The father's email was hardly ferocious. When children are young, we express disappointment when they do something they should not do and express encouragement when they do something they should.

" People don’t behave badly because they lack information about their shortcomings. They behave badly because they’ve fallen into patterns of destructive behavior from which they’re unable to escape."

The behavior described by the father could hardly be genetic or environmental shortcomings. If lack of information is not the cause, then why do we say that problem youth need more and more education with superman-like teachers and fewer kids per class?

"Human behavior flows from hidden springs and calls for constant and crafty prodding more than blunt hectoring. The way to get someone out of a negative cascade is not with a ferocious e-mail trying to attack their bad behavior. It’s to go on offense and try to maximize some alternative good behavior. There’s a trove of research suggesting that it’s best to tackle negative behaviors obliquely, by redirecting attention toward different, positive ones."

Yes, hidden springs that mysterious yet totally doable thing that, if we did it right, then we'd know we were doing it, somehow.