Ladies and gentlemen it has come to my attention, despite desperate attempts to ignore it, that I am getting older. In truth, I’ve known about this for a while. Time may heal all things but it does diddly squat for old age. I’m afraid time is so often mediated and perceived through a youthful filter. … Continued
I would like to start this blog on a slight tangent… Take a look at the picture below. I’m sure many of you are already familiar with this wretched story. To those of you who are not it revolves around a 12-year-old girl and her father, a gun toting, NRA loving, … Continued
The internet was set alight last July with angry mums from all over the globe furiously tweeting, blogging, instagraming, emailing, shouting and generally airing their views in any medium that would have them. What was the source of this ire, you ask? The answer is a Dr Charlotte Renzick, an American clinical psychologist and author … Continued
Why is it that authority in one area so often confers authority in another? It’s a well-studied phenomenon. One of the most famous examples of this can be seen in the social psychology experiment conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Miligram in the 1960s in which he measured the willingness of study participants to obey … Continued
I’ve written a number of times about discipline, parental supervision and technology. There is some pretty good advice out there on the net and a plethora of online communities that exist to provide support to newly minted parents. One theme that has run through many of my posts is the risk and challenges presented by … Continued
Medical experts in Australia have concluded, following the result of a royal commission into domestic violence in the state of Victoria (the first of its kind in the country), that children are affected by it even before birth. Statistics show that the number of cases of domestic violence in the country has increased by 136 … Continued
I have spoken a lot about the necessity of secure attachments in the development of a socially and emotionally healthy children. Anyone with a modicum of common sense understands that good interaction and quality parenting behaviour lie at the heart of this. Achieving this however is not always easy. Kids are not blank slates that … Continued
I’ve spent a lot of talking about attachment theory, but have not really focused explicitly on the role of the father. General speaking infants develop attachments with regular interaction. This interaction is relational and not simply a matter of sheer proximity. A child is adept at discerning the nature of such attachments and deciding whether … Continued