S3 E12 Dr. Larry Waldman on Discipline, Behavior, and Communication

This is the 100% Dad Podcast with your host Townsend Russell. On this episode, we have Dr. Larry Waldman, PhD, retired psychologist, but like most successful retired men, not actually quite retired and still active. On this episode, we're going to talk primarily two things. That is going to be discipline, better ways to discipline, and we're going to talk Dr. Larry's experience in the Arizona family court system and how he saw dads being treated. And with no further ado, this is the 100 Dad Podcast.

100 Dad Podcast with Townsend Russell. Uh, we have the top psychologist in Phoenix, Dr. Larry Waldman, uh, coming to us from, well, normally Arizona, but right now Long Beach, California, soon to be Arizona again. Tell us a little bit about yourself.

Well, I'm actually semi-retired, no longer in private practice actively. I, I had a very active, diverse clinical and forensic psychological practice in Phoenix, Arizona for actually 47 years, if you will. Retired from practice, as I said, end of '15. I, I'm still involved. I write, I speak, I teach, and I guest on podcasts and, and things like that.

Fun. So, uh, so the topic of today's podcast can be mostly discipline in relation to You know, dads and families. Uh, I'm a little curious just because you said forensic, uh, what exactly forensic psychology is.

Uh, well, forensic psychology is basically, uh, legal psychology, uh, you know, in the, uh, in the legal world. So, uh, I did a lot of work in the family law arena. Uh, I probably conducted over, uh, I'll say close to 100 family studies, you know, where the judge appointed me to evaluate a family that was going through a contested divorce and advise the judge what would be in the best interests of the children. That led to parenting coordinating where a now divorced couple was having difficulty in negotiating their divorce and the visitation schedule and things of that nature and other things. Should the kid get a driver's license? Should they be enrolled in the special education program? All things that parents have to agree on and so forth. And sometimes they— it would be so contentious it would go into court. And again, the judges knew me well and said, look, let Waldman take a look at this and give us some ideas. I was also involved in other legal arenas like estate planning attorneys, immigration attorneys, personal injury attorneys. And so on. So I was in court a great deal.

Can we tangent off on the family court segment of this? Um, because that's, that's an area that's pretty hotly talked about, um, as far as maybe not being— nah, definitely not being as fair to fathers as moms, where it kind of is— it's almost a situation where a dad, a good dad, has to fight really hard to gain something like 50/50 custody to where a maybe not so great mom is automatically given 100% custody. I know there's lots of variables there, but I'm just kind of curious as to what you have seen in that, uh, any improvements we could make to our, um, our legal structure and those kind of things. Because obviously 100% Dad really feels strongly that, that dad's role is important and that taking dads away from the families or taking families away from the dads is not a good thing long term. I think there's a lot of studies that back that up. Uh, well, we also don't want— I don't think it's one or the other. I don't think moms should be completely ignored. I think there needs to be a balance, and a divorce is not a fun thing or necessarily even a good thing, but it is a reality to deal with. So how, I guess, how do you see best, uh, for a divorce scenario to go, a custody scenario to go, and what, I guess, what have you seen in the actual courtroom drama that's keeping dads held back?

Back.

Uh, I just threw a lot of questions at you.

That's okay. Um, well, there's no question, uh, when I started out in, uh, in the family law arena in the late '90s, that, that, yeah, it, it was almost given, you know, in, in almost any divorce situation that, that moms you know, we're going to get the lion's share of the custody and so on. I certainly, at least in my limited experience and, you know, in the Maricopa County arena, you know, where Phoenix is located and in the courts in which I served, that was brought back.— it wasn't automatic anymore that, you know, that mom have legal custody and decision-making authority and so on, and dad gets to see the kids, you know, every other weekend. That wasn't rubber-stamped in the courts any longer, at least during my late tenure there. What I think, of course, is ideal is Let's face it, it'd be nice if the divorce rate wasn't the astronomical problem it is. In our country, the divorce rate hovers even to this day around 50%. Just about 50% of marriages fail, and the majority of them within the first 5 years. As a matter of fact. So that's a serious problem. I mean, no question. It's something that I talk about a lot, how to make marriages work. And I probably saw in my time better than 1,000 couples. And I'm not going to say I saved everyone, no, but I think I saved my share. And, you know, helping couples learn, you know, to manage their, their relationship and so forth is important. But back to your specific point, uh, if divorce has to occur, uh, then the ideal situation is, is that, you know, the children— the child or children have essentially equal access to both parents, and both parents are committed to the mental health of their children, which means that there is no open fighting with the other parent, that the arguing or discussions are constructive and designed to make it fair to all concerned. There's no outward acrimony, if you will. The— and here's the other thing, particularly now as, as a senior myself that I'm faced with, is that the grandparents are welcome from both sides and involved. I, I've seen too many cases where there is an ugly divorce. In fact, all divorces frankly are ugly, but some are more ugly than others. And not only does dad now have limited access to his kids, his parents are completely out of the picture. And I've, in fact, I've been to court on a couple of cases. Word got out that, hey, Dr. Waltman is in favor of grandparents' rights. Well, to be honest, I wasn't really that aware of grandparents' rights until I became one. Now, fortunately, both my sons have married great women and, uh, and so on, and those relationships are, are solid. Uh, but my wife and I have talked, and it's like, oh my God, you know, Could you imagine, as close as we are to our grandkids— we have 3, 1 with my oldest and 2 with my youngest— if God forbid something were to happen and we would lose our contact? I mean, we are in touch with our, our grandkids regularly through, through FaceTime and so forth. And in fact, the reason we're in Long Beach is my oldest grandson, in fact who turns 7 in about a week, is nearby. Plus we have grand twins, 3 and a half, who live up in Portland, Oregon, and we're there every 2 months and again read stories to them and so forth on a regular basis during the week. So all of a sudden that was cut out. I mean, that, that would be a huge loss. So It can work if people realize that it's not just about them anymore. If you've decided to have kids, then your kids deserve to have access to both their parents and their grandparents.

