Question: in your studies is their a certain age group that is affected by behaviour problems? do more boys have behaviour problems than girls?? What techniques do you use to help these people get better/ inprove? Are there certain factors responsible for this behaviour?

Alice Jones Bartoli answered on 14 Jun 2011:

Lots of questions, smashing.
I’ll try and answer them one by one…
It is the case that behaviour problems seem to get worse with age – the older children get, the more children seem to show behaviour problems – the peak is during teenage years where adolescents are trying stuff our (drink, drugs, shoplifting…), but these problems often slow down and stop with age.

Young children with behaviour problems are the ones we really need to worry about. Research shows that it’s the children who show very early behaviour problems are the ones who are most likely to have the poorest outcome.

Boys do tend to have more obvious behavioural problems than girls, they do tend to be more aggressive and physically violent, but that doesn’t mean that they’re the only ones who we need to worry about. There are plenty of girls who also show behavioural problems, they might be involved in more covert (or ‘secretive’) behaviour – bullying, stealing or getting pregnant. Most of my work happens with boys, because it’s boys that tend to end up in special schools for children with behavioural problems.

We use a range of techniques to help children to improve their behaviour. It’s useful to try and work out what specific problems children have and tailor their treatment to suit them – one size doesn’t fit all… Some children have real trouble understanding other people’s thoughts and feelings, and it’s useful to work on these skills, but other children are ok at this already and have other problems, maybe they have memory difficulties or language problems, and we need to work on those instead. One of the key things we do is use rewards. We set targets with the children about their behaviour (something like ‘I will put up my hand when i want something from my teacher instead of shouting out’), and children are rewarded for meeting their targets. We are trying to teach children that it is worth behaving, and that if they do something wrong (sometimes for reasons that they can’t quite control) they won’t always be punished.

There are lots of factors that could put a child at risk for developing behavioural problems, and this is one of things that I study. Sometimes it’s poor parenting experiences, or ADHD-type problems, or difficulties understanding the world. There are lots of ways that a child can end up looking ‘bad’, it’s important to try to pull those reasons apart and develop treatments that treat specific problems.

I really hope I’ve answered your questions properly – shout me if I’ve missed anything.