Negative effects of yelling at a child

Are you a yeller? You're either scary or hilarious. 

Many are the times that parents yell at children when they're in the wrong or not listening. Yelling is not an effective way of communication but an innefective reaction to anger. Shouting and screaming to a child is not an effective way to make them follow your instructions or stop bad behaviour. It just affects their healthy development. Here are some of the negative impacts of yelling

1. Yelling teaches children to react to anger in bad way. Yelling teaches a child when to yell, how to yell and yelling is the effective way to respond when you're emotionally charged. So a child who is yelled at all the time might start yelling at their peers when playing, teachers or other adults. As long as the child is upset, they feel they're justified to shout to people. 

2. Yelling scares most children. Yelling instills fear in children. The younger the child, the more fear they develop. Yelling puts a child in a state of fear which makes it impossible to think about their behavior. When you yell, the child will not learn the lesson you wanted to teach them but will instead learn how to fear. A fearful child grows up to be a fearful and anxious adult.

3. Yelling hinders the child from learning useful language expression. When yelling is constantly done to a child below the age of 3, they register it as part of language use. When angry they will not Express themselves in a better way when yelling is their model. (If mom and dad yells, why can't I do it?) They're too young to know whether it's wrong. 

4. It might not change defiant behavior as sometimes the parents sound hilarious. You have seen a parent shouting at children but they do not listen. They laugh it off or even start imitating the parent. Why, the shouting sounds funny to them. So they'll always want to be on the wrong so that the parent can tell and they get entertained. 

5. Yelling fuels low self-esteem, anxiety and depression. Shouting at someone is demeaning and embarrassing. Children feel so bad when someone shouts at them Infront of their peers. They feel less valued. Might develop anxiety and eventually depression by feeling they cannot do anything right. 

If you're a parent and you're a yeller, you have issues in your anger management. Yelling is a response to anger. Your child does something that triggers you and since you don't have effective ways to react to anger, you yell at the child. 

You're the one wounded and not your child. Understand your triggers then come up with ways to calm yourself down when angry. Yelling won't calm you down. You're just transferring your trauma to an innocent child. 

Children only learn effectively when they're are instructed or corrected when the parent is not angry. Talk to your child when you're calm. Otherwise, they might learn to fear you and not good behavior. 

© Joyce Mwai

Writer/ Trainer/ Teenage Mentor