To help your child or teen with self-control, it is important for him to know that all humans have impulses; however, it is imperative that he knows that learning to control his impulses is a necessity in order to avoid a whole list of possible problems. One of the important steps to decreasing impulsivity is to understand the brain chemistry of self-control.

Understanding Brain Chemistry

First, it is important that you and your child or teen understand why she has problems acting before thinking: specifically, weaknesses in the frontal lobe and parts of the limbic system of the brain often fail to help even the smartest people to stop and think before acting or speaking.

Knowing this can help your child understand that you understand that she is not purposely being oppositional or defiant.  But you can’t just stop here; otherwise, you may unwittingly allow your child to turn her executive functioning problems into an excuse or a crutch for her impulsive behavior.

Developing Skills

When I talk with a child or teen with executive functioning challenges and related disorders about his difficulties, I explain to him that even though he did not cause the chemistry in his brain that causes impulsivity, he can take responsibility for developing skills to stop and think before acting.

Once your child understands that he did not cause his challenges with response inhibition and that he can learn strategies to help control it, he is less likely to be hard on himself about this most difficult difficulty, and more willing to start working toward a solution.

Identifying and Addressing Tempting Situations

The next step is to identify the situations that cause impulsivity to be a problem for your child as outlined in the next article in this series.

Need Help Applying this Concept?

Over the years, Dr. Davenport has found that problems with impulsivity can be improved using a research-based model of self-control.  Contact us to make an appointment.

(c) 2010-2019, Monte W. Davenport, Ph.D.