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Chapter 10. SOCIAL AND PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT IN MIDDLE CHILDHOOD. THE DEVELOPING SELF. Who Am I? During middle childhood. C hildren begin to view themselves : Less in terms of external physical attributes More in terms of psychological traits.
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Chapter 10 SOCIAL AND PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT IN MIDDLE CHILDHOOD
Who Am I? During middle childhood Children begin to view themselves: • Less in terms of external physical attributes • More in terms of psychological traits
Psychosocial Development in Middle Childhood by Erik Erikson Success in the industry-vs-inferiority stage brings: • feelings of mastery and proficiency • a growing sense of competence • Industry: feelings of mastery and proficiency and a growing sense of competence • Inferiority: feelings of failure and inadequacy
Erik Erikson's middle childhood • Period from 6 to 12 • Encompasses the INDUSTRY-Vs-INFERIORITY STAGE • Characterized by a focus on efforts to attain competence in meeting the challenges of: • Parents • Peers • School • Other complexities of the modern world
Understanding One's Self: A New Response to “Who Am I?” How do school-agers change? • Children realize they are good at some things and not so good at others • Self-concept and self-esteem continue to develop • Children's self-concepts become divided into personal and academic spheres
Looking Inward: The Development of Self As children get older, their views of self become more differentiated, comprising several personal and academic spheres.
Social Comparison Children use social comparison to themselves judge abilities, expertise, and opinions of others Festinger (1959) • When objective measures are absent children rely on social reality • How others act, think, feel, and view the world
Sometimes… Children Make Downward Social Comparisons • With others who are: • Less competent • Less successful • To raise or protect their self-esteem
Self-Esteem: Developing a Positive-or Negative-View of the Self Develops in important ways during middle childhood • Children increasingly compare themselves to others • Children are developing their own standards • Parent’s influence wanes • Peer influence ascends • Influence of sports stars, movie stars, others • For most children, overall self-esteem improves in middle childhood
Change and Stability in Self-Esteem Generally, overall self-esteem is high during middle childhood, but it begins to decline around the age of 12 • School transition • Chronically low self-esteem for some
Highly under-recognized psychological principle HFE: Downward spiral of errors A Cycle of Low Self-Esteem
Breaking the Cycle of Failure • Promoting development of self-esteem • Using authoritative child-rearing style • Authoritarian & indulgent parenting createslow self esteem in children • Providing opportunities for success • Rewarding successful behaviors • Peer group management
Race and Self-Esteem Early research found that African Americans had lower self-esteem than whites • Recent research shows earlier findings were overstated • But there are differences compared to ‘whites’ • African Americans: lower but higher around 11 • Hispanic Americans: upward curve but below whites • Asian Americans: opposite white • Explanations tortured need research on minorities in other cultures like ‘white’ kids in India, China, Africa
Why Does This Occur? Social Identity Theory • Members of a minority group accept negative views held by majority group only if they perceive little realistic possibility of changing power and status differences between groups • Individuals with strong sense of self independent of group membership have more self esteem and more positive self views. • This tends to support Social Identity Theory
Are Children of Immigrant Families Well Adjusted? • Tend to have equal or better grades than children with US born parents • Often more highly motivated to succeed and place greater value on education than do children in nonimmigrant families • Show similar levels of self-esteem to nonimmigrant children • Report feeling less popular and less in control of their lives • Depends on: • Age this effect diminishes by adolescence • Ethnic group: Legal vs illegal, country of origin, race etc.
