My child can't bear/accept losing; what should I do?

My child is about to go to primary school and I want to train him in all aspects, so I signed him up for some interest classes in competitive sports. 

However, on one occasion, when my boy lost the Go game, he directly turned the table, lost his temper, cried and said, "I will never play chess again." 

This matter makes we feel uncomfortable. Character determines fate, but my child can't accept losing, what are we going to do?

  Topic Parenting Subtopic Education Tags Parenting Education Children Developmental psychology Growth
3 Years 2 Answers 2.9k views

Hannie Liu

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Answers ( 2 )

 
  1. J Starr 4425 Community Answer

    This one is going to depend upon how you (and his other parent) approach the idea of winning and losing.

    There's often a problem for children who are expected- be it demanded or the more subtle criticism of performance- to win or be best, or even simply always do their best in learning to accept defeat, not being Number One, not knowing how to share the spotlight, not knowing how to accept others are just as good or better.  It's not an easy concept when you're a little child- especially if those around you are constantly exhorting you for more-More-MORE, and criticising who and how you are already.

    Your son needs to know he is an acceptable human being even if he is not best, even if he dawdles, even if he is afraid of bugs, even if he doesn't win- and right now, he doesn't.  He cannot accept he is not BEST, and that's because he feels he is not measuring up to the standards of the two people he cares about most in the world: His parents.

    Stop ctritiquing him.  Stop correcting every little thing.  Instead, use positive reinforcement.

    It isn't easy- you are going to have to work at it;  you will need to find something at nearly every interaction for which you can praise him. It seems like rewarding him for no reason, but it works- it helps him change his mind about how he reacts to the world.


    He finished his breakfast with a minute to spare?  "Great job getting done so quickly this morning" and drop it. 

    He did his chores with only two reminders?  "Thank you for getting your chores done, I appreciate it- and you" and drop it.

    All day, every day, you have to find ways to reinforce the behaviors you want, while ignoring (unless something is dangerous) the behaviors you don't want.  All day.  Day after day after day.  It will not take long, if you follow this, for your son to seek your praise.  All you have to do is give him opportunities to be praised rather than criticized and corrected.

    I know-  it seems like new-age, namby-pamby B.S., but it works.


    As to winning and losing, start with small contests- who can finish tying their shoes first, you or him?  You, of course, but, "...that's because I have had more practice and bigger fingers.  In a few months, you will give me a run for my money!"  Who can run from the back porch to the fence and back fastest?  Not him-  but  "...that's because my legs are longer.  As you get taller, you will be much faster."  And then, you slow down a bit so he almost does it, he almost wins, and you praise-praise-praise his accomplishment- not him, but what he did.  Then you let him win, and praise the stuffing out of him.  After that, well, he should be better about winning and losing altogether.

    The other thing to remember is lessons parents teach are nothing compared to the lessons taught by peers.  Peers have an enormous impact on children, and so giving him lots of opportunities to interact with peers is crucial.  If school is not providing in-person learning where you are, look up a social group of peer-aged children, and have him just go play- go learn how to be a kid-  sorry if the word offends you, but it sounds like your son may view himself as a small, stubborn adult.  He's not, so give him the opportunity to experience life the way others just like him experience life.

    So, let up on the criticism, find reasons to praise him, find ways to let him lose "honorably"- for a specific reason, and give him more opportunities to learn how others just like himself react to the world. 

    And, remember: It's a good bet he'll grow up to be a wonderful adult one way or the other.  If not, trust me, his wife will whip him into shape!

    UTC 2020-08-12 05:31 PM 0 Comments
  2. Chier Hu 433 Accepted Answer

    What people in can accept losing and can't accept losing have in common is that "it will be hard to lose", but the essential difference between them is "whether to associate winning or losing with self-worth".

    After losing the game, people in can accept losing are sad that they are incompetent in some aspects, but they do not feel that "I am worthless as a whole."

    They can separate winning or losing from their self-worth, and their self-worth does not depend on whether they win the game or not.

    Therefore, they will be sad when they lose, but they still have a sense of self-worth to support them to start all over again.




    After losing the game, those can't accept losing people are sad that "I am a useless person, an incompetent person, a worthless person", because their opinion of themselves is dependent on whether they can win or not.

    Only by winning can they feel a sense of self-worth.




    Therefore, the reason why a child has these lack sportsmanship performances (losing his temper, lifting the table, giving up playing chess) after a go match is because for him, losing the game not only means "my go ability is incompetent", but also makes him feel "I am a worthless person".




    Once the sense of self-worth is formed, it will be more stable.

    Therefore, when a child is can't accept losing, parents can't rely on words to cheer him up and reason with him.

    What parents need to do is to help their children improve their sense of self-worth.




    Specifically, parents can pay attention to the following points in their daily life:




    1. If your child gets too much praise, such as "you are great" from an early age, remember to reduce the praise for your child. 




    Contrary to many parents' views on praise, too much praise will not improve their children's self-confidence, but will hurt it.




