Sucking Fingers in Children: Causes and Treatment

Childhood is one of the most important distinctive stages in a person’s life. Building the child's proper personality requires special attention to raise a healthy child.

Therefore, the early stages of the child's life are crucial in shaping their personality traits. How parents at home and teachers at school treat them affects their psychological and social composition. Childhood is the stage of the system; the child is gradually learning the right attitudes and behavior. There is a set of expected behaviors during the early childhood stage, which are primarily regarded as involuntary behaviors that usually result from their repetition. In other words, they result from the continuous repetition of voluntary work that becomes an involuntary practice.

Among these behaviors are some oral habits that the child usually repeats, including sucking the finger or thumb, and most of these behaviors begin and end spontaneously, but this habit affects the shape of their jaw, bite, and teeth, as well as the way they pronounce; therefore, the child must eliminate this habit as one of the bad habits.

sucking fingers

The sucking response is the first muscular activity issued by the child since birth, and it arises as a result of the combination of the functioning of oral and perioral neuromuscular mechanisms with each other well. Simpler fingertip sucking means inserting the thumb and one or more fingers into different depths of the oral cavity. This condition is so common that it was observed in the embryo in the prenatal stage, as doctors observed their presence using an echography device during the eighth month of the embryo's life.

The infant practices the finger-sucking process to occupy themselves between the times of breastfeeding; it gives them a sense of calm and relieves them of feelings of boredom or distress, but what can be accepted in early childhood behaviors, i.e., before three years, cannot be accepted after that age. The continuation of the child in that habit is considered a bad thing, and they are often reprimanded to get rid of it by the parents without realizing that psychological pressures play a role in its continuation. The mouth is the leading site for expressing emotions and affections in both children and adults as well. Therefore, stimulating the mouth is a calming factor for the child to feel comfortable.

There are two essential types of sucking, the first is nutritious sucking associated with nutrition, such as feeding from the mother's breast or the bottle. The second is the non-nutritious pattern, which is the pattern that the child takes to express their need to communicate with others and meet their desires. Hence, they resort to sucking their fingers or other similar things that make them feel happy such as pacifiers, and this habit affects up to 90% of children. Research also suggests that there are about 6% of children who maintain this habit up to the age of 11.

When does the finger-sucking habit become a bad habit that must be eliminated?

Psychologists consider that sucking fingers in children is part of the natural development of their maturity, but it may turn into one of the bad habits if this habit continues for a long time; that is, longer than usual and to the extent that it harms normal growth and develops to the point that it enters into its social development. The continuation of this habit can indicate psychological problems that hide behind it, which must be sought and treated before it worsens and prevents the growth of their personality in a normal way.

Generally, scientists have agreed that the habit of sucking is within normal limits during two or two and a half years of the child's age and becomes abnormal from the age of three and a half and causes damage to the dental facial structure if it lasts at the age of five or six years. Therefore, the best age to start treating a child for this habit is the age of three.

What are the reasons for sucking fingers in the child?

1. Psychological reasons

Doctors point out that the child’s sucking of their fingers at the moment of isolation, sleep, or at a particular moment isn’t worrying, but it becomes so if they do so when facing any new situation. This is an indication of the existence of a psychological problem or an undeclared nervous condition facing the child and is often an emotional problem, as it indicates the incompatibility of their emotional age with the environment in which they live due to the lack of adequate attention, when the child enters a frustrated situation, or when they are surprised by the presence of a new person or fear, especially when their mothers leave them alone.

2. Synthetic feeding

The baby may become accustomed to synthetic feeding and get used to sucking things. Depriving them of the bottle of milk is one of the reasons for the habit of sucking the finger as a suitable alternative to sucking the bottle.

3. Jealousy

A  young child is often jealous when seeing another child, especially if that child is the focus of the attention of others, especially parents. Jealousy is a compensatory method through which the child tries to explain their feelings of discomfort, for example, the birth of a new baby to the family and the child seeing the parents’ excessive interest in the new baby or their lack of interest in them to the same degree as that new baby. Because of their inability to change anything, they resort to compensatory behaviors, like sucking their fingers, which is usually considered one of them.

4. Hunger

Insufficient breast milk and lack of artificial milk keep a feeling of hunger in the baby.

5. Poor perception by parents

Parents' lack of knowledge of the meaning and significance of the practice and that it is only a bad habit. Often, the use of violence generates other problems for the child rather than solving the fundamental problem that causes them to retain the practice.

6. Gum massage

The child's desire to massage the gums and relieve the aches or toothache that grows is often the primary cause for the existence of this habit.

What should be done to rid the child of the habit of sucking fingers?

The treatment of the child should start from the common practice of sucking fingers through the parents. They must know the reasons behind this behavior and why it continues in their child's life. This helps to meet and compensate for a child's lack of need by sucking their fingers, whether that need is physical or psychological. Parents must also have an appropriate family atmosphere, surround the child with compassion, care, and affection, and avoid placing them in any situation that may cause them sadness and psychological harm during the period of treatment, especially reprimand and beating.

Also, children should not adopt stubborn behavior when they want or when adults refrain from fulfilling their wishes, and jealousy interferes with psychological reasons as well. All measures must be taken to limit it if found in the child by involving them in taking responsibility.

Also, to eliminate this habit, it is necessary to work to occupy the child with practical things, whether different physical games or practicing ordinary games such as installation games or coloring simple drawings and other things that make them pass the time without being bored. Another trick you can use is drawing on their fingers to remind them not to put their fingers in their mouth.

Attention should be paid to the child during sleeping, as often the finger is placed in the mouth during that condition, so it should be removed quietly and held tenderly so that the child does not get upset by taking it out of their mouth and start crying. If the age of the child exceeds to allow them to put a toy between their hands, this can be done to make them forget the habit of sucking.

In addition to the above, it is possible to use the method of enhancement by granting the child things that are dear to them or rewarding them due to their departure from this habit. It can be awarded at close times during the day and then every day once to make the required progress, snd then for a longer time, and so on until this habit is finally interrupted. If all these methods are tried and do not work, then it is better to consult the specialist doctor to seek consultation and advice from them.

In conclusion

Many mothers consider that it is not a problem for a child to suck their fingers if it keeps them calm as long as possible and that it is not a problem for concern and fear. Still, the problem of sucking fingers may be simple in shape but hides more significant issues that must be addressed early on before they worsen and become difficult to treat.

Parents must cooperate to rid their child of it. The reasons behind it, whatever they may be, are following a set of steps, starting from the child's engagement in games and ending with their involvement in various social activities that keep them away from boredom entirely and meet their psychological, social, and physical needs. The child must continue to be monitored even after leaving the habit to be wary of returning to it and to ensure the child's growth and the development of their personality in a way that makes the child a normal and good human being.