Yesterday we offered you an entry in which we explained what is the Reverse psychology and we show you some examples of how does it work with both adults and children. Today we continue with this entry showing some more examples and explaining why it is a technique that should be used with care.
An example of how reverse psychology works when selling something
When a company puts an item on sale, it tries to have stock for all those buyers who want it. However, there are times when a lot of availability means less exclusivity. People like to make us feel special or different in some areas and, when buying something, there are many people who value having things that others do not have.
There are companies that, even having stock of their products, usually limit it artificially for a while for consumers to believe that it is difficult to obtain it, which is only available to a few. If they also get the message to run: "Uff, do you want this one? It's hard to get," the desire to have it is even greater.
Let's say is the system that is used in limited editions. They create a new article, they give it an aura of exclusive, they make a limited edition, even if it has a high value, and they practically ensure sales, because being an exclusive edition, only within the reach of a few, people try to get that article . In the end it is still absurd, because whoever wants to do business with their products usually tries to sell the more the better, but by creating a limit you offer the message "only within reach of a privileged few, I don't think you can get it" and, as we have already said, people like to feel privileged and like to show that they are capable of getting what they are denied.
Following the examples, I am sure that what I explain below has happened to you on occasion: you see a piece of clothing that you like and only one of your size remains. There are other clothes that you also like, so keep looking. Suddenly you observe another person looking closely at that unique garment that you have let out. Finally, after several doubts, he leaves her again ... then you run for the garment. Nobody really provokes the action, but it is we who apply the story to ourselves: "there is only one left, I will not be able to get it ... How can I not? I buy it before they take it away."
This type of Reverse psychology I used it a lot my brother. Every year we made a kind of market where we sold those things we didn't want to our brothers (yes, okay, this selling things to your brothers is a bit weird, but hey, it's not the issue today). The case is that I said: "I keep this" and then I took it to give it to me and then stopped and said "you know, I thought better and I think I do not want to sell it to you, I like me" . Then he managed, little by little, and at the stroke of pulling the rope, that I would end up paying more for something that he didn't really want.
Reverse psychology when it comes to seducing someone
There are many people who wonder if reverse psychology can be used to seduce someone. The truth is that the question has been answered for millennia: it is not that it can be used, it is that many people use it.
Surely on more than one occasion someone has recommended you make "the narrow" to flirt with someone. You show somehow to the boy that you like, that attracts you, that there is chemistry. Once he knows, you choose to say hello and little else, without following the game. Indirectly you are saying that "no longer ... now do not come near me, that I no longer want you to be with me". The effect that is achieved is exactly the opposite, because the boy, who knew he wanted, notes that now he is no longer. What was a game, and what was perhaps a "no, I don't want to go out with you", becomes a challenge because the woman is no longer within her reach and, as you know, People often want to achieve what is not within their reach.
Following this theme are jealousy. When a person feels that their partner is somewhat distant and notices that they should go behind them, they have two options: to intensify the "persecution" or to stop suddenly. Intensify usually produces the opposite effect, since the other has just exhausted from "running away", while stopping suddenly and ceasing in the effort has the opposite effect, because the other person observes that the message is released "is fine, I leave you alone, I do not want to be with you as before." That change makes the one who felt pressured feel a loss and wants to solve it, being now he (or she) who approaches the other person.
Inverted psychology in breastfeeding
When a woman wants to wean her child it is recommended, so that weaning is not something traumatic for the child, that she does not offer her breast, that she substitutes it for something else (both nutritionally and emotionally) and that Do not deny it. In summary, to anticipate the times when the child usually breastfeeds, offering alternatives so that the child can eat and alternatives where mother and child can spend time together sharing emotions, without breastfeeding being present, but not denying it if it ends asking for it.
This "do not deny" corresponds to the need to do not exercise reverse psychology in the child, because if he is denied and the child realizes that the mother is trying to remove his chest, he will try to hold on to his mother even more and will suck more often than before weaning. In other words, if the child understands with the attitude of the mother "I do not want you to breastfeed anymore," the child will do the opposite, suck more.
