Divorce is one of the most challenging situations a person can face. It is not an easy decision to leave a person who you have committed your life to. There must be good reasons for such a decision. These reasons are even more difficult for children in that relationship to understand. Some children may make the transition without much stress but others can suffer significantly. Depending on the child’s attachment style, they may be more or less susceptible to things such as separation anxiety during these troubling times. Through an empathetic understanding of how to apply certain cognitive models within an accessible social context, let us give children who carry the challenge of separation anxiety the tools to overcome it. To solve the problem of separation anxiety, we first have to understand how people develop attachments to their caregiver’s through specific styles developed in infancy.
Attachment Styles
First we have to have an understanding of attachment styles. Attachment is the quality of relation between two people relative to the longing for the other person. Attachment styles are initially developed between infant and caregiver and carry into adult relationships.
There are four primary types of attachment styles that were initially determined in the ‘Strange Situation’ study by Mary Ainsworth in 1967. In the study, the mother leaves the baby with a stranger and later in an empty room. The baby's response towards the mother's absence and return determined the first three attachment styles: secure, avoidant and ambivalent. The fourth attachment style was determined later in 1986 by Main and Solomon. (204-205 A Child’s World) The four attachment styles are:
Secure - the baby cries when the caregiver leaves and seeks closeness with the caregiver upon their return.
Avoidant - the baby rarely cries when the caregiver leaves and avoids contact when the caregiver returns.
Ambivalent - the baby displays anxiety when the caregiver leaves, becomes extremely upset while the caregiver is gone, and displays seeking and resisting closeness upon the caregiver’s return
Disorganized - the baby shows contradictory behaviours when the caregiver returns; brightly greeting mother upon return then turning away or approaching and not looking at her. Disorganized styles develop in babies whose mothers are insensitive, intrusive or abusive.
In the context of separation anxiety, we would be dealing with a child that has an ambivalent attachment style. To deal with this issue, there are several elements we can add to increase the child’s ability to feel secure when they are alone.
Object Permanence
The developmental psychologist, Jean Piaget (1896-1980), first discussed the concept of object permanence in reference to a child’s understanding that an object exists when it is not in sight. The phenomena of object permanence is also extended to the sense of security that a parent still exists when not in sight. Simple games, like ‘Peekaboo,’ display the phenomena of ‘out of sight of out mind’ where the child is astonished that a person can exist one moment, then completely not in another! The game loses its fun when the child develops the cognitive mechanisms allowing them to know the person still exists even though their face may be covered momentarily.
The perception that something we value is lost from our experience also occurs in the context of grieving. In life, learning to deal with the loss of loved ones or things we value is part of our maturation and development as persons. In the context of separation anxiety, there is the sense that the valued person or thing will not return, creating the anxious emotions. In all of these conditions, the representation of the valued person or thing in the mind is the only variable that the individual has control over. We do not have control over external things in the same way we do over the internal contents of our own minds.
If the person who is grieving or suffering separation anxiety can attribute their sense of security to the mental representation of the lost or absent person, then they will begin to have control over the anxious emotion being caused by the actual or perceived loss. The object may be out of sight, however the fact that I have been exposed to it gives me all the information needed to access the representational meaning in my own mind.
For the divorce case, the next step is teaching the child how to learn a sense of security even though their parents do not live together. Same as those grieving, we want to reinforce the influence of the representation of the person in the child's mind and not limit access to the meaning or security of the person to their actual physical presence.
Training Module 1: Object Permanence
Step 1: Practice closing eyes and visualizing happiest moments with mom and dad
Step 2: Visualize most upsetting moments without them
Step 3: Switch between them as to connect those schemas together and reduce the intensity of the anxiety state, bringing it back to neutral secure state
Goal: Teach the child that nothing has changed except for the content of their mind. Mom and dad still love the child. Only elements in the child's environment have changed and the power to feel good or anxious is entirely within the child's control. It all depends on the kinds of thoughts the child is having and the creation of certain emotions.
Self-Efficacy
A person’s ability to determine their success in completing a task within a specific situation is their level of self-efficacy. This concept was first discussed by psychologist Albert Bandura in 1982 where he defined self-efficacy as
“how well one can execute courses of action required to deal with prospective situations." (SEiHA 1982)
In the context of separation anxiety, the person has a lack of self-efficacy in regards to functioning and feeling secure without the person or object of value.
