My Toddler Laughs When She Hits Me. Why?

By Ruth Anne Hammond

2/25/20

“She thinks it’s funny when I say ‘Ouch!’ Is my child a budding sociopath?” Some form of this question comes up in my practice a lot. Whether a child hits because he is angry, or is just trying out a powerful behavior, this scenario often plays out:

The child unexpectedly hits or bites the parent. The parent exclaims, “Ow!!” and makes a surprised and hurt face. The child sees and hears this reaction and starts laughing. The parent thinks the child is enjoying the parent’s pain….

It’s such an easy assumption to make, that the child’s laughter is an indication of lack of empathy. And…on some level this is true; toddlers’ empathy comes and goes, depending upon their state of mind. However, this laughter is not happening because the child is heartless, but rather because the child is trying to shift the parent’s affect from shocked or angry to happy. He reasons that, in the past when I laugh, Mommy laughs with me. I don’t like that face she’s wearing; it’s making me feel bad. I’ll laugh so she will be happy again. He is trying to get the parent to stop being unhappy with him because that little sense of shame at having hurt Mommy is really making him want to sink into the floor. He doesn’t like that feeling (Who does?) and if mommy is happy again, he can stop feeling bad. He just doesn’t have the social skill to recognize that laughter is an inappropriate response to another person’s pain, or to have alternative strategies for getting Mommy to stop making that face.

At this point, it’s unnecessary to heap on more shame for the laughing; the original offense is still the topic. It’s time to keep the serious face and tone of voice to let the child know you won’t allow hitting because it hurts. You can offer him a different way to express his anger, if you think he hit for that reason. But what you need to do is let him feel the shame for long enough to build a memory that hitting made Mommy very unhappy with me and I don’t like the feeling that gives me…so next time I’ll think before hitting. And after you have made your point, within a few minutes, you can find a way to rebuild harmony by saying something like, “I didn’t like it when you hit me…but I think you know that now; let’s go look at your new book.” You help to repair the rupture made when your child hit; he isn’t expected to woo you back. You offer a way out. You become his partner again on the road to maturity.

This small dose of shame is actually the socializing input he needs to learn self-regulation. Small, regulated doses of shame, says psychologist Allan Schore (1994), are required as toddlers are learning to wield power and control in their second year. This is not the same pit as toxic shame in which the child is immersed without a caring adult to help him out. If you can handle your child’s transgressions with this equanimity (not stoicism) you can be confident that you are not raising a bad seed headed for the penitentiary. You just have a normal, exuberant toddler who is learning how to conduct himself in the world, in the safety of his relationship with you.