From Rick Marken (940609.0900)]
Bill Leach (940608.22:44 EST(EDT)) --
I have been wondering now for a fair period of time, what the PCT
researchers may have concluded about "controlling children"?
Does PCT really even have "anything to say on the subject"?
Of course! We have something to say about everything 
I believe that the meager understanding of PCT and its' implications that
I have now tells me that most parents that I observe do two things that
are, in my opinion, seriously in conflict with what PCT teaches us about
influencing others:
It took me a while to realize that PCT does not teach us what we _should_ do.
It simply tells us what we actually do (control) and how we do it (by acting
to keep perceptual signals matching reference signals). So whether or not
a parent "forces" control of their children is not really in conflict with
what PCT teaches because PCT doesn't teach what the parent SHOULD do.
PCT teaches what is likely to happen if you do certain things -- in
particular, PCT explains what kinds of things are likely to lead to intra-
and interpersonal conflict. Since conflict usually means loss of control, and
since people ultimately survive by controlling, most people find the results
of being in conflict to be pretty unpleasant. But PCT doesn't say that you
should avoid conflict; it just says that conflict will happen under certain
circumstances -- i.e. when two or more control systems try to control the
same or a similar perceptual variable relative to two different reference
conditions.
With respect to dealing with children specifically: we discussed many of
these issues some time ago but I think it is worth dealing with them again.
They are important.
PCT suggests that parents can successfully control children for two reasons:
1) parents are much stronger and 2) parents can often control perceptions
that the child cannot yet perceive and control. This means that the chances
for a debilitating conflict are somewhat smaller when dealing with children -
- and that's a good thing because (as you noted) if you value the life of
your child (and most parents do) then there are many cases where you will
want to control the child "for its own good". What this means is that parents
are often in a position to perceive potentially dangerous aspects of the
world that the child cannot perceive. When my kids were little and were about
to run into the street I stopped them. I controlled them -- forcibly
preventing them from achieving their goal (getting the ball that rolled into
the street). I won this conflict handily because I was stronger than they
were; I was "right" to control them because I could perceive things about the
street that they couldn't and I happened to not want to see my kids get run
over. I used arbitrary control, created a conflict with their goals, and won.
Problems would result, however, if this way of dealing with kids were made a
policy -- if you tried to deal with children using control. This is because
you might end up using this approach when the kids 1) can nearly counter your
efforts (note, for example, the physical fights that sometimes result when
parents try to control adult sized adolescents) or 2) can see that the
parent's controlling is arbitary (the adolescent, for example, knows that
running into the street is not "intrinsically" wrong; they can perceive the
higher level reasons that make running or not running into the street a
"good" choice of reference signal).
We all want the world to be "right" -- ie. to have our perception of the world
match the state defined by our current reference signals -- but some of the
perceptions we want to have be "right" are perceptions of the side effects of
the controlling done by other controllers, who also want things in their
world to be "right". All PCT says is that this is what is happening; that
there are two kinds of effects in the world out there -- those created by
innanimate systems and those created by living control systems. If you grab
and try to control the wrong kind (the control system) you will end up in a
conflict with possibly undesireable results. PCT also says that the aspects
of the world that are being controlled by you and other living control
systems are of many different types (levels) and that they are being kept in
varying reference states. This is the context in which you do whatever you
do. That's all PCT is about. PCT doesn't say what _should_ happen (only your
own control systems can determine that); it just says what _will_ happen if
you do certain things.
Alluding to one of my favorite books (Zen and the Art of Motorcycle
Maintenance), PCT is about the motorcycle that is your mind; it is about how
you (and the other motorcycles around you) work. Knowledge of motorcycle
maintenance (like knowledge of PCT) doesn't tell you whether you should drive
fast or slow, on or off road, with a clean and smooth or dirty and clunky
engine. Knowledge of motorcycle maintenance helps you understand what will
happen if you twist certain dials on the motorcycle; knowledge of PCT
helps you understand what will happen when you set certain reference signals
in your brain.
Best
Rick