    True self-confidence is not based on success, but to believe in yourself unconditionally, even if you fail, you also think that "failure is only temporary, no matter how long it takes, I will be able to achieve something."




    But praise brings children false self-confidence based on success.

    Praise is to show appreciation when a child does something.

    This implies that the child,

    "your value lies in the success of the thing itself,"

    "your value is directly related to the success or failure of the thing."

    But people sometimes fail, and once they fail, the child will think, "if I don't succeed, I have no self-worth."

    Therefore, his self-worth is not unconditional but conditional.

    To avoid losing this condition, the child will worry about gain and loss and lose confidence in himself.




    Therefore, parents should praise their children less but pay more attention to their feelings and efforts in doing things and learning.

    For example, when talking to your child about go and go competitions, you can ask your child,

    "what do you think is the most interesting thing about go?"

    "what kind of people do you like to play go with?"

    "what are the similarities and differences between go and mathematics?"...




    2. When a child is emotional about winning or losing, don't always try to distract him, or always say "it doesn't matter if you fail, try next time."

    You should keep a calm attitude, help your children express these emotions, and let them gradually learn to manage them.




    Children in can't accept losing will naturally have strong emotions after failure, and if parents teach their children to avoid these emotions at this time from an early age, they will not be able to learn to cope with them.

    Emotion, like reason, is a way for us to deal with the information of our surroundings.

    The task of emotions is to tell us what happened, so we can't "destroy" emotions by turning a blind eye or avoiding them.

    What we need to do is to learn to manage the "emotional message".

    To this end, we must first be familiar with emotions and understand emotions.




    Children need to be familiar with and understand the excitement and happiness brought about by success and the frustration, disappointment, helplessness, but sadness brought about by failure.

    The way parents can help their children familiarize themselves with and understand these emotions is calmly discussed these emotions with their children.

    For example, parents can say, "it's disappointing / frustrating to lose the game."

    Of course, this is not easy to do; parents can read some excellent EQ training and parent-child communication books.




    3. Help children find their own advantages. 




    "Using advantages to drive disadvantages" is a principle in education.




    A truly confident person can objectively recognize and accept his own strengths and weaknesses.

    Suppose parents always look for their shortcomings (or always let their children make up for their shortcomings) when their children can't know themselves objectively. In that case, they will often make their children think that "I am useless" will make it difficult for them to accept failure.




    On the other hand, it is much easier for parents to help their children find their advantages, and it is much easier for their children to gain confidence in their advantages to improve their disadvantages.

    In particular, I would like to say one thing: let children learn to help others.

    Helping others can make children feel that "I am useful, valuable and dignified to others."

    This can be a psychological advantage for children!




    4. Help the child adjust the attribution tendency.




    The attribution theory in psychology holds that "people will always explain their behavior and find the reason."

    The attribution tendency of people to their own behavior is the critical factor of self-evaluation.




    For example, what is the reason why the child lost the go game?

    Some children may think, "it's because I can't learn well, because I'm stupid."

    While some kids will think, "it's because I'm not in good shape in this game, because I don't work hard enough, because I've been careless in a few moves."

    Such different attributions have different effects on "how children treat winning or losing and how they view themselves."

    The self-evaluation caused by the latter attribution is higher than that caused by the former attribution.




    To help children adjust their attribution tendency, parents need to pay attention to "whether children like to blame their own personality and ability for failure."

    For example, "I'm so stupid. I always forget my keys."

    This attribution tendency is to think that "there is nothing I can do about this behavior. I have proved my incompetence, and I will continue to do so in the future and cannot be changed."

    This kind of attribution is a bad example for children.

    But, if his parents taught him about the same thing, "I didn't take the key this time because I wasn't paying attention. Next time I have to figure out in advance what I need to take before I leave, then I won't forget it."




    Besides, for children that can't accept losing, it is necessary to help him pay attention to the rationality of his own attribution and find practical examples to show him that "it is unreasonable to attribute failure entirely to his own ability."

    Of course, this should after the child has accepted his own emotions, otherwise, the child will not accept it because he is in a violent mood.




    5. Increase a child's self-complexity.




    The so-called "self-complexity" is that everyone thinks "how many identities and characteristics I have".

    If a person thinks that the more identities they have and the more characteristics they have, the higher their self-complexity will be.




    A child can say: I am a student, I can play Go, I am a son, I am a brother, I am a good friend of xx, I am the third place in the sprint of the Games, I like listening to xx music, I can make scrambled eggs with tomatoes…

    If more projects show his characteristics, the higher his self-complexity will be!




    A child with high self-complexity has more pillars to support himself.

    In that case, the damage to self-worth caused by the collapse of "one of the many pillars" is much less than that in which "only a limited number of pillars supports himself".

    Therefore, if children put too much self-worth on a pillar, it is easy to can't accept losing.




    Therefore, parents usually have to enrich their children's life content. So that their children, in addition to learning, homework, extra-curricular classes, and other social opportunities, develop their self-development, which is also good for their children's self-evaluation.

    UTC 2020-08-12 10:55 PM 0 Comments

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