Inverted psychology in infant feeding
My mother was an expert of the involuntary inverse psychology. I remember that from time to time I bought new yogurts and some liked them a lot. Then I said "mom, how good this yogurt" and my mother acted accordingly and bought those yogurts for months. The message that I ended up receiving was "how you like them so much, I buy them, that I know you love them and I want you to always eat them" and the logical consequence on my part was the opposite "because as you want me to eat them, I no longer I love". It wasn't a tantrum, it was that he had just had enough of so much repeated yogurt.
It follows that if a child has an obsession with a food, the ideal way to solve it is to promote eating that food, the better. My children had a crazy season for chocolate. You watched them devour the tablets and everything that carried chocolate. The logical thing in that situation would have been to try to limit the intake, buying less or distributing the amount to each other, day by day.
However, we did something similar to that with television and consoles: buy more chocolate. We leave more chocolate, more chocolate cookies and more "guardas" available for them to eat and "get fed up". Nor are we callous rulers, every time they took something we told them that, if they ate a lot, they would surely hurt their belly, but we would let them eat if they wanted to.
Now there are still chocolate and there are still cookies at home, but what used to last for hours, now lasts for days. Sometimes you even offer them chocolate and they tell you: "I don't feel like it" or "No, it'll hurt my belly."
The intensive method in this sense would be "take all the chocolate you want", so that the child gets fed up and ends up in a way abhorring it.
A sample of reverse psychology on video
I love this video because it shows how humans function in general and how wrong are those who advise limiting this or that food so that the child eats less. This is an excerpt from a documentary called "The whole truth about food" in which we can see how children are offered two foods that they like equally and that they would be distributed more or less equitably.
Then reverse psychology comes into play and a food is limited: "you cannot eat until the alarm sounds", which means "it is an exclusive food within the reach of a few ... you cannot eat it". You already know the effect. The children end up wanting to eat raisins and only raisins, although previously there was no clear preference.
The conclusion therefore is: if you want someone to eat something, tell them they can't eat it.
But ... watch out for inverse psychology
After many examples and ideas that can be used to handle as we please some aspects of our children it is necessary to discuss the possible disadvantages of reverse psychology, there are.
For starters, it is a method that does not always work, although many times. The problem is that it is a strange resource and contrary to our theoretical desires. That is, the child ends up doing what we want him to do, but he believes he is doing the opposite of what we want him to do. If after doing the opposite of what we want us to do, we are pleased to generate confusion, because the logical thing would be the opposite, to bother us.
This confusion increases even more if using reverse psychology we end up giving absurd or illogical messages like "eat all the chocolate you want" or "if you want to watch TV all afternoon." The consequence will be what we expect, to stop doing it, but the children are able to engrave our words in stone and will always remember that mom and dad advised them to watch a lot of TV and eat a lot of chocolate, and who knows if when they are older They will not begin to see as good what we said to them in the past.
In conclusion, it is a strategy that I would only use as a last resort and always trying to offer a logical message and not repeat it often. For example, yesterday I told you about "ok, son, don't go to school" ... if I give this message many times, several days, my son will finally understand that what I really want is not to go to school or that, simply, I do not care. Sometimes children are able to sacrifice their wishes to satisfy parents and maybe one day my son would tell me that "okay, dad, I'm not going today."
In the example of chocolate, as I have said, I vote to increase the offer and availability (as my mother did, who bought many equal yogurts), without limiting it, so that they eat as much as they want but without encouraging them (not telling them "eat as much as you want ") and always offering our vision (" if you eat a lot, it may hurt you "), to apply the Reverse psychology in a little coherent way.
Photos | Mahalie, Viralbus on Flickr In Babies and more | How reverse psychology works: don't read this entry (I), Reverse psychology in childhood
