Page 36 - How Children Learn to Hate Their Parents

How Behavior Effects Attitudes:
As if it were not enough that children could be influenced simply by rehearsing a negative attitude that leads them to avoid visitation, social psychologists also point out that the more we behave in certain ways, the more we strengthen our own attitudes about it. In other words, if social psychologists are onto something, then the more we allow children to refuse visitation with a parent, the more hateful of that parent they will become.
We have all encountered people who lie so vigorously and with such conviction that they convince themselves that the lie is true. The more opportunity one is given to practice the lie, the more conviction is gained and the stronger the attitude about the lie.
This helps to explain why children will continue to refuse visitation even when they feel guilty or ambivalent about it. The more they refuse, the less ambivalent they may become and as a result, may ultimately express stronger negative feelings for the parent who they no longer see. The act of “saying” becomes “believing.” This was powerfully demonstrated by Klaas (1978) who showed that even when people were not bribed or coerced, the very act of providing a negative attribution to someone, even when there is doubt or personal misgivings about the representation will often strengthen the negative feeling until it becomes unambiguously negative.
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