Behaviour is how we conduct ourselves. It is our actions, reactions and functioning in response to everyday environments and situations. Challenging behaviour is used to describe behaviour that interferes with a child’s daily life. Managing any child’s behaviour is essential in maintaining order and routine/structure in the lives of busy families. It also helps to set children up for success.
It is important to be aware that behavioural difficulties can often be caused due to difficulties/delays in other areas including: sensory processing, understanding language, being abele to self regulate, social skills and planning skills.
Behaviour includes:
Sensory processing: being able to accurately process sensory stimulation in the environment as well as in one’s own body.
Self regulation: being able to understand, maintain and change emotion, behaviour, attention and activity level appropriate for a task or situation presented to them.
Emotional Development/regulation: is the ability to understand another person’s emotion, take it on board and regulate your own emotional response
Impacts:
Behaviour can impact a child’s life in many different ways:
Health and or quality of life: Challenging behaviour may seriously affect a child and parent/carers health and quality of life. They may not be able to take part in certain tasks/activities. Miss out on family occasions, days out, social clubs/groups.
Reduce risk: Some risks associated with challenging behaviour include self-harming (this can include eating or inhaling foreign objects, hitting their head or throwing their body on the floor) which can result in serious injuries. Accidental injury can also be a common issue in children with aggressive behaviour, not only for them, but anyone involved in their care or in close contact.
Dietary needs: refusal to eat certain foods or eat too much of a particular food which may result in dietary deficiencies, weight loss or gross obesity.
Social isolation: Challenging behaviour can often lead to social isolation. Children may be frightened to make friends through fear of being hurt themselves
School transition: social isolations is likely to impact on their sense of well being and transition to school.
Reduce mental health issues: Research also suggests that lack of social skills can lead to loneliness and depression from an early age.
Maturity: How a person behaves is a direct reflection on their maturity.