Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
New Visions
Health, Fitness and Religion
What We Got Wrong About Behavior

What We Got Wrong About Behavior

Last updated on: July 29, 2025 at 12:37 pm by Karl J. Forehand

What We Got Wrong About Behavior 2025-07-29T12:37:26-06:00 Karl J. Forehand

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

What We Got wrong About Behavior

Photo by Keira Burton: https://www.pexels.com/photo/desperate-screaming-young-boy-6624327/

What We Got Wrong About Behavior

It’s common to hear parents and teachers express frustration over the challenging task of parenting, teaching, and disciplining children. It can feel like you’re not doing anything right because of the inherent difficulties, and sometimes our misguided expectations. We’ve been influenced by our families, teachers, religious leaders, and personal experiences. However, at least for the past 100 years, we have also been misinformed.

Behaviorism

Whether we realize it or not, our perspectives on behavior are heavily influenced by B.F. Skinner and Behaviorism. If you don’t know, Behaviorism is “a psychological approach that emphasizes the importance of environmental consequences in shaping behavior. Skinner posited that both current and past consequences, alongside genetic factors, significantly influence how individuals behave. Central to this theory is the concept of operant conditioning, where behaviors are modified by reinforcements—events that increase the likelihood of a behavior recurring—and punishers, which decrease behavior frequency.”[1]

Most of us don’t even question this idea because we haven’t been exposed to or don’t know any other way. When we use reward and punishment to motivate children to behave (comply), it works for about 90% of children. It could be argued that it doesn’t work that well long-term because it only produces immediate results, but it may have long-term effects, such as trauma. Some children also experience neurodivergence and things that complicate their compliance with forced obedience.

Using the classroom as an example, when we yell, threaten, punish, restrict, and reward without understanding dysregulation and trauma, most students comply even if it harms them. When school, families, and religion become highly controlling, they may feel like they have succeeded because more people comply, but often there are casualties and damage resulting from their “progress.”

Teachers, parents, and religious leaders often say they spend most of their time on children who don’t follow rules. The natural response is to “do something” because they misbehave. We give a reward (carrot) or a punishment (stick), and when they still don’t follow, we assume they just don’t want to. Even worse, we label them as evil or “problems,” which makes the situation more complicated. The truth is, it’s not that they don’t want to; they just don’t know how.

Changing Direction

It helps to understand what discipline means. The concept of discipline comes from disciples (learners), emphasizing the importance of teaching (discipling). It’s that “As you walk along the way” type of teaching that is so helpful. Since a dysregulated adult cannot regulate a dysregulated child, the necessary change calls us to, “Adults fix yourself first, address your trauma, and then provide care and training to the child.” Children learn emotional regulation by observing and mirroring the adults around them, especially their caregivers. See Dr. Bruce Perry for more detailed insights.

For help with neurodivergent and more “difficult” cases, seek out trauma-informed experts to explore the rapidly developing landscape around trauma and behavior. To dive deeper into the trauma-informed world, start with the following authors and groups:

Lori L. Desautels (Revelations in Education)
Joe Brummer (Building a Trauma-Informed Restorative School)
Alice Miller (The Body Never Lies)
Bruce Perry (Trauma Research Foundation)
Peter Levine (Somatic Experiencing)
Bessel van der Kolk (The Body Keeps the Score)
Attachment and Trauma Network (Ginger Healy and Julie Beem)
Family Peace Initiative (Steve and Dorthy Hulley)
ESSDACK (Rebecca Lewis-Pankratz)
The Alliance Against Seclusion and Restraint (Guy Stephens)

Another Important Point

I was raised as a Christian from birth. I later served as a pastor for 20 years until I decided to deconstruct my faith and embark on a nomadic journey to discover truth and examine my faulty belief systems and experiences in pursuit of a more enlightened understanding. One of the strongholds was from the very core of the Christian faith, which actually originates in the Jewish scripture, The Ten Commandments.

The commandment states, “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you”.

This commandment may be part of the problem of why behaviorism is not very effective. The thinking behind the commandment is that you obey it, and if you don’t, you’re sinful, bad, or don’t really want to be “good.” Notice the carrot and the stick of behaviorism. Notice how easy it is to draw narrow boundaries around honoring your parents, and it is also easy to dismiss those who don’t “honor” these assumptions. Shame, unpredictable outcomes, and trauma are likely to follow.

I was awakened to this idea in Alice Miller’s Book, The Body Never Lies. In this book, she states, “We sometimes spend all our lives obeying a phantom that goes by the name of upbringing, morality, or religion. It forces us to ignore, repress, or fight against our natural, biological needs, and, finally, we pay for this with illness that we neither understand nor want to understand.”

We end up compensating for this the rest of our lives.

I didn’t say that we shouldn’t follow our parents’ instructions. I believe it’s a mistake to assume that when children don’t do what we expect, they’re automatically rebellious, bad, or sinful. Some people point out potential dangers, but we can’t be in survival mode every day without traumatizing those we’re trying to help.