Would you see any complications to kind of— if most family law courts or all family law courts started with that baseline of we're going to do a 50/50 custody split unless someone is arguing otherwise, that the other parent is unfit or something like that?

Well, uh, when we— when I was involved, again, I'm speaking up till, you know, uh, early, you know, the beginning of 2016, but I don't think it's changed. That was the standard, that the court— the court would go— the court was going to— the judge was going to settle the, the de facto settlement was, uh, uh, 50/50 custody and visitation unless the data showed otherwise. Um, and, and we were instructed as, uh, as custody evaluators, you know, that that was our earmark as well. We start with that. And so on. And then of course do the evaluation. And now if the data, you know, suggests otherwise, well then we make that recommendation. A lot of the time, maybe even much of the time, that's appropriate. Sometimes it's not, frankly.

Oh no, I agree with that. There's weird scenarios out there. The more, the more I talk to the fathers out there and people reach out to me, the more I realize, man, there's, there's a whole world out there outside of what I knew existed. And, uh, not all of it's good.

Sure. No, that's right. Well, and it's on both sides. I mean, there's, there's, I mean, I mean, I, one of the late, remember one of the latest cases I, I had, I mean, I'm I remember, I can't remember all the 100 that I did, but not to mention again the 1,000 couples I actually worked with, but I remember this case fairly vividly is that, you know, the marriage was kind of tenuous and so on, but Dad was an involved dad, spent lots of time with, I think it was about a 7-year-old boy and so forth. And such. And in fact, mom went on a girls' trip for about 4 or 5 days, you know, leaving the child, of course, just with dad and so forth. And she came home, and apparently part of that girls' trip was to get support from a couple of other girlfriends and so forth. And she comes home and announces that She's decided she's filing for divorce. And about a week later or so, she'd actually been in touch with the divorce— week later with divorce attorney. Week later, father gets a legal notice that divorce has been filed and mother is asking for father have limited supervised visitation. And so the case got, you know, thrown to me, and I— and of course, I, uh, I'm interviewing the mom, and I'm saying, now let me see if I have this straight. Uh, your dad was very involved with the children. As a matter of fact, I've already spoken with the teacher many times. He was the one that had come to the parenting parent-teacher conference, not mom. I even checked with the pediatrician. I mean, again, I've been doing this a long time, and I had, I had a court order, so I, I could get all that information. And dad took the child as many times to the pediatrician as did mom, maybe even a little more. And so dad took the kid to soccer, in fact was assistant soccer coach, etc., etc. And so forth. I said, and then I said, I, I, I've been told that, you know, just prior to the time you mentioned you wanted a divorce to Dad, that, that actually Dad had the child to himself for about 5, 6 days. Is that so? Well, yes, that's, that's true. And she knew I knew it, so she couldn't lie. She said, yes, that's true. I said, well, then explain to me if it was proper for Dad to have the child come completely by himself for 6 days and so on, why is it that since you filed for divorce, you believe Dad needs supervised visitation? If he was that dangerous to the child and requires supervised visitation, why would you allow him to have 6 days unsupervised sole contact with him? To me, that doesn't, that doesn't make sense. Well, and so what— unfortunately what happened, she happened to find one of those bulldog attorneys, you know, who goes all out, all for their, their client, and the heck with the kids, uh, and so on. And unfortunately there are attorneys like that, that they look at divorce like a, you know, like a game, and someone has to win and someone has to lose.

I was just about to say that, where it's a winner-take-all.