Back to our case of separation anxiety, we simply have to strengthen the person’s confidence and belief that they can meet the challenge of being physically distant from the object or person of value. Through a behavioural modification technique called shaping, developed by B.F. Skinner (1904-1990), the parents and child make successive approximations from the current state, extreme anxiety, towards the goal, feeling secure without the presence of parents. Taking baby steps from one’s current habits and state towards a desired goal, is a very effective method to create sophisticated ways of being that were previously unreachable.
The relevance of self-efficacy to separation anxiety is clearly stated by Kathy Kolbe in a 2009 journal,
"Belief in innate abilities means valuing one's particular set of cognitive strengths. It also involves determination and perseverance to overcome obstacles that would interfere with utilizing those innate abilities to achieve goals." (SERfECOPCS 2009)
The child is faced with an obstacle, separation anxiety, for which we want to embark a sense of mastery and control over.
Bandura identifies four main factors that influence self-efficacy that can be utilized in the shaping behavior modification technique:
Experience, or "Enactive Attainment" - The most powerful predictor is the individual's personal experiential mastery over the challenge of having successful trials in contrast to failures: they need to feel that it was them who did it.
Modeling, or "Vicarious Experience" - When a person observes another successfully completing a task, we can feel that we can also be successful in completing that task.
Social Persuasion - Directly communicating to another that they can be successful.
Physiological Factors - How a person interprets their internal states, like anxiety, will increase or decrease their confidence in completing the task. If the individual perceives anxiety as their body readying them for a challenge, in contrast to debilitating them, they will be more successful.
These four properties can be utilized to increase self-efficacy in the case of separation anxiety, drawing attention to the child’s mastery over small successes. Alluding to other people who have successfully dealt with anxiety or perceived loss of a valued object/person can show how it is possible to deal with. Being encouraging towards the person and promoting the belief in their success is essential. Lastly, helping the individual interpret their personal psychological states in an empowering way will only offer further strength in overcoming the challenge of separation anxiety.
Emotional Intelligence
An individual’s ability to accurately identify, label and discriminate between different emotions and guide oneself through negative emotions and use positive emotions in oneself and others is emotional intelligence. Daniel Goleman popularized the understanding of EI and applied it to the context of the workplace with his book ‘Emotional Intelligence’ (1995). When dealing with negative emotions, having an understanding of what causes their occurrence and how to navigate through them to a state of well-being can be achieved through the development of emotional intelligence.
In the context of our case of separation anxiety, becoming aware of the progressive intensity of anxiety and the specific triggers within one’s mind and environment can yield greater emotional control and stability. When one becomes aware that anxiety is building, they can then begin to address the emotions before they go beyond a threshold point of no return like an anxiety or panic attack.
Questions for self or other when experiencing unpleasant feelings:
What is the feeling I am experiencing right now?
What is the object, mental or physical, that is creating the onset of this feeling?
Is there anything within my control that I can do to regulate or change my experience of the feeling?
Is there some boundary or information I can communicate with another person that my feeling is indicating to me?
Is there some action I can take in my control that the emotion is directing me towards?
To begin asking these questions, we must first be aware that something in our experience has changed with our emotions. The self awareness necessary may not be prevalent for everyone unless they have taken time to develop it. Mindfulness meditation is a scientifically proven way to increase our self-awareness, the first step in emotional intelligence.
Mindfulness Meditation
Mindfulness meditation is the process of being aware of stimulus in one’s experience but not necessarily attaching oneself to that stimulus or excessively attending to it. The process itself is an exercise in increasing one’s self awareness by actively identifying elements in one’s experience and then allowing them to pass through our observational field. While in the state of meditation, we become encompassed with the state of observation itself and not the specific content of that observation.
Identifying with the state of observation and not the content is specifically useful in emotional control and stability, for we become aware of how specific elements in our experience make us feel but we do not become overly attached to those feelings. We are able to allow the feelings to pass through us like a cloud moving past the sun. The sun does not follow the cloud as it moves through the sky. As our emotions affect us, we can strengthen our ability to be mindful of them and not react to them. We develop the awareness to make conscious decisions on our lifestyle such that the emotions we desire will be produced automatically or navigate through unexpected states.
