I’ve heard a psychologist say that the #1 fear of human beings is the fear of being, or becoming invisible. That is, invisible to other human beings, especially to those to whom they want to matter. This makes a lot of sense and that’s why we, children and adults alike, do or say certain things so people will notice us or pay attention to us. Sometimes we do it consciously, most of the time we do it unconsciously. No one is immune to this need. We just have different levels of neediness, so to speak.
     The reality is, if we have unmet needs as children, we will continue to crave for them as adults one way or another. Unabomber Ted Kaczynski who supposedly shunned the entire world and became a hermit, wanted to let us know he is still alive and pay him some attention. Only he did it destructively.
     When children are needy, they can be cute. But if adults exhibit the same quality of neediness, they can be annoying or irritating. Or worse, destructive like Ted above. And then there are those who do not want to expose any level of neediness or vulnerability and instead lead deadened lives.
     We sometimes find ourselves complaining about why children need so much attention. The bad news is: That is true and we cannot change that. Whether we like it or not, whether we are ready or not, whatever the circumstances were that we ended up as parents, we now have certain unequivocal responsibilities towards the children we brought into this world for a good many many years. Accept that premise and the following might be easier to swallow.
     Children will crave attention. And it is the acknowledgement and recognition
we give them that helps (or the lack of it that hinders) their development. That is why “accentuating the positive” is so important. If we notice (by praise or encouragement) them for the positive things they do, no matter how insignificant they are, they will continue to do positive things. Catch them doing something good and then appreciate them. But if they are not getting enough attention, they will do other things to get it and sometimes, this means trying to get negative attention (meaning doing negative things). So we have a choice. We can either shower them with hundreds of positive attention (Take heart as the neediness will be reduced someday if we do the base work now) or wait for them to do something that will shake us up and we wake up into a dark world we don’t want to be in. 

     A word about physical punishment: It may work short-term since we are able to exact the behavior we want from our children at that moment. But does it work long-term? Do we really get to have our children realize that there is a relationship between the behavior we are trying to correct and the physical punishment? Research shows that this is not the case. Children who are punished physically grow resentment towards the punishing parent (And perhaps towards the other parent too who did not protect them). And the energy that should be devoted to changing the behavior gets directed instead towards harboring this resentment. The child may stop doing the behavior in question but is seething inside with this negative feeling towards his parent. And psychology and physics have taught us that this energy will someday be converted – to what other form? – it’s hard to predict but most likely, to something that is negative (or destructive!) as well.