Exactly. Now, as a matter of fact, uh, my last book, uh, that I, that I wrote, uh, and I finished it during, uh, COVID, is entitled Love Your Child More Than You Hate Your Ex, uh, What Every Divorced Parent Needs to Know. And in the process of doing that, I came upon this organization called the International Association of Collaborative International Council of Practice, IACP. And they have— this is a large international group that has offices made up of attorneys, mental health providers, forensic accountants, and so on that believe in collaborative divorce as opposed to divorce the way we're doing it, unfortunately, most of the time in courts. In an adversarial way. I believe that the adversarial process works pretty well, fairly well, with respect to criminal cases. I think it sucks, frankly, with respect to family law. You know, we're not trying to find guilt or innocence here. It's not an all-or-none proposition. Here. And so there are a number of collaborative divorce offices in just about every major city in the country.

And I assume that's stemming from— which I 100% agree with that, that's a great way to phrase it— but I assume because we're getting divorced, this wasn't, this wasn't us sitting down and saying, hey, you know, our life is going in different paths, maybe we should pursue going different directions and figuring out how to work this out. Because in that scenario, they're probably working on their marriage and trying to make this work together. There's probably somebody had an affair, somebody lost trust somehow, or they're just— they've gone so long without working on their marriage that they've become almost vicious to each other in the marriage, constantly criticizing, no longer any positive reinforcement or affirmment, withholding relations, things like that., and to where it's getting to the point of hatred, and now it's, it's, I have to stick it to the other person. I want to cause them pain, uh, and really make them suffer for what they did to me.

Yes, unfortunately, that, that's, uh, that's very true, uh, very often true. Uh, you know, I used to say to people all the time, look, you know, divorce, divorce is simply a, you know, a a legal process of breaking a contract. It's like you were in business with someone, uh, and you break a contract. That's it. You know, you were breaking a contract. Happens to be a matrimonial contract, but you're breaking the contract. You're not seeking revenge. You're not suing the other person. You know, you know, we're not— we're just— we're we're just breaking the contract.

Well, I, I mean, in a sense you kind of are. If mom's really going after dad for, you know, some serious, um, what do you call that, alimony and child support, then it almost is like suing the other person. I'm, I'm trying to legally use a method to, to take money from you.

Well, again, yes, and it depends on the situation. Yeah, I had lots of situations, you know, where yes, dad, you know, dad was the workhorse, if you will, but mom supported him while he was even in grad school. Maybe she waited tables and so forth. And then they had some kids and then she stayed home and so forth, maybe worked part-time, whatever. Certainly she deserves the fruits of her labors if they're going to have a divorce. I mean, it would certainly isn't fair, although sometimes we saw that where where mom supported dad, he gets his final degree, becomes an attorney, a doctor, or whatever, and so forth. And then he runs off with his secretary or his nurse, you know, and they're living in a mansion, and mom's supposed to live in a one-bedroom apartment, you know, with the two kids. No, no, that, that's not fair. And that's certainly not in the best interest of the children either.

Sure, but different scenario from a working dad and a working mom, and now dad's having these massive payments to make and he's barely able to provide an okay life for himself.

And the same is true there. It works the opposite way as well, of course. Yeah.

So what, uh, what have you seen? Uh, and it sounds like Arizona kind of, I guess, had figured this out a little bit, but what kind of mistakes were fathers making during that divorce process that were essentially penalizing maybe some pretty decent, good fathers from being more involved with their kids? Or I guess, you know, quote unquote, losing that situation.

Well, a lot of people basically thought they could do it on their own. You know, like it's too expensive to hire an attorney.

Um, so not being represented.

Yeah, not being represented, stupid. Now again, you know, choose your, you know, your representative wisely. You know, you're not looking for a bulldog, as we keep talking about, who's gonna— but you're looking for someone who's reasonable, uh, and, and has the, you know, has the kids. You know, if they don't mention kids you know, in the first few minutes of your conversation, then find somebody else. You know, if they're talking about, oh, we're gonna teach her a lesson, no, no, that's not what you want. This is not a war, you know, this is a negotiation, if you will. And so, so yeah, not being represented and so forth, and frankly, um, not asking sometimes if things are are really acrimonious and, and you— we— and the attorneys can't seem to work something out reasonable between them, to ask for a custody study, a family study. Yes, that's a little— that's more money, but frankly, compared to the what it's going to cost for the attorney, a family study is, is a pittance. My average custody family study or rent was maybe $5,000, $7,500, or something like that. You know, you're paying $20,000, $25,000 to your attorney. Why not have a professional, a neutral professional, examine, evaluate the entire situation, and, and give the judge or the court a well-founded, appropriate recommendation recommendation as to what's best for the children. Or as I was just saying before, uh, you contact a collaborative group, the two of them, um, and where each get— they each get their own attorney but within the same office, uh, and so on. So the two attorneys are representing their clients' needs, but at the same time are very much aware that it's a combination of things. It's not just what the client wants per se, but also what are— what is best for the kids.

