The Japanese bonsai – a "perfect little tree" that thrives only with lots and lots of care – is a good metaphor for children raised to be reliant on high levels of support, says clinical psychologist Judith Locke.
Despite their parents best intentions, 'Bonsai children' learn to expect that it's other people who'll make them happy and successful, she tells Susie Ferguson.
Bonsai tree by a member of the Otago Bonsai Society Photo: Otago Bonsai Society / Facebook
Judith Locke is the author of The Bonsai Child and The Bonsai Student.
The style of parenting that leads to Bonsai children developed back in the '70s and '80s when research first linked a child's success in life with feeling good, Locke says.
"We started to think that feeling good was the key so we started to really build children's immediate self-esteem with things like excessive praise … and thinking that that was going to make them feel good in the future."
The urgently-run race to get a child ahead puts a lot of pressure on both them and their parents, she says.
'There's not a lot of kind of 'choose your own adventure' in parenting. Now, it's much more pushed this idea there is this perfect right way. And often that's very effort-intensive. Parents are doing most of the work [rather] than encouraging children to slowly take on more responsibility to make themselves happy and make themselves successful.
"All of this stuff is done with incredibly good intentions, it's just in the long term, it produces some really problematic beliefs in children, and also a real lack of essential skills in the child to face the normal challenges of life."
Locke coined the term 'Sherpa parent' after seeing a woman push two children standing on scooters up a hill while wearing both of their school bags on her back.
"I thought 'She's their Sherpa … she's doing all the grunt work. They're pretending that they're getting up this hill on this scooter themselves but they're not doing anything."
Parents continue trying to do a lot of the work for their child when they're at university and even in the workplace, Locke says.
"Once you start sherpa-ing, it's very hard to stop."
Not every young person is suited to university but many especially struggle in their first year because they aren't well prepared because they've had a "perfect situation" at home.
This can foster in a young person a sense of 'academic entitlement' - the belief that it's other people such as teachers and lecturers who can make them academically successful.
This kind of 'learned helplessness' is really problematic for a person's well-being and sense of ownership over their own life, Locke says.
"It's a very externalised sense that other people should be helping me. That kind of arrogance can lead to some depression, as well."
Although screen use is a "huge problem" for teen mental health, she says, getting an education isn't actually harder today.
"Because we're ill equipping them to face these things, we think that schooling is much more challenging for them than it used to be.
"We almost have this expectation [that schooling] is going to be problematic, and then we become very hyper-vigilant.
"We almost encourage our children to think that suddenly an exam is not overcome-able, it's not able to be faced, you need to get special considerations for it … We almost talk kids into these things being much more problematic than [they need to be]."
Clinical psychologist Dr Judith Locke Photo: Supplied
Locke says her next book in the Bonsai series may well be a guide for teachers.
"Parents want the best for their child and they misunderstand that there's an important part to a child being disappointed. As I say to parents all the time, if your child is not being disappointed by the school on a semi-regular basis, you're not getting your value for money - they need to be disappointed by the school.
"But unfortunately, these days, when parents know that their child is disappointed they're often up at the school saying to the teacher 'Why did you not put my child in the class with their best friend? Or why did you not give them an A on their assignment [when] they worked so hard?'
"Teachers need to be able to explain those decisions back [to the parents]. So it's a hard thing because everybody's doing the best they can. Nobody's doing this deliberately. But it just needs to be some explanation to them, a palatable explanation, so that the parents are on board, as well.'
In the last year of high school, parents often let a child skip doing chores so they can study, Locke says, but this prevents the child from learning how to juggle different demands.
"They haven't had to juggle responsibilities of doing their chores, as well as studying for the exam, as well as doing a part-time job, which is what they're gonna face when they leave school, whether they go to university, whether they work, whatever they do. They're gonna have to juggle a lot more, and they can't, they have had no experience of juggling the year before. It really doesn't set them up well for that first year. "
The cultural overuse of "therapy speak" - a tendency to exaggerate feelings using therapeutic terms - doesn't help the situation, Locke says.
Although anxiety can develop from 'nerves', it is actually a separate thing, she says.
"Anxiety is a very, very specific term. It means a fear that is greater than the situation demands. And it also has a huge impact on your [general] well-being.
"We've kind of pathologised normal nerves into things that are greater than the child can face. And so I think what needs to happen is a gentle sort of pushback."
When a child is nervous about school, often the best thing a parent can do is listen and empathise, she says. It's good to normalise their nerves and show you're comfortable with more than one outcome rather than assuring them that they're going to be successful.
"A parent will often say "No, you're not going to fail, you're going to be okay. You've worked really hard for this' whereas I think you've got to get a little bit more 'Well, let's see what happens."
When a child has a learning difficulty or disability, parents can often fall into the 'nurturer trap' where they offer a little bit too much help, Locke says.
"Inadvertently what happens with that is that the child actually doesn't get the opportunities to slowly step up and face more challenging things because the parents are stepping in too much and not slowly stepping back from stepping in."
The first step in stepping back is to not offer help before the child asks for it, she says.
Sitting next to them all the time will make them reliant on constant praise.
"If your child is, say, eight years old, and you are regularly sitting with them doing their homework, what you need to do say when they turn nine or when they come into a new year of school is 'Well, I'm not going to sit with you anymore to do your homework. If you've got any problems you can come and ask me but I'm going to see how much you can do by yourself."
When a child asks you for help with their schoolwork, get them to help you in return, Locke suggests.
"You're in the kitchen, cutting up the vegetables, and they come and say, 'Can you help me with this?' You say 'Absolutely, if you can help me cut these vegetables for a while'. So you start to slowly get them owning their [own] work and also owning the assistance that you give them and working for that, as well. There are good ways you can do that and that's developing their independence."
