Brain science revealed: Roaring babies affect children's IQ development?

Highlights of this article:

From the perspective of brain science, roaring babies will affect the development of children's IQ, why?

Today, I will use the principles of brain science to unravel the truth for you, and I will also give parents some practical solutions.

The full text has a total of 3961 words and a reading time of 10 minutes

A friend often can't help yelling at the baby, although she also knows that this will only deter the child and will not achieve the purpose of internalizing good behavior, but she is still distressed, she can't help it!

Until one time I seriously told her that you would overdevelop her amygdala and affect the development of the rational brain, she was shocked and asked me how to practice emotional management. It seems that she has realized that she needs to do something. She is also curious about why the amygdala is affected by emotions and how it affects the rational brain.

So what is the magic of this little amygdala that can control our rational brain? Starting from the three-layer structure of the brain, the innermost layer is the brainstem, that is, the low-order crawling brain, which is responsible for the basic life activities of the body, such as breathing, heartbeat, apathy, hostility, etc. The middle layer that wraps the brainstem is the limbic system, which has the hypothalamus, amygdala, etc., which is responsible for the integration of emotions with the five senses. The outermost layer is the neocortical layer, the higher-order rational brain, which is buckled on the limbic system like a hat and is responsible for thinking, logic, reasoning and other thinking operations.

In addition, some basic reflexes to external stimuli, such as coughing and blinking, are also responsible for the brainstem. It can be seen that the function of the brain stem is permanent, ensuring our most basic life safety. As for the limbic system, it bears more of our sensibility. And the hippocampus in the limbic system is responsible for memory formation and storage. In the neocortical layer, the functions assumed are more refined. We can talk, we can move, it's all at work. Usually, if we say that others do things without the brain, we actually refer to the neocortical layer in the brain.

The magical amygdala

In the limbic system, the amygdala is the CEO in charge of emotions, named for its almond-shaped, when we have bad emotions, such as anger, panic, etc., the amygdala will swell, affecting the rational brain and the crawling brain information connection, at this time the crawling brain is online, we tend to show indifference, hostility, make unwise choices.

Therefore, in the "roaring baby" event, the child feels anger and fear, and these bad emotions cause the child to overactivate the amygdala and therefore develop abnormally. Once there is a problem with the amygdala, other areas of the brain are also affected, especially the rational brain area. When the amygdala takes up too many resources in the brain, it cannot fully develop the brain's cognitive abilities. The child's rational thinking ability will be suppressed, resulting in the rational brain being unable to work online.

In the long run, the child will be unable to concentrate and memory loss, which is manifested in the child's confusion by parents, will have no eyes, stand there dumbly, and eventually affect the development of "IQ".

How to make the amygdala safe and secure for a long time

The amygdala is the brain center that generates, recognizes emotions and regulates them, that is, the emotional intelligence administrator, in order to avoid its swelling affecting our rational brain, in two steps:

The first step is to identify emotions

Parents:

When we have bad emotions, crawling brain on the line, the body first knows: breathing, heart rate increase, muscle tension, first perceive the body's reaction, press the pause button in time, my own cultivation is: no matter what happens, the tone of speech remains unchanged.

Because when we yell at the baby, the first thing the child feels is that the mother's voice becomes louder, if we can keep the voice calm, the amygdala will not swell, the rational brain thinks normally and thinks of a solution to the problem, it is difficult to fall into the vortex of bad emotions.

This is difficult, but as long as we are aware of this awareness, remind ourselves often, and then we can also ask our children to help: if the mother's tone improves, please remind us in time.

In this way, we can quickly identify the emotions of the moment and avoid yelling incidents.

For example, usually before communicating with children, let yourself get out of those things that are not going well in life.

You can also put a catchy reminder on the background image of your phone to keep yourself calm.

Of course, it is inevitable that there will be some times when words with strong emotions will blurt out, I will tell the baby in advance, once so, let him directly say "Mom, you yelled at me again" and other words.

Children's Chapter:

Many parents will also have children always yelling, yelling troubled, we can generally quickly identify his emotions behind, anger or frustration, the more noisy the child parents need peace, give him a benign reference, patiently accompany him to calm down.

Some parents may say, I am also very anxious to see my child like this, and I can't wait to yell louder to calm him down, so that we will not enter the vortex of roaring babies again?

Believing in brain science, we just have to wait peacefully. Parents are really anxious, you can assume that they become a little transparent and fly into the air, watch the child perform like a TV series, quietly accompany him or touch him, wait until he calms down, can help the child describe the current emotions, and then teach him ways to calm his emotions.

Usually, when parents and children read together, you can take your child to read more emotional picture books, understand the types of emotions, and discover the situations in which each emotion appears. When reading a story picture book, you can ask your child what emotions the characters in the story are and why they have these emotions.

In this way, the child will recognize that different events or experiences cause different emotions. If the character in the story becomes angry, it may be that he has been offended; Becoming happy, probably meeting the person you want to see. Children's ability to recognize emotions will improve and they will also be able to express their emotions.

Over time, children are able to perceive not only their own emotions, but also the emotions of others. Not only that, when children understand the source of emotions, they will not demonize emotions, and when they face the challenges brought by emotions, they will be able to cope better.

The second step is to regulate emotions

The amygdala coordinates the five senses of the human body, and the five senses can also bring positive or negative feedback to the amygdala.

Among them, using the sense of smell is the fastest way to regulate the amygdala.