I did not know— I didn't know that was possible. I figured that would be some sort of conflict of interest.

No, no, it's the way that it's done.

Interesting.

Yeah, it really isn't— it is an interesting process.

So I've never— I've never really looked into the cost of the family studies, uh, and even the cost of hiring an attorney before. But man, yeah, if you're— I mean, there's a lot of, like I said, the dads that are out there that are struggling, you know, that $25,000 check and then a $7,500 check on top, so talking $30,000 plus. Uh, I could see why a lot of dads are trying to do it themselves and then not winning.

Well, pay me now or pay me later, because you know what happens, you know, If you go into court alone and the other side's got an attorney, you might as well just lay your wallet on the table, because the judge isn't going to— you know, frankly, to the judge, that's an extra effort and pain that he or she has to deal with because they got to explain— he or she has to explain things to you and so on. You're going in with one one hand tied behind your back. Yeah, you just are. And, and what's going to ultimately happen is you're, you're going to, uh, end up most likely, 9 times out of 10, you know, paying probably more than you should have, probably get less, uh, less access and, and less ability to make decisions, uh, and so forth. So Like I said, pay me now or pay me later.

So what— because I've always wondered this, I, I don't understand what's going on with the judges, and I assume their dockets are overloaded and there's aspects like that, but you hear so many stories about good dads being completely cut out or getting shafted, uh, and maybe it's because they didn't hire an attorney, but isn't— I would think there'd be a human element to the judge of like, do we really want to let this, this legal mind just kind of beat up on this guy that's doesn't have a legal assistant to him?

Well, you know, again, it's not a matter of what's fair. It's just that, you know, the attorney who has done this, uh, you know, I mean, it's like anything. I mean, you, any kind of— I mean, it's kind of a negotiation, you know, and so forth. I mean, uh, you know, if If you go into a negotiation, it's like buying a car. You know, if you know nothing about the car at all, you're just going in and so on, you know, and you're dealing with this sharp car dealer who sold 1,000 cars and knows— I mean, you're at a disadvantage. They can tell you anything or say anything and so on.

I get it because it's kind of like a debate, I guess, into where how you craft that argument and how you craft your counterargument. You can use facts to paint a very pretty picture or a very nasty picture. And if you don't have that skill, if you don't have that practice, it's— yeah, I, I could see how it's how you frame that argument to the judge, and he just starts to look at you as not as good of a father when, you know, we're just not presenting, presenting a good picture to him, and the other side's kind of crushing you. They're not lying necessarily. It's just we're not looking at the full picture from a complete view, just that one side. I think I just— that explanation seemed more murkier than I meant it to be.

Yeah, well, but, but it's true. I mean, that, you know, the attorneys do the research. If— well, that's if they do. I mean, I can tell you, I mean, I, you know, I I've been in court, uh, you know, prepared to testify, uh, on my family study, uh, report which I've submitted to the court, which could be anywhere from 30 to 50 pages and so forth. And I'm looking across, sitting outside waiting to be called in, and I'm looking outside and I'm seeing one of the parents' attorneys reading the stuff and, uh, online, uh, underlining it like, like this is the first time he's seen it. Now he's had it for a couple of weeks, but you know, it's like he's so busy, he's doing, he's doing his work right now while he's waiting, you know, to be, you know, while we're waiting to enter the courtroom and so forth. And of course the questions he asks are, you know, clearly he doesn't really fully understand the case and so forth. Meanwhile, he's charging $400 an hour while he's probably pouring dollars right there while he's reading it for the first time. And I'm thinking, gee, I don't know who he represents because I don't know who the attorneys are. I know what they are, but I'm, you know, so on. Uh, I haven't met them face to face— well, sometimes, of course, uh, from previous cases. And I'm thinking, well, whoever, you know, this parent is going to get screwed here because this attorney, you know, hasn't done his homework. He's doing his— he's doing his work court, right, right, you know, in the, in the court waiting room, right?

Okay, um, so, Sean, we, we tangent it off on that, but, uh, I think the original topic was intended to be discipline, uh, you know, how dads and moms can— I guess what's good, what's not bad, and, you know, kind of some modern takes on that. Uh, my theory has always been, at least the advice that I put out, is do what works. You know, we're talking about behavior correction and discipline, not punishing. Punishment can be used but not just punishment, not trying to cause pain. We're trying to cause behavior correction. You know, on hot topics like spanking, you know, I'm not saying everyone has to be spanked. I'm not saying you shouldn't spank. I'm saying if it works, that's fine! I think there should be, you know, some rules and guidelines. It shouldn't be a beating. Um, but I do think we shifted really hard from spanking used to be the norm to now it's child abuse to now to then it became almost you don't punish your kid at all anymore, it's almost free-range parenting, um, to now starting to come back to the proper mixture of it can be used as a tool if it's done right. Again, not a beating, but, you know, as a method to behavior correction. That was just a vomit of, of words, kind of some, some of the content. It's obviously You can go a lot of different directions in the discipline discussion, but, uh, have you done— you mentioned a book. Have you done any books on discipline or writings like that?