Moral Development: Kohlberg • Proposes series of fixed stages in development of moral reasoning • Uses moral dilemmas to assess moral reasoning • Provides good account of moral judgment but not adequate at predicting moral behavior
Kohlberg Criticisms • Based solely on observations of members of Western cultures • Theory initially based largely on data from males • Cross-cultural research finds industrialized, technologically advanced cultures move through the stages more rapidly than nonindustrialized countries. • Nature of morality may differ in diverse cultures • Focus of information: business, religious, < Psych
Carol Gilligan • Way boys and girls raised leads to differences in moral reasoning • Boys view morality primarily in terms of justice & fairness. • Girls see morality in terms of responsibility and compassion toward individuals and a willingness to sacrifice for relationships. • Suggests Kohlberg's theory inadequate and places girls’ moral reasoning at lower level than boys’
Gilligan's Stages of Morality in Girls Think back to our discussion of the tactics of power & physical strength Vs. less powerful and physically weaker
Kinds of Aggression from Chapter 8 Effective strategy when bigger stronger Effective strategy when smaller weaker A kind of asymmetrical warfare
Friends in Middle Childhood • Provide emotional support & help kids handle stress • Teach children how to manage & control emotions • Teach about communication with others • Foster intellectual growth • Allow children to practice relationship skills
Damon's Stages of Friendship Secrets (Shh)
King or Queen of the Hill…Status Hierarchies • Children's friendships show clear hierarchies in terms of status • Status is the evaluation of a role or person by other relevant members of a group
High Status Children • Form friendships with high status children • More likely to form exclusive and desirable cliques • Tend to play with a greater number of children • Have greater access to resources such as games, toys, books, and information
Depends on your POV • All these descriptive terms are relative. • Relative status • Relative to individual norms • Relative to OTHER’s perspectives • “Annoying” to one person may be teasing or even “attentive” to another person • “Cooperative” may be another’s “suck-up” • Other groupings besides status hierarchy are important • Clicks of all types: Goth, motorheads, dorks, geeks, bookworms, band members, motorcycle owners, ? • Racial/ethnic or wealth or neighborhood or parent’s jobs or hobbies/interests • Family associations, military brats, where you’re from
Yah, but… • Generally popular children are friendly, open, and cooperative • one subset of popular boys displays an array of negative behaviors, including being aggressive, disruptive, and causing trouble. • Despite these behaviors, they may be viewed as cool and tough by their peers, and they are often remarkably popular. • This popularity may occur in part because they are seen as boldly breaking rules that others feel constrained to follow.
Social Problem-Solving and Information Processing Kenneth Dodge Children’s problem solving proceeds through several steps involving different information processing strategies
Low Status Children • Form friendships with other lower status children • Tend to play with a lower number of children than higher status children • Are more likely to play with younger or less popular children • Tend to follow the lead of higher status children
Especially during puberty Unpopular Children
Unpopular Children Lack of popularity may take two forms Neglected children • Receive relatively little attention from their peers in the form of either positive or negative interaction Rejected children • Are actively disliked and their peers may react to them in an obviously negative manner
Gender and Friendships: The Sex Segregation of Middle Childhood
Boyfriend, girlfriend…any friend? • Avoidance of opposite sex becomes very pronounced during middle childhood • Children's friendships are almost entirely sex-segregated • When sexes interact it is called “border work,” is often romantic, and helps emphasize clear boundaries between sexes
Boys and Friendship interactions are interrupted when status is challenged Composed of rankings that represent the relative social power of those in a group hierarchy.
Gender challenges of adolescence • Hierarchies must be blended in group dating • Social power styles must be interwoven • To the extent this occurs couples gain disproportional social position
FAMILY AND SCHOOL: SHAPING CHILDREN’S BEHAVIOR IN MIDDLE CHILDHOOD
Middle Childhood in the 21st Century In addition to other changes, children experience: • Increasing independence • Co-regulation with parents • Sibling relationships and rivalry • brothers and sisters can provide support, companionship, and a sense of security • they can also be a source of strife.
Siblings Siblings • Children who negotiate well w/ siblings in early childhood • enjoy better relations with their teachers and classmates in middle childhood. • Destructive conflict solving between siblings is associated w/ • continued aggressiveness in boys. • Sibling relationships are likely to endure across lifespan • Early relationships between siblings shape how children relate to others and choices made in later life • Older children also can function as role models for their younger sibling, but not always in a positive way.
What about children who have no siblings? • Only children are as well-adjusted as children with brothers and sisters • In some ways, only children are better-adjusted, often having higher self-esteem and stronger motivation to achieve • --------- • May be more gender impaired if no opposite gender sibling
When Both Parents Work Outside the Home: How Do Children Fare? In most cases, children fare quite well • When parents • Are loving • Are sensitive to their children's needs • Provide appropriate substitute care • Good adjustment of children relates to psychological adjustment of parents, especially mothers
Happy wife – Happy lifeApplies to kids too • women who are satisfied with their lives tend to be more nurturing with their children. • High satisfaction w/ work may provide better psychological support of kids • According to the book: • Kids with full time working parents spend essentially the same amount of time with family, in class, with friends, and alone as children in families where one parent stays at home. • This can not possibly be true.
