Boredom is a common part of life, and it serves a useful purpose: motivateing people to pursue new goals and challenges.
I am writing a book about modern parenting, and I’ve noticed many parents try to help their kids avoid boredom. They might see it as a negative emotion that they don’t want their children to experience. Or they might steer them into doing something that they see as more productive.
There are various reasons they want to prevent their children from being bored. Many parents are busy with work. They’re stressed about money, child care responsibilities and managing other parts of daily life. Making sure a child is occupied at home can help parents work uninterrupted, or make dinner, without their kids complaining they are bored.
Parents may also feel pressure for their children to succeed, whether that means getting admitted to a selective school, or becoming a good athlete or an accomplished musician.
Children also spend less time playing freely outside and more time participating in structured activities than they did a few decades ago.
Easy access to screens has made it possible to avoid boredom more than ever before.
But before striving to eliminate boredom completely, it’s important to know the benefits of boredom. One benefit is personal growth.
Boredom is a signal that a change is needed, whether it be a change in scenery, activity, or company. Psychologists have found that the experience of boredom can lead to discovering new goals and trying new activities.
Harvard public and nonprofit leadership professor Arthur Brooks has found that boredom is necessary for reflection. Downtime leaves room to ask the big questions in life and find meaning.
Children who are rarely bored could become adults who cannot cope with boredom. Boredom also offers a brain boost that can cultivate a child’s innate curiosity and creativity.
Learning to manage boredom and other negative emotions is an important life skill. When children manage their own time, it can help them develop executive function, which includes the ability to set goals and make plans.
The benefits of boredom make sense from an evolutionary perspective. Boredom affects all ages, genders and cultures. Natural selection favors traits that offer a leg up, so it is unlikely that boredom would be so prevalent if it did not deliver some advantages.
Parents should be wary of treating boredom as a problem they must solve for their children. Psychologists have found that college students with overly involved parents suffer from more depression.
Other research shows that young children who were given screens to help them calm down were less equipped to regulate their emotions as they got older.
Tolerating boredom is a skill that many children resist learning or do not have the opportunity to develop.
It takes practice to learn how to handle boredom. Start with small doses of boredom and work up to longer stretches of unstructured time. Tips for parents include getting kids outside, suggesting a new game or recipe, or simply resting.
Younger children might need ideas for what they could do when bored. Parents do not need to play with them every time they are bored, but offering suggestions is helpful.
Encouraging older children to solve the problem of boredom themselves is empowering. Let them know boredom is a normal part of life.
As children get used to occasional boredom, it will take them longer to become bored in the future. People find life less boring once they regularly experience boredom.
Letting go of the obligation to keep children entertained could also help parents feel less stressed. So the next time a kid complains, “I’m bored,” don’t feel guilty or frustrated.
Let children know that a little boredom isn’t just OK – in fact, it’s good for them.
Margaret Murray is an associate professor of public communication and culture studies at the University of Michigan Dearborn. Distributed by The Conversation and The Associated Press.
