More Backgrounds: Boys in Balance –
Development, Opportunities and High-risk
Behaviour
© 28-02-'08 L.Woltring (When
quoting parts of this text please cite
source with date of update and if
possible, create a link to this text)
We live in fascinating times: exciting,
sometimes terrible, but also full of new
possibilities and insights. A lot of
learning has to be done, a lot is being
learned and there are numerous opportunities
to learn.
Pleasure or problem?
Use it or loose it. This is not only
true about the developing brain and all the
connections we make (or not) while
experiencing life and acting upon it, it
also goes for the energy and the qualities
of young men.
A thirst for action, creativity and
exploring boundaries are qualities often
associated with boys, as well as taking the
initiative, experimenting, searching for
solutions, desiring and having a feeling for
justice. Every boy is naturally different.
Many boys are doing really well, the current
generation of young people are learning from
the mistakes of previous generations and
they are often able to get on with each
other and others in a remarkably wise,
supple and pleasurable manner. Naturally,
creating problems where they don’t exist is
nonsense.
However, some boys only manage to achieve
part of their potential and there is a group
who are really doing badly. In education,
politics and the media these boys tend to
have a negative image: they are portrayed as
restless, troublesome, inaccessible, lazy,
rude, aggressive or unreliable. They are
either lacking in ambition or overambitious.
Although this only applies to some boys,
even so … are they really so bad? Or can
their behaviour also be regarded as a
reaction to what adults have to offer them?
The worlds of sport, media and advertising
often seem to glorify misbehaviour. The
major question is what are these boys
channelling their energy into? What do they
dream of? Which adults - both men and women
- are offering them support to search for
something actually worthwhile, where they
can develop their talents and direct their
energy towards? How they can take up their
responsibilities for the world if they do
not, and how they can connected with others
instead of focussing on their troubled self.
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Policy and politics
Youth policy and the law are often
ambivalent: boys are given a considerable
amount of leeway but are also carefully
watched and on occasion treated harshly.
Boys who don’t project a strong image tend
to be neglected, they often have to face
problems on their own, while a tough
approach for those overstepping the line
frequently has the opposite effect. It calls
forth new aggression and when everything has
once again cooled down it’s a matter of
waiting for the next incident. Even youth
care professionals and civil servants in
youth policy are often at their wits’ end.
In the Netherlands, in education and other
areas of policy, special consideration for
girls and their problems, questions and
difficulties has existed for years. There is
naturally nothing wrong with this, however,
the same doesn’t apply for boys. Special
attention for boys anticipates primarily
potential nuisance and often is repressive.
Boys can fend for themselves and, if
necessary, they will be given a proper
dressing down (“That’ll teach them…”). Too
much reproach in raising children and
education can be detrimental. Feelings of
guilt and shame are very strong emotions. If
you don’t feel capable of preventing shame
or shaking off blame, then this will only
reinforce the feeling of inadequacy; with
resentment this forms an explosive
combination. Without clear prospects,
prisons are easy learning grounds for
criminality. Humiliating sanctions or
unfulfillable orders result in isolation,
defensiveness and callous behaviour. Leaving
school early is hardly the recipe for a
successful future.
There are naturally better ways of dealing
with boys. But to develop them requires
creativity and an awareness of sexual and
cultural differences. Based on many years of
experience both in the Netherlands and
abroad, I can provide the services you need
in this area.
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Boys – a blind spot?
When the media and policy documents talk
about ‘youth’ or ‘young people’ they usually
mean ‘young men’ without making this
explicit. Take any newspaper article,
replace the word ‘young people’ with ‘boys’
or ‘girls’ and see whether the text still
makes sense. A blind spot? What are boys
really interested in? What brings out their
better qualities and what makes them happy?
How can they discover these things? What are
their strengths and where do they get stuck?
In an economic recession, doing nothing is
destructive for a person’s self-image and it
affects the motivation. If you are
unemployed it is also important to consider
what you are going to channel your energy
into. On average, boys sooner than girls are
more likely to be involved in all sorts of
risky behaviour, alcohol and drug abuse,
hostile behaviour at school, or small or
large scale criminality, not only damaging
others but also themselves.
