FRIGHTENED CHILDREN.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIII, Issue 4446, 28 July 1922, Page 4

FRIGHTENED CHILDREN.

NIGHT TERRORS OF THE YOUNG.

Parents who fail to recognise the disastrous influence of} strong fear upon young children are responsible for great mental suffering, often leading to nervous illness in later life. I know a medical men whoso frequent nightmares and disturbed sleep, are .associated with stories of bogies in the dark told to him by his governess at the age of six.

Th? nigiit terrors endured by Charles Lamb throughout his life probably contributed to the attack o 3 mental disease which caused his temporary confinement in the Hoxton Asylum.

“I was dreadfully alive to nervous terrors,” lie writes. "I never laid my head on my pillow, I suppose, from the fourth! to the seventh or eighth year of my life—so far as memory serves in tilings so long ago—without an assurance which realised its own prophecy of- seeing some frightful spectre.” Pavor nocturnus, or night fear, is veiy common among imaginative, nervously constituted children. Some degree- of fear is entirely natural and wholesome. Fear is the protective instinct that urges us to flight from danger. But there is a constant risk that fear may become morbid and excessive. The victim of phobias is at least handicappeel in the battle of 1/fe, and his dreads may produce positive insanity.

Acjite emotional pain is endured by many children who are subjected to over-severity in punishment. The record of juvenile suicides through an exaggerated sense of. guilt for misdoing and the terror of penalties illustrates the torture that a considerable number of children suffer. The aim of the parent and teacher should be to foster confidence ami courage in the child. This training is quite compatible with the instilling of respect, consideration, and obedieime.

The results ofj terrorism are a development of deceitfulness and cunning in the child of the touglminindml type, or morbid tjinidity and neurot-.c ailments in the tender minded. Ruling by love is always more effective than intimidation and harshness. The normal attitude of! the child to the parents is a mixture of love and fear of authority, When the parental domination is unduly harsh secret or open rebellion is the invariable consequence, and the child grows up with a "esentment against all authority. In this way the mental soil is prepared for revolt and anarchic theories. The physical symptom's of fear are seen in hysteria, stammering, an 1 squinting. During the air raids a number of; London children sank imo stupors after the terrors of the bombardment. The results of fear frequently last for years or for the whole o>f adult life.. —By “A Psychplo-