Of course, yes. Um, my first book I ever, I ever wrote back in the mid-'80s, and it was revised I think in 2007, uh, is entitled The Graduate Course— excuse me, uh, that's— it's entitled Who's Raising Whom? A Parent's Guide to Effective Child Discipline. Shortly after that, a couple years later, I wrote Coping with Your Adolescent, which is a follow-up to that. I like to say when I do my parenting workshops that if you haven't read Who's Raising Whom, you're certainly going to need to read Coping with Your Adolescent. Now, I agree and disagree with your, your previous statement. What I agree with is that yes, I do believe parents today are lacking in discipline. I'll grant you that. In fact, I, if you, if you go on my website, which is topphoenixpsychologist.com, the latest article in there that I wrote is entitled entitled, you know, Addressing Inappropriate Behavior: A Paradigm Shift. And in it, I note, just as you suggested, that parents are not fully addressing inappropriate behavior. On the other hand, no, I disagree. With any physical kind of discipline. If you start doing it right early on, it isn't— it just isn't necessary. Besides which, I don't like the message it sends, you know, that might makes right. That's not something we want to teach our children. Kids. I raised two sons who, you know, and I think— I know, you know, I try to be honest, and I did it well. One is a litigation attorney here in Southern California, well married, and a soon-to-be 7-year-old boy. And a good dad, a great dad. My younger son is a psychologist, special ed director in the Portland, Oregon area. Also a great husband, a great dad, and they have 3-and-a-half-year-old twins. I'll swear on a stack of Bibles I never struck either of my kids didn't have to because I don't agree with it. As I said, I think it's not think, I know it sends the wrong message. This, of course, you know, we could talk about for a long time, but there's some, I think, some basic principles that are critical here. And that is, you know, what parents need to focus on when we talk about discipline is not the bad behavior, but the good. And that's where, that's where, you know, I think we often are mistaken. I see so many parents operating according to what I call the sleeping dog parenting philosophy. And that is just like if the dog is sleeping, you leave it alone. When the kid is behaving appropriately, you leave it alone, leave them alone. No. Okay. Because what does any— and I'm talking primarily young children, 10 and under, particularly the first 5 years, absolutely. And even, even to a large degree from 5 to preadolescence, it does change after that. That's why my second book, came out. What kids want more than anything else in the world is parental attention. They want their parents' time and attention. And of course, that's stamped in from day one. You know, what happens? The kid leaves, you know, put, you know, makes a squawk, and next thing you know, you know, they're being fed. Okay, so, you know, that gets stamped in real early. You know, I want and need this parental attention.

So it's like when you give a dog a treat for doing something good. When you get excited for your baby or your child doing something good and your voice kind of gets to that higher pitch and you have that excitement in your tone, that they enjoy that, crave that, and want to earn that again.

Absolutely. Okay. Simple as that. Yes. So, but the question becomes, this has been well researched, when do most parents attend to their kids?

Day in and day out.

When they do something wrong. Yeah, when they've done something wrong. So the kids are playing quietly, or maybe they're playing a board game or something, and you, you know, you peek in and they're doing fine. You go, oh, that's nice, and you go back to whatever it is you're doing. 5 minutes later, you now hear some, oh, it's not fair, or whatever. And what do we do?

Go to it.

We rush in. Okay, so what's the message? What do the kids learn? You know, if I'm playing appropriately and so on, yeah, that's fine, but there's certainly no parental attention. But as soon as we make a squawk or so forth, in they come. And that really is the key. That's the paradigm shift that I talk about. And I've counseled, oh my gosh, hundreds, thousands of parents, either as a couple or as in parenting groups I used to do, again, based on my my books, uh, and so on, uh, is, is, is we need to focus on what's going well. As I like to say, you know, you know, my two sons, you know, manipulated me all, all through their childhood. They did. Okay, that's true. They behaved well and they got my attention. Yeah, yeah. You know, so that's how that worked. And, and my kids learned early on, not— of course, they hadn't read any books, they didn't know that Dad was playing mind games or whatever, call it what you will. All they knew is, I like Dad's attention. You know, he's a fun guy, we do fun things when, you know, you know, he's good fun to be with, etc., etc. When I'm not behaving well, he's not so much fun. You know, it's like or I'm not there, you know. And so they realized, well, wait a minute, I get all kinds of attention and praise and we do fun things when I behave according to the rules, the things I know I need to do. On the other hand, when I mess up or whatever, he's not there or he's not looking at me. Or maybe I'm just giving him a, you know, a cross-eyed look and they go, well, that's not the dad I like. I like the dad, you know, that is warm and accepting and praiseworthy and so forth. And so that's, that's kind of how it should work.