Predisposition, environment and maturation
Of course every child and every boy is
different, but upbringing, education and all
sorts of interventions can be significantly
more effective when people know how to
respond to the particular predisposition and
maturation process of boys.
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Chromosomes and hormones: the male
body-brain
The X chromosome is older in the evolution.
The nowadays female variant is in a way
closer to that original form. If not
influenced by the Y-chromosome every baby
would be female. The Y-chromosome has -
among other factors by means of provoking
testosterone production - the effect that
the foetus via a series of complex processes
is 'converted' or 'further developed into
the male variant' (it is just how you put
it...).
The Y-chromosome in the boy makes that the
mother produces a lot of testosterone in the
womb; just before birth the little boy is
'marinated' in testosterone... In this
complex conversion process things can go
wrong. There are more complications during
pregnancy and around the birth. The first
ten years boys are the weaker sex. Later
they become stronger.
Boys tend to be more boisterous than girls:
adrenaline and testosterone at work. On
average, they mature more slowly. Their
immune system is initially weaker: they have
more childhood illnesses, but once they get
over these, their immune system grows
stronger. The physical growth as well as
their emotional, verbal and cognitive
development is often more irregular in boys,
making it appear more incoherent. Balancing
seems the nuclear developmental task for
boys more than for girls.
Their fine motor skills - for example,
writing - usually develop later and their
vocabulary is initially smaller. Tension
stimulates performance, but being under too
much stress means the higher cerebral
functions are hardly given a chance and the
necessary connections (i.e. learning) are
made less easily.
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Behaviour under Stress
Stress means that the primary reactions -
fight, flight or fright - are more likely to
dominate and the frontal neocortex is
practically disconnected, unless boys learn
to consciously manage their breathing
(relaxation!) and reflective capacities.
Maturation of the Brain
Certainly in early years, some functions -
especially those facilitating higher order
skills - seem to be less integrated withy
primary processes deep in the brain in boys
than in girls. In boys, some brain
functions seem to be more clearly connected
to the left and right hemispheres ('more
lateralized'); research is going on and
replaces some myths with more hard data.
In brief, those parts in the brain that are
associated with the intelligence of body and
movement,
felt
emotions, space, music,
creativity and intuition, are in boys in
childhood and early adolescence less
integrated with those parts that play a big
role in logic, language and analysis. In
many ways a question of maturation. The
prefrontal lobes - with their important
functions of inhibition, anticipation and
planning - take more time to mature and
integrate than in girls. In a process of
making new connections (synaptognese) and
dying away of unused connections ('pruning')
the connections do grow and balance in the
course of time, amongst other things through
experience, and often through the correct
challenges, attention, exercise and
stimulus. It is thus a matter of challenging
boys and helping them to integrate in due
time (see, for example, on this website:
cooperation,
www.rockandwaterprogram.com.
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Risks and taking Chances
Boys often have more of an eye for taking
advantage of opportunities rather than for
risks and safety. Tension and danger can be
an attractive means of proving themselves,
'it stimulates their nerve ends to make new
connections', so it is learning - but the
'buzz' of risky behaviour also numbs
feelings of doubt, shame or not coming up to
the mark. Boys certainly do not have any
less emotions than girls, but it is often
more difficult for them to express
themselves. This makes them vulnerable for
emotional pressure. Putting their own
behaviour or feelings into words, to then be
corrected or laughed at, easily leads them
to bluffing or avoid expressing themselves
in words:
After all,
everything you say can be used against you.
This is unfortunate: it is
precisely by being able to express yourself
that you automatically give structure to
your thoughts and feelings (conscious
emotions) making reflection and
communication easier.
Emotions and getting grip on your own
reactions
A feeling for space, impulsive and intuitive
movement and also the visual brain are often
particularly strongly developed in boys.
