age, mental or physical capabilities.

Extreme Inconsistency
The interaction between the caregivers and the child, even at the very early days after the Childs birth, is one of the most important factors for building the foundations of learning for the child. In this relationships, the child learns that each action have a reaction.

When the child knows what to expect when an action is done, whether right or wrong, the child learning skills will be improved and the child will know how to think and act in a logical way. When the child however can not expect the consequences, all areas of learning can be effected throughout the child's life span. It may also leave the child in extreme stresses as the child does not know what will happen next especially when the child wants to start something new.

A very simple example is when the caregivers act differently for the situation. For example, the child may go out without permission and will receive an extreme punishment and other time does the same but the caregiver react with total ignorance without providing any reason that the child could understand.

Another example is when the child breaks a peace of antique at home and the child get punished physically and emotionally in the worse possible manner and the mother will make sure that the child get the message of how expensive and important that peace of antique was and how she is sad to lose it. On the other hand, the mothers friend come with her kids and one of the friend's children break a similar antique and when the friend get angry at her kid, the mother try to convince her friend that it is OK, it is not an important matter, it is easy to buy another one or that the kid does not deserve all that punishment. The child will be left in a big confusion seeing such anomalies. He or she will end up with a very low self esteem when the child see the extreme inconsistency between the reactions when he\she break the antique and when the friends child breaks it. Having these types of reactions continuously with the child may have a big negative effect on the emotional health of the child and also on the child's learning pattern.

Belittling
Calling the child names such as "Stupid", "Useless", "Fool" or any other names that badly hits the child self worthiness can have an extremely negative impact on the child personality especially if those words are used continuously. Such continuous belittling causes the child to see him or herself in a way consistent with the caregivers negative wordings. This of course would results in the loss or the negative impact on the child's self esteem or self worthiness.

Parents do need to be critic of the child but not in this belittling fashion. They should criticize the child's actions and not the personality. For example, if the child have low marks in the exam, instead of them saying "You are stupid", "You will never learn or succeed", they better tell the child "You did not utilize your time properly" or "You did not put enough time and effort for this exam". This will help the child know where exactly is his or her problems and will always see hope for improvements.

Ignorance

An example of ignorance is when the child is having a problem and tries to talk to the caregiver about it or tires to send signals to the caregiver that he\she is in trouble but the caregiver does not listen or react due to reasons that the child can't understand. Another example is when the child is scared and the caregiver knows it but does not try to cool the child down or to explain the situation so that the child can feel that the caregiver is available to protect or to provide support when required.

Ignorance occurs when the caregiver is physically and or mentally unavailable to the child. Be it self absorbed or failing to respond to the child's behaviors. Ignoring a child may be in many forms when the child need to receive love and support and the caregiver is able to provide it but does not do so. Ignoring a child may leave the child unable to get all the essential and necessary stimulations and interactions necessary for the child's emotional, intellectual and social development. Ignoring the child may have extreme effects on the child's self worthiness.

Inappropriate Control
Inappropriate control takes three forms - lack of control, over control, and inconsistent control. Lack of control puts the children at risk of danger or harm to themselves. It does not provide the child with the experience needed to lead a safe life. An example of this is leaving the child to decide on the TV channels to watch even if they are not appropriate for the child's age and also set no time limit to watch the TV. The same also applies to the Internet.

Over control does not leave enough space and opportunities for the child's self-assertion and self-development. It prevents the children from exploring the world around them. An example of this is when the child have no area where the child can experience decision making and also when the child has to get a permission for every single activity he\she wants to make. Giving children enough knowledge. Allowing the children to practice decision making will help in the child's mental and social development and also will help in learning and practicing good decision making need to help them make bigger decisions when they are grown ups.

Inconsistent control on the other hand could cause anxiety and confusion and could lead to a variety of problematic behaviors as well as impairing the intellectual development. When caregivers over control the child on a subject today and lose control over the same subject the next day, this would leaves the child scared and confused of what really his\her boundaries and areas of movements are. As a general rule, children do not feel very safe or relaxed with inconsistent behaviors of their caregivers.

Isolation

Isolation involve the caregiver's behavior which prevents the child from making normal social relations by for example preventing the child from forming friendships and normal family relations. Isolation can lead to psychological disorders such as depression. Isolating a child can seriously impairs their intellectual, emotional and social development. Isolation may be accompanied by other forms of emotional abuse and often physical abuse.

Rejection

Caregivers whom lack the ability to bond will often display rejection behavior towards a child. When a caregiver rejects a child, the caregiver is negating the child's self-image, showing the child that he\she has no value and is unwanted. Children who are rejected from the start by their caregivers are more likely to develop a range of behavior problems. An infant who is rejected has almost no chance of integrating into a healthy adulthood.

When children are criticized, their behaviors should be criticized and not the personality. Make it clear to the child that you are not rejecting them but you are rejecting that particular behavior. There is a big difference between being told that your father thinks that you could do a better job at school and have better grades and being told that your father thinks your are too lazy and stupid to do better than what you are doing.

Terrorizing

Terrorizing involves threatening the child with the extreme or vague but harsh punishment as this would invoke intense fear. Terrorizing can involve threats to destroy the child's prosperities, break arm or leg, burn, kick out of the house or even to kill pets or loved ones if the child does not meet the caregiver expectations.

Terrorizing does a great damage to the child's feelings of safety and leaves the child sinking in stresses and fear almost all the time. This will not only have a psychological negative effect on the child but will also cause physical problems and it may also reduce the ability of the child to fight diseases. The child living in terror has little opportunity to develop a healthy mentality without social and behavior problems.

Remember

Emotional abuse is the core of all forms of abuse, and the long term effects of child abuse and neglect is a result of the emotional aspects of abuse. In fact, it is the psychological aspect of most abusive behaviors that defines them as abusive.

Think of a child breaking his\her leg. If the leg was broken while playing football with friends, the child will heal and recover with no psychological problems and the child will learn valuable life lessons and this will be stronger if the caregivers and friends offer there support to the child.

But what if the same leg was broken because a caregiver kicked the child and dropped him\her down the stairs? Will the feeling be the same? Will handling the problem and pain be the same? In this case the child will heal physically, but may never heal psychologically.

Although the major harm of abuse is often caused by the emotionally, yet emotional abuse is the most difficult forms of abuse to substantiate and prosecute. This is because emotional abuse leaves no tangible marks like is the case with physical abuse.