So are you, are you saying at some level, a lot of kids doing something wrong is like some sort of ingrained, deep cry for attention?

Remember, kids are naive. What do they know? All they know is what they've lived.

Sure. I guess what I'm asking is, is that like a conscious, I know that this, this craves attention, or is that more just like an instinct? The brain wants that, that feel-good chemical to release, and this is just— it creates that action because it knows it'll get that, but it's not really a conscious thing?

Yeah, it is conscious. It's okay. They, you know, they've learned, and it becomes, like so many things that we learn, it almost becomes automatic. And, you know, in fact, I, in my book, again, I refer to it as the negative attention cycle that both the child and the parent get locked into. And that is, over time, and this can happen by age 2 or 3 with the child, of course, You know, both, both parties, the child and the parent, pretty much expect that the only time we're going to interact, by and large, is following the child's misbehavior.

Hmm.

And think about it. I mean, think about it. You know, you're 2, 3, all right? You don't know any better. But you're a child, okay? You want some recognition. Some attention. Now parents say, but yeah, but it's negative, it's bad. Well, what do celebrities say? You know, bad attention is better than no attention at all. And that's the same thing with kids, but they don't even know it's bad attention. It's attention as far as they're concerned, and that's what we've agreed previously is what they all want. Would it—

so would it be fair to say it's not It's not positive reinforcement, it's positive attention. And to make a distinction between the two?

No, I call it— well, I think we're saying the same thing. Reinforcement is the technical term, if you will. Okay. And since you brought it up, yes, reinforcement is the provision of— well, here's the technical definition of reinforcement according to behavioral theory, behavioral psychological theory. Positive reinforcement is the application of something positive that increases the likelihood of an appropriate behavior.

Okay.

Okay. It could be a smile, a touch, offering, let's, let's play a game, or giving up, giving of your time and attention. Okay. Now, since again, we talked about it, we can even hone that a little better. Okay. A lot of parents think they're being, you know, using positive reinforcement when they say things like, way to go, nice job.

So that's kind of where I was going with that, whereas I was thinking positive reinforcement maybe using that word as like, hey, you did good there, and then moving on, versus positive attention where we, we create some more excitement about that and spend more time in that moment, uh, being the positive attention.

It could be either.

Okay.

It's usually a combination of things. But your last phrase, which was something like— what'd you say? That was good, good doing, or you— I forgot what you said exactly.

You did good.

You did good. Okay, all right. We need to refine that a little bit, okay? Because there's some real power in positive reinforcement, okay? Why do we reinforce a child? Why do we give them a 10? I mean, we give them because we love them and they're our kids. But technically, why would we reinforce a child? What's our objective?

Rewarding that behavior because we want it to happen again.

Yes, absolutely. Okay, now when you say, hey, you did good there, and I'm 2 and a half, okay, I'm going, hmm, Daddy liked something, but I don't know what the hell that is. Okay, and, and so you see, when When I reinforced my kids, okay, if they were playing checkers quietly and so forth and so on, I would come in and say, "Hey guys, I really like the way you're playing so quietly and cooperatively here. You know, if you continue to do this like this, I'm gonna go finish my chore in the kitchen, come back in 15 minutes, and we're gonna go to the park." So now they go, well, okay, by playing cooperatively and quietly, we now get to go to the park. Not to mention we just got some good dad's attention, you know. You know, like, like, like, for example, you know, as they're sitting there at the dinner table, you could say, um, Mom, I— look how, uh, look how the kids are. Aren't we happy? Good job, guys. Okay, now you're 5 and 6. You've been told good job for eating, you know, for, you know, sitting at the dinner table. How are they supposed to repeat it? What are they supposed to do? The way I reinforce them is, Josh, I really like the way that you hold your fork just the way we showed you, and you ask for the potatoes to be passed instead of standing up and grabbing them. We like that, that politeness. Good.

So really spelling it out helps create, create the connection for them.

Absolutely. Now they know specifically, absolutely, what they need to do to get your attention.

And I would, I would assume consistency and repetition are important factors as well.

