"Remorseless Children"

Parents and teachers want children to "do the right thing" because of a moral compass. Really, this compass is almost a magical device. We kind of expect it to happen without really thinking about what it takes to develop moral reasoning. There's a lot of research out there about moral reasoning, and a couple of my favorite points are that two things are very important for its development: 1) the ability to think about and understand things, and 2) experiences that challenge the child's current moral beliefs. I like those ideas. They're neat, they make sense (intuitively), and they're very appealing (maybe because they don't put all of the responsibility on parents). The problem is they don't give us any comfort when a child is engaging in aggressive behavior and doesn't appear to feel guilty.

I've heard from parents, teachers, and daycare providers that some children are "remorseless" or even take pleasure in the suffering of their peers. That seems scary and is likely to make us think of criminals, murderers, and so forth. Maybe there is a biological risk of a child having a natural tendency to become a criminal, but it does not do any good to assume a child is "bad" or destined to become the next Jack the Ripper (or Hamburgler). If we assumed that it was the child's fate, then at the worst we abandon all efforts to change the child, and at best we begin thinking from the perspective that this child is "bad." It's better to think of the child's behavior and what we want them to do instead of their current behavior.

"But he smiles and laughs after hitting his classmate/taking something from his classmate!"

We're thinking from our own perspective in that situation. We don't actually know why he is smiling or laughing, though, and we're making a pretty big assumption: that the child is thinking like an adult or feeling emotions like an adult. It's also not a well-supported assumption. Children have only had a limited amount of time to learn how the world works, and that includes their "internal world" (emotions, thoughts, and body sensations). Consider the following questions:

- When an infant smiles or laughs, what kind of reaction does that get from other people?
- If a child is feeling nervous, worried, or confused, what kind of reaction do you expect from them?
- What do you think the child is expecting after hitting his classmate?
- What does "remorse" look like? How do you really know it's happened?

I'm oversimplifying here, but when young children feel worried, sad, upset, frustrated, irritated, angry, anxious, confused, or nervous, what they're really feeling is "Upset." It's one category for them and all of those emotions fit in there. They aren't that good at telling the difference yet, nor are they very good at controlling their behavior when they suddenly get a strong feeling. It takes a lot of time to understand the difference between frustrated and irritated, or worried and nervous. If you ask a child what those emotions feel like, they'll probably tell you that they feel "bad" and that's about it (note: I've asked many children and gotten the same responses). It also takes a lot of time and practice to get good at not immediately responding to how one feels. Indeed, many adults still can't stop themselves from acting immediately in response to a strong emotion. It's just how humans are wired; it helps a lot in certain situations, but the classroom is not one of those situations.

So we should consider that this child is not "remorseless" (which really isn't even a "thing" for young children yet), but that he/she doesn't know how to respond to the worry they're feeling about getting in trouble (which they know is coming). We shouldn't pay as much attention to what we see on their face at that time. We need to focus on what we want them to do differently, give them every incentive and advantage in being able to do that, and then letting them know when they've done the right thing instead of the wrong thing. Try to take ourselves out of the situation and instead focus on the behavior and the child. It's hard to do because we don't naturally think that way, but it is more helpful than assuming the child is seeing things the same way we do.