Three Reasons Why Time Out May Not Work

Whether or not to use time out when raising your children is a question that every parent faces. Ronald Mah who specializes in dealing with difficult behavior, wrote a book called Difficult  Behavior in Early Childhood: Positive Discipline for Pre-K-3. In this book he suggests three common reasons why parents use time out and explains why it usually doesn't work.

The first reason why parents use  time out is that the theory behind time out is the child is being forced to sit away from other children which is upsetting to a child and will motivate the child to regret the bad behavior. The time out may not work because some children respond and change their behavior when given time to sit away from the activity they were removed from however, others don't get upset when removed and instead find creative ways to entertain themselves.

Another reason parents may use time out is to give time to sit in the chair and think about what the child has done and what they can do instead next time. Time outs where the child needs to think about what they have done and what they will do differently next time are generally ineffective because young children aren't developmentally ready to reflect on their behavior and instead find creative ways to entertain themselves while in time out which counteracts the intent of punishment.  Children need to think about their action, but need scaffolding from adults in order to do so. For example, a child needs the parent to explain why they were removed and why their behavior was inappropriate.

The third reason why parents use time out is they hope children will learn empathy for others if asked while in time out, "how would you feel if..." and this will change a child's behavior. This approach might not work though because young children developmentally aren't ready to put themselves in another person's shoes and need adult direction not a lonely time out to understand something they don't yet have the mental capacity to understand.

Time out does have positive uses. Steps to help time out be positive include: using time out to help children understand they can't hurt themselves and that interacting poorly with others may cause others to not like them. A second step to help time out be positive is to teach children they can't be allowed to harm others and that removing them from the group helps them understand this. A third reason time out can be positive is children need to understand they can't be allowed to harm the process of their group. Working in groups helps children learn how to work together and get along with others.

Regardless of a parents view of time out scaffolding is required to get to the root of inappropriate behavior. Whether time out is a used is a private family decision to make and depends on how the parents feel about using time out when raising their children.