When parents are constantly busy, they might resort to buying toys for their kids instead of finding time to spend it with them. As toys lose their value and become out-of-date, kids will nag and cry their heart out for the newest trends, leaving their parents with two options: they either cave in and buy it, or they teach their kids that materialism isn’t what’s necessary in life.
Building a strong family relationship that isn’t based on materials, but instead on experiences, isn’t hard to achieve.
When you ask a child to remember their happiest memories, they will mention that time you spent the whole day at the beach, the trip you took across the country, that one time you baked together and got messy, or any other moment you took time off to focus on your kid. Happiness and well-being are essential to youngsters, and allowing them to experience emotions through human contact instead of toys they will be bored of soon is much more powerful and important.
“One of the enemies of happiness is adaptation. We buy things to make us happy, and we succeed. But only for a while. New things are exciting to us at first, but then we adapt to them,” said Dr. Thomas Gilovich, a psychology professor at Cornell University.
Many studies have shown how the greater the number of toys a kid has can negatively affect their attention span, creativity, and social skills. When having too many objects (especially those that make noises) can alter a kid’s attention span, reducing it to only focusing on that toy they have in hand, and the many others they have around them. They will not communicate or interact with people as long as they have colorful, noisy objects they can play with and break, and then move to even shinier ones.
Kids tend to use their creativity and imagination when only offered a few toys, and they will learn to take greater care of them instead of knowing they have plenty of other toys to play with. When it comes to human interaction, children will gain social skills whether by communicating more with their parents or learning to find new ways to play with one toy with other kids.
Talk to your child and do activities with them to get to know them better (and vice versa,) to encourage them to be curious and attentive to what’s around them, and to build a stronger relationship based on trust and communication.
Give them life-long experiences instead of short-lived fun through a toy they might not even remember ever owning.