The olfactory globulus that recognizes odors is located behind the nasal cavity, closest to the straight line from our amygdala.

I remember a teenage psychological counselor and aromatherapist sharing a case, an 8-year-old autistic child came to the studio has been in a state of excitement, shouting, the counselor is difficult to approach, so she took out pure plant wild orange essential oil to sprinkle on his chest, the fresh aroma surrounded him, after 10 minutes the child gradually calmed down, the counselor began to communicate with him, and the family called it a miracle. Suffice it to see that the natural aroma has a very good stabilizing effect on our amygdala.

Professor Peng Kaiping, head of the Department of Psychology of Tsinghua University, mentioned in his book "Children's Character" that "smelling incense can quickly calm our emotions", there is a saying in ancient China called "gentleman pei xiang", and there is a commonly used expression in English called "smell the fragrance of roses", in fact, it also shows that aroma helps to relieve and regulate emotions, that is, to help our amygdala return to normal size.

If we don't have essential oils and sachets as a carrier, we can choose to take our children to outdoor activities, after all, the fragrance of nature is the most beautiful and beautiful. If it is at home, we can keep a bouquet of flowers or take out some fragrant fruits such as lemons, oranges, etc., it is also helpful to sniff and inhale.

Deep breathing is also an ideal way to regulate the amygdala. Because when people are anxious and angry, crawling brain is on the line, breathing and heart rate are accelerated, so there is a word called "breath and breath". Conversely, if we want to control our emotions, we need to adjust our breathing, and deep breathing can help us.

But many children may not breathe deeply, you can usually lead them to do it together in daily life, such as showing his stomach and putting a toy he likes on it, seeing the ups and downs of the toy according to the breath, and getting this skill in the game. There is also a picture book that can also help children learn to breathe deeply, that is, "Learn to breathe with the frog brother", and practice deep breathing with the little frog with the picture book. At the same time, it can be seen from the above that deep breathing + sniffing aroma will achieve a double effect of regulating the amygdala.

Touching the body soothes our mood and regulates the amygdala. Many parents will use cold treatment when they have conflicts with their children, but at this time their nerves and muscles are already in a state of tension, which will prolong the swelling of the amygdala, and if long-term memory is formed, it will lead to their emotional indifference in the future.

At this time, he needs his parents to get close to him, touch and hug him, and say to him "you are very angry, I will accompany you to calm down" to help him relax. At this time, we will find that the tiger-like child gradually turns into a little sheep, and when his amygdala returns to normal, the rational brain is online, and we don't need to say that they will also actively realize their behavioral deviations, and then review at this time will be twice as effective. When "other detection" constantly transitions to "self-observation", the synapses on this pathway will become more and more sensitive, and children with high emotional intelligence will be born.

Drawing or writing can help children vent their emotions. The German dramatist and poet Goethe wanted to commit suicide, so he wrote a book "The Troubles of Young Werther", which wrote that his thoughts of suicide disappeared.

Therefore, we can encourage children to write down bad emotions and the experiences they cause, the more detailed the better, in fact, to lead them to self-review. If it is a younger child, we can take them to draw and describe their emotional state, such as fire-breathing dinosaurs, rampaging cars, etc., anger, frustration with the slow output, the body will gradually relax, the amygdala receives a relaxation signal and returns to normal size, the child's mood will naturally relax.

Looking at the clouds, this is a good way I recently learned by psychologist Zhang Peichao. In our daily life, the mind will fall into a daily state, and it is easy to form a tubular vision. But once you look up at the sky, you will find that the sky is very big, many things are not transformed according to our will, and the sky itself is very comfortable. Therefore, you can usually take your child to observe the clouds in the sky intentionally or unintentionally, there are people outside the people, there is a sky outside the sky, and the transformation of perspective will also bring emotional transformation.

Of course, you can also talk about your heart, exercise, meditation, etc., which are all helpful for emotions.

The commonality of these methods is that they provide an opportunity to relax our bodies and minds and release our emotions. Emotions need an outlet, and if they are allowed to spread, they will fall into a vicious circle. Regardless of the above methods, we are given the opportunity to get along with emotions, to be able to focus on emotions, to sort out the source of emotions, and to understand ourselves more clearly. Our body also secretes dopamine, endorphins and other substances to play a good sedative effect.

But at the same time, we need to avoid misunderstandings, in order to "not roar baby" caused parents to be in a long-term "nervous" state of excessive self-control, it will still be mildly stimulated to the amygdala, and when it expands to a certain extent, the final result is still an emotional outburst.

Be a real parent, even if we yell at the baby and break out, it doesn't matter, use the above methods to help us calm down, "review" in time, discuss the process of emotional storms with children, find the source, may be because the mother is too tired from work, may be that the child does not have a sense of time and so on. With this kind of cultivation, we and the child's amygdala will become more and more stable, information will be transmitted to the rational brain faster and faster, and these bits and pieces of emotions will be transformed into wisdom. At this time, children will have real emotional intelligence: they can identify their own emotional state, they can also identify people's emotions or emotional states, and they know their own emotions, emotional laws, and the laws of others.

When children have a stable amygdala, the ability to carry emotions will be strong, and they will gain higher emotional intelligence.

From the perspective of brain science, emotional intelligence and IQ complement each other, as long as we are aware and use the method that suits us, both can be obtained, and children can experience life more comfortably like clouds.

Can you perceive your child's true side?