“When I grow up to be a professional footballer, I’ll buy you a house in Barcelona,” the 7-year-old son of a colleague once said deadly to his parents. The daughter (6) of a friend can also use it. “I hear her tell her friends that she can read much better than the rest of the class. That is true. Yet.’ The boasting of one’s own offspring leads to discomfort for the parents. After all, they know that boasting is experienced as unsympathetic. Should you intervene as a parent?
This is what the experts say
With young children up to the age of 7, bragging is very normal. ‘Ask a class full of toddlers who can draw best and there is a good chance that all fingers will go up in the air,’ says Sander Thomaes, professor of developmental psychology at Utrecht University. “We all want to pretend to be a little bit better than we are. Adults have learned to do this in a subtle and sophisticated way. Children do not yet know what is socially accepted and cannot yet estimate what others see through.’
Between the ages of 6 and 9 children develop a more realistic self-image. ‘They are getting better at making comparisons with others, and they understand that some peers can run faster than them.’
Interestingly, research shows that young children actually overestimate themselves. They don’t pretend to be better when they know deep down that they will never play at FC Barcelona, they really believe it. ‘We call this wishful thinking. Young children are not yet able to distinguish between the person they want to be and who they actually are.’
During his research, Thomaes asked preschoolers to predict how far they could throw a ball. “The prediction was always much further ahead. Even when building a block tower, children always estimate that it will be much higher than is the case in practice.’
Evolutionary psychologists believe that such an inflated self-image has an important function. ‘In the first years of life, a child learns a lot of new things, such as walking and reading. You need confidence for that.’
How do you handle it?
When you hear that your child is bragging to friends, should you as a parent say something about it? ‘If it doesn’t pose a problem for the friendship, I wouldn’t do anything. That friend probably also thinks that your child is better at football and that he is better at drawing’, says Monique Albeda, remedial educationalist at Kwadraad. For adults, this boasting carries a negative connotation, which is not yet present for children. ‘We value modesty. But a child is also just egocentric at that age.’
If you notice that your child is bothered by it, for example because he or she is being locked out, you can start a conversation. ‘Ask open questions, as a curious journalist would, starting with: who, what, where, when, how.’ In this way you discover why a child thinks it needs this show-off behaviour. ‘Children who overextend themselves are sometimes insecure.’
Parents can pay attention to how they give compliments to their offspring. “It often works better to praise the process and the effort, not the result,” says Albeda. ‘If you say: ‘You are so smart’, there is the pressure to get another 10 next time, which can lead to fear of failure. Instead, ask: ‘Great, a 9 for history, how did you handle that? A child then feels seen more.’
The boy in the example is now 27 and plays at AVV Sloterdijk. Eventually the reality of life sinks in on its own.