Mindfulness meditation has the effect of creating more emotional control and stability. As in the case of separation anxiety, if the child is able to start learning to meditate and apply mindfulness in their everyday experience, they will gain greater control over their emotional states. The meditative practice needs to be implemented into a habit through daily practice and mastered so that it can detect the increase of anxiety and be used in extreme situations of panic or anxiety attacks. Over time, the individual will gain control over their emotions and develop a sense of emotional stability.
Cognitive Modules
A module is a ‘set of standardized parts of independent units that can be used to construct a more complex structure.’ (dictionary.com) A cognitive module is a structure of mental processes, beliefs and habits that are used together to complete some cognitive task. The concept of cognitive module was first introduced by Jerry Fodor in his book ‘The Modularity of Mind’ (1993). The use of a cognitive module can include actions, habits and behaviours that are alongside cognitive processing, beliefs and philosophical perspectives. The simplicity and utility of the cognitive module address situational challenges or psychological problems that an individual may face.
Sometimes we are not equipped to deal with the challenges presented to us in our social environment or we have developed maladaptive psychological ways of dealing with the world. In these cases, we can change the way our brains have developed neurologically by creating a cognitive module that shifts the automatic, habitual processing towards a healthier way of being and lifestyle.
In the context of separation anxiety from divorce, there are many factors at play that affect the child’s negative experience. A cognitive module can be used as a learned response to counterbalance the problem of separation anxiety. An example of a cognitive module for the adobe case is:
Perspective/ Belief:
I am able to overcome and master any challenging situation
I am in control of my emotions
My parents not living together does not have to affect my wellbeing. I am my own person and my happiness comes from within.
Behaviours/ Habits:
Everyday I will practice my mindfulness meditation which will develop into a habit.
Actions:
When I feel my anxiety is increasing, I will stop what I am doing and meditate.
I will make small steps in mastering and developing a habit of being comfortable with this new situation.
Emotions and Thoughts:
If I feel upset that my parents are not home, I can remember that they do not need to be here for them to love me. I can remember/visualize all the positive experiences I have shared with them.
My feelings of anxiety are simply me being unfamiliar with this new situation. If I breathe and focus on my surroundings, I will realize that there is nothing actually wrong.
I will make an effort to understand my emotions and how they develop throughout the day.
Practicing these different elements together will create a sense of control and give the individual who is suffering from separation anxiety a method to deal with the problem. The next element is the social context we learn these elements in which can increase their influence and accelerate our learning.
Social Context
The social context that we are in has a significant impact on our ability to learn and integrate information. In the context of the separation anxiety case, finding a way that the child is able to see the training of the meditative practice and the new cognitive module is very important for it will make it easier to implement into their daily routine and apply on their own when necessary.
By making meditation and the application of the cognitive module part of the family narrative, it becomes socially reinforced by all the members of the family as a social norm. The goal is to teach the family in its entirety the procedure such that it becomes a cultural tradition or norm of the group. If too far from accessible understanding, it makes application and generalization of the learning that much more difficult. An easy way to integrate the meditative practice and cognitive module is to follow some simple steps.
Social Accessibility Training:
Step 1 - make sure both parents understand and are in agreement with the concepts.
Very important for both parents to be emulating these elements themselves such that they can be role models for the children
Step 2 - find a time everyday where the entire family can meditate together to build the habit and instill it as an acceptable social norm
ex: an analogy of art and crafts time after dinner. In this case, meditation time after dinner or before bedtime.
Step 3 - Throughout the day, practice discussing the different elements of the cognitive module so that the ideas are common among the family members and will be easily recalled during a time of crisis
First we successfully implement these procedures in a group setting then learn to do it individually.
If done within the context of accessible social context, the child will have an easier time applying the cognitive module in states of distress. First we want to learn to apply the cognitive module within neutral states then progressively work towards applying the cognitive modules in higher stressful states and situations. Initially the parents will have to do it with the child, but as we see in the self-efficacy content, we want the child to develop a sense of self-mastery so they can do it on their own.
References
Feldman, Kruk, Olds, Papalia. A Child’s World: Infancy through Adolescence. 2nd ed. McGraw-Hill Ryerson. 2008
Bandura, Albert. (1982) "Self-efficacy mechanism in human agency". American Psychologist. 37 (2): 122–147.)
Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy. The exercise of control. New York: W.H.Freeman and Company.Emory University, Division of Educational Studies, Information on Self-Efficacy: A Community of Scholars.
18.8.20 AJ
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