The commandment isn’t meant to be taken literally, as we often interpret it. For example, historical evidence shows that the promised reward doesn’t always match our experiences. People who honor their parents don’t necessarily live longer than others. What’s more important is the healthy attachment between caregivers and children, along with shared experiences that help them manage and understand their world. Maybe that’s what the commandment truly intended all along.

I strongly encourage everyone to learn about the brain and how trauma functions. We are in a troubling time, but the good news is that we are gaining a deeper understanding each day about how we hurt one another. I hope we shift from Behaviorism toward learning to walk together. As we learn from each other and experience life together, we will heal our generational trauma and create a different legacy.

Remember that behavior is a form of communication. Stay tuned for that discussion!

Be where you are, Be who you are, Be at peace!

Karl Forehand

[1] https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/radical-behaviorism-according-b-f-skinner

How to Survive a Stroke

Learn to be Where You Are (Presence)

Learn to be Who You Are (Authenticity)

Finding Regulating and Somatic Healing

Getting Away From Your Trauma

Getting Out of Survival Mode

Are you genuinely committed to deconstruction and seeking more profound answers?

If that’s the case, this book was created for you. As a former pastor, I made the mistake of deconstructing a bit and then trying to start something new, as I was trained to do. The problem with that approach is that I wasn’t ready to begin something new.

I hadn’t delved deeply enough or asked enough questions. The first stage of deconstruction typically includes assessing our beliefs regarding hell and the afterlife, supporting queer individuals and women in their fight for equality, and achieving a better understanding of racism and privilege.

Many people in deconstruction communities expend significant effort criticizing Evangelicals and attempting to gain a following. While I believe they deserve intense criticism, this strategy fails to effectively tackle the problem because they generally don’t listen to us!

Our tendency to punish our former organizations sometimes overlooks the challenging process of healing and growth. It is the same trap we fell into in our former associations.

Order Now!

Campfires occupy a special spot in the mosaic of history. They act as communal hubs across different cultures and faiths. The campfire’s circular design fosters equal participation within the collective group. The flames at the center draw our focus and encourage face-to-face interactions as we exchange experiences, wisdom, and insights about the world beyond. It is where legendary myths and tales are born.

Order Now – Study Questions in each chapter!

This book is named Campfires in the Desert as it stems from nearly 400 discussions we held with individuals on our podcast, The Desert Sanctuary, and our aspiration to improve.

Available now!

Thanks for considering us, autographed copies are $20

Karl Forehand Campfires in the Desert – A Soft Book Release. Karl Forehand is a former pastor, podcaster, and award-winning author. His books include Out into the Desert, Leaning Forward, Apparent Faith: What Fatherhood Taught Me About the Father’s Heart, The Tea Shop, and Being: A Journey Toward Presence and Authenticity. He is the creator of The Desert Sanctuary podcast and community. He has been married to his wife Laura for 35 years and has one dog named Winston. His three children are grown and are beginning to multiply! You can read more about the author here.

Progressive Christian

Health, Fitness and Religion

Family, Parenting and Religion

Uncategorized

behavior

behaviorism

honor your father and mother

skinner

Previous Post

July 28, 2025

What Do I Fear?

Next Post

August 2, 2025 Is God Retributive or Restorative?

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Abuse Addiction Advent adventure Alpha Male Animals Answers Attachment Attitude authenticity Authenticty Authentiicity Awareness being Bible Black Community BLM body awarenss book Books Bravery Bullying Bypassing Certainty Certianty Chamge change children Christianity Christmas Church Comfort community Compaasion Compassion Complementarian Complementarianism Conditioning Consciousness Contemplation Control Conversation Converstations Covid-19 Creation Darkness Death Debate deconstruction demons depression desert Devil Disciples discussion Divine dreams Easter Eclipse Empathy Essence evolution evolve faith fatherhood Fear fiction Flood Focus Focusing Focussing Future Genesis Goals God Gratitude grief growth Guns Hate healing Health Heart Hell Holiday Hypnosis ignorance Improvement infallible Inner Child Integrity Intuition Jesus Jezebel Journey King LGBTQ+ Love MAGA Marriage meditation Men Mercy Message metaphysical Mindfulness Misogyny Mourning Music Mystic mystical Narcissism Nationalism Nature New Year Novel Nutrition Organization other Pain Pandemic parenting Pastors Patriarchy Patriotism Personal Growth Plan Poet poets Police politics Power practice praise Prayer presence pro-life Problem Solving Progress prolife Prophet prophets Purity Culture Purpose Queer Questions Racism Rape Rapture reconstruction Recovery Religion Resolutions Restoration Resurrection Retribution Reviews Root Cause Sanctuary Satan SBC Scripture Seeking Self-Care Self-esteem Seminary Sex Shadow shame social justice social media solitude Spirits Spirituality stillness Story Survivor Thanksgiving Theologians Theology Tradition Trauma travel Trump Uncategorized Unchurching Universe Violence Vision Voice Volunteer Vulnerability War Women Word worship Writing

Select a Month September 2026 August 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What does Paul say happens when we are baptized into Christ Jesus?

Select your answer to see how you score.

We become children of God We are baptized into his death We receive the Holy Spirit We are saved

Books by This Author Books by The Desert Sanctuary

See All Titles »