Agreeable kids may seem convenient. They’re more likely to let their parents tie their shoes, apply sunscreen or eat their vegetables without fuss.
But if kids only comply with rules to make their parents happy, they’re more likely to become anxious, burnt out adults, child psychologist Becky Kennedy said at the Fast Company Innovation Festival 2025 on September 18.
“We love our people-pleasers when they’re young … because they’ve gotten very good at noticing if we’re happy with them and changing their behavior accordingly,” said Kennedy, host of the parenting podcast “Good Inside” and a Columbia University-trained psychologist. “Long term, if we want to know what leads to a lot of adult anxiety and emptiness, it’s those literal qualities.”
Helping your people-pleasing kid at an early age can help them be more successful in the future, Kennedy said. To help kids find their own identities, they need to be reminded and encouraged to explore their own wants and needs, so they can learn who they are outside of satisfying other people’s expectations, she added.
“We train kids, especially little girls, to disappoint themselves over and over in the name of making other people happy,” Kennedy said. “We shouldn’t be surprised when they get older that they don’t get into the best relationships and don’t feel great about themselves.”
Putting other people’s needs before your own can come with long-term consequences, some experts say — and being a people-pleaser as an adult is often associated with avoiding conflict, suppressing emotions and relying on external validation to gain self-esteem. Those traits can prevent you from forming close relationships, developing self-esteem and even getting ahead at work.
You can help your child break their people-pleasing habits with these three strategies, Kennedy said in an Instagram reel posted in April 2023:
1. Let your child know you still love them when you’re mad. Try saying something like: “Yes, I am upset, sweetie, and even when I’m upset, I still love you,” Kennedy advised.
2. Identify and encourage when your child does something separately from you. If you notice them doing something differently from you, point it out: “You see me eating yogurt for breakfast most days, and you still know that you don’t like yogurt. You prefer bagels. I love that you’re a kid who knows who they really are,” said Kennedy.
3. Nudge your kids to make decisions for themselves, even when other people are upset. You can balance teaching your child habits, like sharing with others, with developing their own self-esteem. If they’re playing with a toy truck, and their brother wants it, you can remind them: “You can keep it a little longer before you give it to him. It’s not your job to make him happy,” Kennedy said.
Kids often learn best by example, Kennedy wrote in the post’s Instagram caption. If you put other people’s needs ahead of your own, struggle to stand up for yourself or have poor self-talk, your child is likely to pick up similar habits, she said.
Wanting to make others happy isn’t wrong, of course — it just can’t come before satisfying your own needs, experts typically say. People-pleasers can help prevent their own burnout by setting boundaries, self-help author Hailey Magee told the Harvard Business Review’s “HBR IdeaCast” podcast in July 2024.
If a co-worker or a member of the Parent Teacher Association asks you if you have time to help, for example, take a moment to take inventory of your own tasks, responsibilities and energy levels before you volunteer to assist them, recommended Magee.
“It does actually benefit your workplace for you to be able to show up rested, balanced, and not feeling this subtle lurking resentment toward your workplace and your colleagues,” she said.
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