That's parenting. Absolutely. Yes. So after a while, they're very clear. Now, what— here's an interesting thing. I've interviewed in my career, without exaggeration, 5,000 kids, right, over almost 50 years. Remember, I was a school psychologist first. So in that total career, that's really no exaggeration. I used to do a little interview, depending on the age of the kid, of course. And I used to say, "What are the things that you can do to make Mommy and Daddy happy?" And I get things like, "Well, be good, be nice, listen." Okay, broad, general kinds of things. And then I'd say, now, what can you do sometimes to make mommy or daddy angry? Oh, and they start listing. I can knock on the door when they're sleeping in the morning. I can tease, I can hurt my sister and make her cry. I can— okay, so the kids are, you know, parents tend to articulate pretty well what they don't like, and we become vague and amorphous about what we would prefer. And, and so this, this, this paradigm shift about looking for the good in your kid's behavior and then responding to it appropriately by reinforcing it specifically— and here's another one— immediately Okay, you know, to tell a child, again, a 4 or 5, like, oh, you know, you know, you're on Thursday, you know, you keep doing, you keep doing this behavior, come Saturday we're gonna go to the park. That's like telling adults, you know, if you save your money for, you know, you know, with every paycheck, you know, when you retire, you know, you'll be able to retire gracefully. Is that true? Yeah. How many people do it? 10%, you know? No. If— here's another example that I cite again in my book. If an overweight person at dinner decided to have a piece of chicken breast with a little spinach salad and wash down with some, you know, with some sparkling water, finishes their meal, and then goes into the bathroom and steps on the scale and notices the scale clicks down 4 pounds. How difficult would it be for that person to continue to eat that way?

Not difficult.

Not difficult at all. Why?

It was immediate.

Exactly, because the reward was immediate. Unfortunately, as we all know, it doesn't work that way. You have to eat that way a long time before you see that damn scale click down. So if immediate reinforcement, you know, stymies adults in their goals, what do you think is going to happen with, with, excuse me, delayed reinforcement stymies adults in their goals? What's going to happen with the delayed reinforcement with our kids. And we do this all the time. You get good grades at the end of the semester, you know, we'll take a trip. Forget about it. The likelihood of the success of that is 5%. No. But, you know, if we see assignments done on time for maybe at the end of the week, we're We're talking about a preteen now and so forth. You know, we'll do something, come on the weekend. Well, all right, now we're getting closer, you know, or even better, when you finish your homework and we see that it's correct, you get to, you know, you get the opportunity to watch one of your special shows. Now you see what's happening. You know, now we're getting specific reinforcement to specific good behavior, and it's immediate.

It almost feels like there'd be, uh, it's almost like everyone has it right. It's just what they're doing on the negative side just needs to be applied to what they're doing on the positive side. If they can be that specific and that immediate and that, and pay that much attention to it and focus on it and just flip the direction and go from the negative things to the positive things, it's like they have the skill sets, is where they're applying it.

Okay, I hadn't thought of it that way, but yeah, okay. Yeah, because we are doing that.

Hey, listen, I was thinking of this as I go. You can tell me I'm wrong.

No, no, no, no, no, it is. I mean, yeah, we are specific and immediate when they're inappropriate, but we got to flip that. That's why I keep calling it the paradigm shift. And then at the same time, of course, see, so if you're doing this good job of reinforcement, you see the kid's appetite if you will, for this parental attention starts getting satisfied on this side, and there's less of a need to misbehave. Plus, of course, what, what's happening when they misbehave, you know, is, is again things like, you know, uh, well, one of my— and I even referred to it earlier, you know, is, is, uh, what again behaviorists refer to as extinction. And that is not responding to that inappropriate behavior. Once again, in my book, I talk about this little experiment I tell parents all the time to try. And I just say this. The next time you start hear— you hear your kids starting to squabble, okay, instead of putting on your referee shirt and getting a whistle and trying to break them up and so forth, like we always do, just adjourn yourself to your room, leave the door open, and sit on the edge of the bed and look at your watch. That's all. And you, and next week you tell me what happened. Well, again, I've done this 100 times, and what do they tell me? Well, within 30 seconds Guess where the kids are?

In their room.

In whose room?

The parents' room.

Yes, they're in the parents' room. So they're squabbling, okay? And the parents going— when I first say this, the person says, oh my God, there'll be blood on the floor. And so no, that isn't whatever happens. The kids bring the fight to mom or bring the dad. And so what has happened? What, what, what? Now the parents begins to realize, oh my God, my kids have learned that whenever they squabble, it's not up to them to resolve their conflict. We gotta like bring it to mom or dad. Well, is that what we want to teach our kids? Besides which, they also know it's an attention-getting mechanism. Okay, which again, you know, it's not. So, so extinction, which is, okay, you're misbehaving. Look, you know, no one's killing each other, you know, no one's, you know, you're not, uh, you know, cutting up the carpet, you know, and so forth. You're just misbehaving, all right? Or you said a bad word, you know, and so forth. I mean, how many times a kid says a bad And the kid goes, "Ooh, I don't know what that word means, but boy, it's pretty interesting." Come on, you know, you simply walk away.

So, so in that scenario you did, that experiment, uh, what was your counsel to the parents to resolve, I guess, after that? So we know they're coming for the attention and that that's the kind of the result if you ignore it. So what's step 2 beyond that?

