How do we make our toddler less afraid of robots?
I'm sure the headline made you curious? :-) But I'm serious, and I am not referring to toys but actual household machines. We have a Roomba floor vacuum cleaner and a lawn mower.
My 20-month son is afraid of these machines, even when they're parked and turned off. He will back away from them and start to whine. I've told him, and shown him, that the machines are harmless and not evil, but that didn't convince him.
He is not afraid of kitchen machines that are much more noisy. He's also (mostly) not afraid of the regular vacuum cleaner and the regular electric lawn mower that we also use, nor of other machines or cars, mopeds, bikes, etc. even if they are noisy. But he is afraid of the power drill. And terrified of mascots operated by a person inside (as in Disneyland).
Do you have experience with similar situations? What can be the cause? What helped?
Note: Just to be clear, I'm well aware that any lawnmower can be very dangerous, and we make absolutely sure that there is no way for the lawnmower to get near our son. But he can still see it.
I'm including some marketing photos so you can see what size the robots are:
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They get over it. Familiarity breeds contempt. Eventually, you'll find the kid trying to figure out a way to ride around on them.
My son is afraid of vacuums and water. My daughter is afraid of balloons. I don't think you can ascribe much rationality to it, other than as an instinct that works in unexplainable ways. My other daughter is almost completely fearless, probably a symptom of her cerebral palsy, and trust me, as a parent a little irrational fear is preferable.
My guess is that these things frighten him (minus the drill - but both my children hated the drill until they topped 4-5 years old because of the noise) because they act on their own; but unlike anything else that acts on its own (you, pets, other children etc), there's no visual cues as to what the machine is going to do next. There's no facial expression or body language to read.
Obviously this fear won't persist forever; once he learns to understand the difference between living things with motives etc; and robots that 'just do'; then he'll be fine.
It might be just as well to let him get round this problem himself rather than trying to force the issue.
I've often found with my children and their irrational fears that we had to completely ease up to give them the room to explore the fear themselves; if they felt that someone was trying to force them, however well-meaning or pleasant, then they dug in deeper.
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