More than girls, boys chiefly learn through
trial and error. This can sometimes be
difficult for their surroundings, but it is
their natural way. Reacting positively to
this results in a bond of confidence, which
is necessary in more complicated situations.
Developing communicative skills helps them
and their daily environment, especially if
we also pay attention to their physical
communication, which they are often good at.
Social and more verbal and reflexive skills
can be learned more easily through physical
balance and resistance programmes. During
puberty, not only the existing connections
in the brain are reorganised, as it were,
but further specialisation also takes place
and unused areas die off or become isolated.
The ability to learn is at its peak.
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Regression and post-feminism
Amidst all these biological data it makes
sense to differentiate between regressive
interpretations about masculinity and
femininity (backlash to pre-feminist times,
using biological data to legitimate male
behaviours and dominance or female role
taking and indirect dominance) and what I
would call the post-feminist view:
serving boys and girls right in what they
need to grow into balanced and many-sided
adults. Boys and girls have the same value,
but they are not the same. Same treatment
may breed larger differences. To reiterate:
sex and gender are not all-determining, we
are concerned here with the average
differences between boys and girls, with
considerable overlapping. Predisposition may
strengthen certain opportunities or risks,
but this is frequently only realised through
influences from the environment. You cannot
reduce boys and girls to one aspect of their
personality, namely their sex and gender.
What we can do is closely observe them with
a feeling for sexual differences to see how
schools, society and the media act upon them
and try to find suitable solutions with
them.
Furthermore, it is important to be aware
that behavioural disorders, in particular in
the autism spectrum (e.g. Asperger),
concerning speech, language and the
regulation of energy (e.g. ADHD
and aggression disorders) occur more
frequently in boys. This is not a question
of a ‘faulty’ upbringing or environment, but
is primarily due to predisposition.
Upbringing and other forms of support or
constraint can help to make the situation
more manageable. It is the case that boys
with behavioural disorders are more likely
to turn up in the judicial system, whereas
girls are more likely to land up in the
health care system or social services. Youth
detention facilities and prisons are full of
boys and young men, who, apart from being
constrained, primarily need support and
treatment.
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Young men today
Improving the way boys are brought up and
dealt with starts with a quest. What does it
mean to be a young man at the start of the
21st century? Girls are changing, tasks and
roles are being redistributed, aspirations
are high and everything seems to be
permanently moving. This creates new
opportunities for boys, but not
automatically. A risk-society demands
special competencies. Excessive
individualization means interrelations must
once again be sought, with each other and
with the natural environment.
Men in parenting and education: role models
and being sensitive to the way boys learn
In their youth, it is as important for girls
as it is for boys that, in addition to
women, they also associate with men. Boys
need close role-models to measure up to, to
mirror themselves upon and associate with.
As children, they are mainly raised by
women, admittedly often very well, but
fathers and other men are still frequently
far too distant. Happily there are
increasing numbers of fathers who make time
for their children, but in family law the
position of fatherhood in all its current
forms is actually weakly regulated.
In which roles do boys associate with men?
In childcare and primary education, a
primarily protective and 'verbal-emotional'
climate does little justice to the more
physical and experimental manner which
characterizes many boys’ lives. Structure
and protection are necessary, but an excess
of order, neatness and protection, and too
great an emphasis on the fine motor
functions and linguistic skills, however,
are perceived by boys to be constraints and
hinder their curiosity, mobility and
incentive to experiment.
In puberty, many boys do not feel they are
understood by women whereas they easily
engage in a power struggle with men, unless
men are able to offer them both space as
well as boundaries, and do this with humour
and a clear structure. They were once boys
themselves, they have had comparable
developmental tasks and often know how to
respond more flexibly to their experimental
behaviour and need for boundaries.
