Scare tactic leaves damaging impact on children’s future

KABUL (Pajhwok): Religious scholars and psychologists say scaring children by their parents can have damaging consequences on their future.

Making children afraid by parents and other family members is an old culture. Whenever children play, cry or act naughty their parents, especially mothers, try to scare them.

Some scare their little one by naming some imaginary characters, some others shout and some beat or tell that they will be eaten by ghosts, dogs, and others if they go out of home

Zahra, 20, a student, said: “When I was a little child, my mother would scare me no to go out in dark or I will face goblin, monster. These things still haunt me though I have grown up.”

She said the practice of scaring children by their parents remained common in most families without knowing its consequences.

“Most families scare their children with words like: ‘Dog is coming to bite you. Do not go out of home or evil women would take you away in order to make them stop crying or eat food,” she said, adding that using such words caused emotional insecurity in children’s minds and could prove dangerous in future.

Tamanna, 18, a high school graduate, also said she her childhood memories were not too good because her mother would shout at her when she would act naughty.

She said now she was well grown but still she was not a courageous person and did not feel good among crowds and new people.

Marwa, a 13 years old girl, remembered: “Once I frightened my cousin who was then two and a half years old. 

“My cousin’s hands, feet and lips crooked, her eyes were open, she could not talk, she was immoveable for several minutes. We scrubbed her feet and chest and sprayed water on her face and finally she came into senses.”

Alia, a mother of five children, said she also scared her son, her first born, when he was a baby. Now her son had grown up but he still afraid of dogs and felt uncomfortable among people, she said.

In some cases, a baby may lose life when scared

Jamila, a 45 years old mother in Kabul who has four sons, told about one of her bitter memories, “Twenty years ago, I attended a wedding, my baby was crying too much, I tried a lot to calm him, but he was still crying, then I angrily shouted at him laudly and slapped him twice, he was shaking after I beat him and died in few minutes.”

While shedding tears, she said: “I never tried to scare my children after that incident, I will never forget my son’s pain, I killed my baby with my own hand.”

Family teaches children basics of social understanding

Anjila Babakrkhel, a schoolteacher and mother of five children, said: “I have always tried not to place fear in my children’s minds, whatever they do, I do not make them scared. I softly tell them do not do this, if something is fearful for children, I explain it how simple is it.”

Mohammad Ehsan, father of three children and a resident of Kabul, saidL “I had never scared my children and also do not let my wife scare them. Fear makes children coward, I have seen people who were frightened in childhood lack no social courage.”

Frightening children results into unwanted consequences

Psychologists warn that besides other dangerous consequences, scaring children sometimes cause babies’ hearts to stop beating and lose lives.

Mohammad Naser Habibi, a psychologist in Kabul University, said families frightened children to prevent them from playing and make them quiet or stop demanding something.

He said scaring children caused mental problems, lack of courage, fear and weakness among them. “A baby’s heart may stop beating and even die if severely frightened,” he said.

Habibi asked families, particularly parents, to avoid making their children afraid and denying their rights.

Rohullah Rezwani, who teaches psychology in a university, said whatever children heard from their parents and elders, they believed it the rule of life. Frightening impacted children’s habits of sleep, eating, relations and others and isolated them from others, he said.

Scaring children may also cause enuresis, emotions, heart pain, problems in breathing and other problems, he said, adding parents should learn positive methods of treating and training their children.

He asked the media, scholars, the Ministry of Education and teachers to create awareness among parents about right training of their children.

Islamic scholars

Islamic scholars say scaring children means not compassionate towards the kids and to keep them oppressed.

Shams Rahman Frotan, an Islamic scholar, said: “Prophet Mohammad (S.A.W) said: “Those who do not show compassion to children and those who do not respect elders are not from among us.”

“In Islam, if someone scares children with words such as monsters or ghosts, he or she tells lie because monsters and ghosts do not exist there,” he said.

mds/ma