Quarrelsome Attitude May Lead to Criminal Behavior

We are taking up a very current issue today – a pressing need to deal with negative aggression in adults and children. We have seen such people on local trains, busses and many-a-times even in our own neighborhood. Children becoming a slave of such aggression is a result of the attitude and the teaching of their parents. Quarrelsomeness is handed down from generation to generation, not genetically but due to the behavior of parents. A Journalist Reveals spoke to Criminal Psychologist Anuja Kapur to learn what goes into this behavior of such people and how to deal with such children. Excerpts from the interview:

Why do some people have the strong urge to fight (arguments as well as hand-fights) with someone else to the extent of hurting the other person?

People, who are in the habit of arguing over petty issues, can’t help themselves and will always create a hassle to the highest degree, just to cause conflict. These are people, who display Narcissist behavior and like the emotion and sense of power, they experience during this agitation. Usually, these people are disturbed due to infinite reasons, of which some are having negative role models as kids, their parents getting a divorce, the death of a close family member or the untimely gaining of a little brother or sister or a lot of anger issues with their parents. All that they have faced in their initial years of life is no appreciation, no affection and no sympathy. Reasons are several but the way to deal with this stress is difficult. People in order to defend themselves often resort to this negative behavior, where they try to argue and hurt others emotionally and physically. People with this negative aura are victims of attention seeking, where they know if “we don’t create a ruckus, we will go unheard”. These are the people who further go on to create domestic and organizational violence.

They teach their children also the same behavior. What repercussions can it have on the children?

With negativism flowing down the family, kids of infuriated parents always tend to be bullies and offenders. These children possess different negative traits like:

• Being more hard-hitting and disobedient.
• Having little or no sympathy towards others.
• Parental anger leads to delinquency amongst kids.
• Various degrees of depression for the kids due to stress.
• Social alienation as nobody wants to be friends with the bad elements of the society.

Handling anger and fury issues with parents is very necessary, in order to avoid this situation from occurring. Parents must deal efficaciously with their emotional arousal, in particular, dealing with their kids. The less stress and burden for children will create a secure atmosphere for them and will help hold a high self-esteem and a feeling of appreciation.

Children emulate their parents and other adults, even in the usage of bad language. What repercussions can it have on the children, as adults? Can their behavior be controlled?

Adopting bad habits is always easier than imitating good ones. The behavior in question here does not happen overnight. It is rather the outcome of subjugation, pulsating and negative behavior that the kids have seen happening to other people and maybe even received in their childhood. A stressful and traumatic life as a kid does this to you. As coined in the differential association theory formulated by Edwin Sutherland, who ascertained that the knowledge and competence required for felonious and malicious acts are not inherited mechanically at birth rather it is a learned conduct that a child comprehends from his parents. It is the social activity and physical phenomenon with others that children adapt and act as adults later on. These behavior, mannerism, methods and motives all usually account for illegal conduct. If this behavior is to be restrained, then children somewhere along the line need to have a positive role model in their life, who alters everything. A person whom they can look up to and want to be like in the years to come and also teaches them to determine the right from the wrong. It is a vicious circle which in order to be controlled needs a positive role model.