In primary education male teachers are
disappearing at an increasing rate, while
boys and girls need both men and
women. This development is in danger of
escalating. At teacher training colleges for
primary education, it is as if 'a hidden
female curriculum' has come to exist and
male students are increasingly rare, amongst
other things because they feel less
attracted to the contents of the lessons and
the predominantly verbal-cognitive and
verbal-emotional atmosphere, namely the
strong relational aspect. And yet it is
precisely male primary teachers who often
have more feeling for the behaviour of boys
and who are often able to discipline them
using fewer words. For boys from an ethnic
minority - who may not be used to the
authority of women outside the home once
they have outgrown their childhood -
flexible and respectful cooperation with
male and female teachers can provide them
with excellent examples.
When starting secondary education, for many
boys the accent has already fallen on
unmanageability and hostile behaviour in
schools. They are content with achieving a
six out of ten for their schoolwork and life
outside school holds far more attraction. At
large schools there can be a lack of contact
and their circle of friends or peer group
predominates.
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Media and Advertisement Industry
Given birth to by a women and for the most
part closely surrounded by women
role-models, there is the possibility that
boys will primarily develop as 'non-girls';
they will be dismissive of girls or women,
and mirror themselves on caricature images
of men in the media. The individuality of
every boy is overshadowed by the demands of
the labour market and idealised images in
the media which cannot be fulfilled. They
are almost forced into bluffing. Advertising
agencies tap into boy’s dreams and
fantasies, embellish and associate them with
all sorts of products which are then
marketed back to them. It is precisely those
intense emotions such as fear or happiness,
the power of attraction or jealousy, greed
or dismissive behaviour that advertising and
the media strongly appeal to in order to
distract consumers from consciously
considering and weighing up the
possibilities, to provide amusement or to
sell products, as if what you possess or
wear is who you are.
Power struggle or balance?
Boys want to have a grip on their lives and
are faced with the special task of trying to
find a balance in this. Faked
self-confidence and challenging each other
while at play can anticipate real
self-confidence, but it also means that they
can continually be brought down by others.
Some boys shut themselves off, loneliness
sets in, and a vicious circle begins. Anger
and resentment mask emotional clumsiness or
low self-esteem and block the development
towards balanced adulthood. Energy spins out
in all directions and in large anonymous
groups boys can become violent. The kicks
induced by risky behaviour drown out common
sense: primary emotions such as
fight,
flight or
fright
take over, agility is the only thing which
counts and the higher brain functions (neocortex)
are almost literally disconnected.
Many boys are continually jostling between
struggling for power, exercising their power
and reverting to powerlessness, until they
find their actual power. They are exploring
the extremes of
the power triangle
(adapted from Anja van de Servellen).
(correction: 'being fixed' must be:
'becoming stuck' LW)
Everyone experiences having power in
their lives: over themselves, over others or
over their environment. This gives a feeling
of
control
- you are in charge of your uncertainties -
and this maybe gives a kick. Perhaps you are
entitled to the position you have attained -
you are good at something, you take
initiatives, are in charge and others also
trust you in this - but there is a danger
that you cling to that power, you take more
than you are entitled to, you become stuck,
stop learning and become cramped: you become
a dictator over others and also partially
over yourself, you easily feel threatened.
You can be toppled from your position and
lose power. However, you can also let go and
move on.
Changing - possibly forced - sometimes leads
to
powerlessness.
You have to admit that you can’t do
something or can’t do it anymore and you are
forced to confront yourself. This can also
lead to becoming stuck. You become pathetic,
use your problems to seek attention and give
others the blame: the victim’s power to prey
on the energy of others. However, people
avoid ‘parasites’ or ‘bloodsuckers' or you
become involved in complicated arguments.
But you can also learn, you can pick up the
thread in a different way, become assertive
and engage in the
power struggle
once again until you have regained power
(over yourself, the situation, possibly over
others). This power struggle also helps you
to learn to know yourself better. Many
people engage in this 'power triangle' a
number of times, each time differently,
until by doing so they learn where their own
inner
strength
lies:
"What do I
actually want? What is right for me, however
great or small? What are my talents, what
makes me feel at home? What really means
something for me? How can I make a
contribution and what do I need to obtain
good and inspired results through which I
can also relate to others and no longer feel
alone?"