Well, basically say, look, you guys need to learn how to settle your own stuff. I'm not a referee anymore.

Okay, so not playing the role of judge then either? Of, of—

okay. No, no, no, uh, no. And this, this not attention, you know, uh, this is— parents You know, again, but see, again, this only works if you're pushing the positive stuff. Okay, so if you're, if you're pushing the positive stuff, then the, which the kids are really grooving on, then when you pull your attention away, you see, now you have this push-pull effect. You're getting lots, you know, the child's getting lots of attention for behaving appropriately and little, hardly any attention for behaving inappropriately.

Okay.

And so that push-pull effect, you know, is— look, I could get a lot more specific, but we don't have the time.

Sure.

But, but that push-pull effect, you know, is the essence of effective behavior management.

Yes. And certainly you're doing that the individual and the group level if you have multiple kids.

Sure, of course.

Yeah. So, uh, before we end this, so a lot of good tips that seem like they help a lot in those early years. So what do we do when the parent's been maybe not having the best tactics, hasn't done that, and is now trying to take control, uh, for a teenager who is driving them crazy, who is disconnected, who whatever the scenario is, how do we, I guess, engage maybe for the first time or reengage with different tactics to a much older child?

Well, I don't want to sound cryptic, but the first thing I'd recommend is read my book, Coping with Your Adolescent. But you've got to start the communication. And there's a way that you can— you have to communicate differently with your teen than you would with a 5-year-old. You know, you can tell a 5-year-old, do this, and so forth. You know, a 15-year-old, no. You know, uh, you can say it, but forget it. Uh, you have to learn how to communicate. You know, it used to happen— if it didn't happen 100 times in my office, it didn't happen once. Your parents would bring in a teen who was acting out and so forth, and, and I'd say, say to them, I'd say, all right, you know, I'm going to spend the session with the child or with your son or whatever. And the mother would say, he's not going to talk to you. I'd say, well, all right. So, and so I bring him in and 45 minutes later I'm taking him out and the parent looks at me and goes, you were in there 45 minutes? I said, yeah. He talked to you? I said, yeah, we weren't just sitting there looking at each other. Really? How'd you do that? Well, you know, obviously there's some training and so forth, but you know, again, it doesn't take a PhD.

This is where we had a little bit of an issue with our hosting platform StreamYard. They, they had some servers fail and it kicked us both off. But to finish what Dr. Larry was saying in respect to communicating with your teen, most parents either lecture, they scold, or they note how disappointed they are in them. And it's no wonder teens frequently avoid communicating with their parents. Parents must ask open-ended questions and give the teen a chance to talk. Asking, "What do you think about whatever the situation is?" and responding with, "That's interesting, tell me more." Uh, "How did you make Or how did that make you feel? Those kind of things, those open-ended questions where it's not just yes or no, it's not just an answer, but kind of forces them to talk, that will perpetuate the conversation. The reason the kid in his office spoke with him for 45 minutes, which was a shock to the mom, is Dr. Larry was the first adult who asked that kid's opinion. He wanted his feelings. He made no judgments, uh, and he seemed truly invested in what he had to say. And counselors have been doing that for years, and parents should do this with their teens to generate meaningful discussions and maintain a healthy bond. So thank you very much to Dr. Larry, uh, check out his material. He's got a lot of stuff on his site. He's got a lot of books that I think would be absolutely wonderful for parents to read. Uh, definitely gave me a different perspective where I can certainly be incredibly critical of my own kids, and I try and be positive. I try and bring a lot of light to the situations, and I try not to hammer on them too much, but that is my natural personality. So it's great to have reminders like this of to reinforce the good things and starve out the negative. Uh, it's content like this that helps me become Badder Father as well. Thank you so much everyone for tuning in to the Season 3, Episode 11, I believe this is going to be. I really appreciate everyone who's subscribing. If you haven't subscribed, please subscribe. We are having lots of great conversations. We got a lot of good ones coming up. Uh, we are talking with real dads. We are talking with, uh, dads who have written books and who speak in certain segments of the world. I really look forward to hearing from them. I look forward to you guys hearing from them, because the more, the more we listen to, the more we take in, the more perspective we're going to gain from other fathers. And we can kind of live vicariously through other people's failures and through other people's successes. And that is so important as a father. Let's take in as much fathering advice and fathering perspective as we can, because then when we run into those kind situations, we are going to have a knowledge we wouldn't have had otherwise unless we had learned from a guy like Dr. Larry or any of our previous guests. This is Townsend Russell, your host of the 100% Dad podcast. See you next time. This is a 100% Dad production. Find our tour schedule on 100dad.com, 100dad.com. Find us on TikTok and Instagram at 100 Dad @100dad. Email Townsend Russell @100dad.com. Subscribe, subscribe, subscribe. I thank you so much.