In jostling for a position young men are
often pitted against each other. Healthy
competition and rivalry turn into
destructive behaviour, certainly if young
men are left too much to their own devices,
or are unable to learn to put themselves in
someone else's shoes and develop sufficient
social skills. They have their hands full
with themselves. The development of their
inner strength and sense of direction – What
is it all about? Who am I? What am I capable
of doing? – is obstructed by shows of
strength to cope with their insecurities.
Some hide in powerlessness or aggression.
Many boys swing between bravado and
timidity.
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Directing energy
Troublesome behaviour can also be seen as a
signal: boys want to give meaning to their
lives and look for boundaries. They like to
test adults’ integrity but still have
difficulty in recognising authority and
sometimes stagnate in resentment, a sad
combination of sadness and anger. Discipline
is sometimes desperately needed, but the
current call for detention centres or
Borstal schools, primarily for boys who can
no longer be handled, is a regrettable
conclusion and an indication of failing
efforts on the part of parents, supervisors
and policy. Paying attention to boys and
their developmental tasks and needs at an
earlier stage can work preventively.
We should support young men in their search
for new paths. This means, first of all,
being able to make contact with them, listen
to them and show appreciation. It also
involves providing good examples and
establishing boundaries, explaining them
clearly and also maintaining them,
preferably with humour and by offering a way
out without losing face. Amends can be made
for what you have brought about. Genuine
interest really works. Confrontation is OK,
but humiliation never works: nobody needs to
be shown up.
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Zone of proximal development
The concept of the zone of proximal
development (by the Russian educational
psychologist Vygotski) can enlighten us in
our work. Just as cells continually divide
and an organism grows, so children have a
strong instinct to grow, experience
something and develop themselves. Their
world is constantly growing, they are
broadening and advancing their prospects and
an increasing amount of active connections
are being made in their brains. Boys go
through a lot and, if things go well, they
want to take on an increasing level of
responsibility. They may experience somewhat
of a freakish passage through life: success,
setback and sometimes relapse. Learning is
often a matter of trial and error.
Being aware of which developmental phase
that boys are in and the skills which they
have already acquired is important. Limiting
someone in what he is already able to do is
humiliating or creates laziness. However, if
you can tune into what boys already are
capable of, you will affirm their
self-esteem and enable them to grow. Setting
a boy a task which is bound to go wrong or
will endanger himself or others leads to
failure and disappointment. It can also be
humiliating or may result in fear or
resentment. It is better to limit a boy when
he goes way beyond his own boundaries and
those of others and support him in doing
things which are just out of his reach but
can be achieved with help. Success not only
boosts self-confidence but also increases
trust in the person who is helping. Boys
require help and support to name or
internalise negative experiences or events
which have not been coped with. Otherwise
the learning process stops, the boy will
feel stuck, or some hidden bitterness, grief
or anger will develop.
(scheme underneath needs some corrections,
LW)
The zone of proximal development can
be used for every day tasks: in education,
sport, recreation, surfing the internet,
music or driving lessons. For example, you
can ask yourself whether a moped with an
increased capacity is appropriate for the
balance already acquired by 16 year olds, or
does it actually place too high demands on
them and only intensifies their natural
restless energy by 50cc, resulting in pranks
and accidents.
Popular or not, it means again and again
tuning in to what boys want and can do; if
necessary, finding this out together,
putting it into words, developing
alternatives together and, if need be,
helping them to direct their energy into
different channels. In this way boys can get
more of a grip on their bodies and lives,
co-operate with others, and feel responsible
for themselves and their surroundings. They
can grow into well-balanced men who feel a
bond with others instead of being selfish
egotists, inflexible controllers or
politically correct, verbally compliant but
in fact weak men without a balanced and
strong self-image.
In this way, fathers can have more fun with
their sons, and professionals and volunteers
will also enjoy their work with boys more.
© 2007 L. Woltring update 19-2-2007
especially on neurobiological aspects of
development. (When quoting parts of this
text please cite source with date of update
and if possible, create a link to this text)
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