Infancy and Toddlerhood Personality and Sociocultural Development

1. Infancy and Toddlerhood Personality and Sociocultural Development Chapter 5 5

2. Infancy and ToddlerhoodPersonality and Sociocultural Development • The Foundations of Personality and Social Development • The Development of Trust • Attachment • Separating from the Caregiver • The Family System: A Broader Context • Infants and Toddlers with Special Needs

3. The Foundations of Personality and Social Development • Emotional Development • In the first two years of life, babies develop attachment to caregivers • They learn to separate and gain a secure sense of themselves • The development of emotions and emotional self-control depends on interactions that occur between infants and caregivers • Infant emotional well-being depends on effective parent-child communication

5. Temperament • Temperament is the inborn, characteristic way a person reacts to the world • Thomas and Chess concluded that there are three temperament styles: • Easy: 40% of children • Difficult: 10% of children • Slow-to-warm-up: 15% of children • Other (combination of other three styles): 35%

6. Video Clip • Interview with Thomas and Chess on the basic styles of temperament • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgXwCqzh9B8

7. Video Clip • Applied-type description of temperament and the importance of “match” • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyVYQzsQ-CY

8. Styles of Temperament

9. Temperament • Rothbart and colleagues developed a more precise measure of infant temperament • These dimensions of temperament have shown stability across the lifespan • Rothbart’s studies suggest that temperament has a strong biological base • Temperament style may change through interactions with family and other caregivers • “Fit” of parent and child temperaments is an important determinant of infant-caregiver interaction and child adjustment

10. Rothbart’s Scale of Infant Temperament

11. The Development of Trust • Erikson’s first development task – trust versus mistrust • Feeding and Comfort • Feeding and comforting behaviors are key to development of trust • Infants develop trust when they come to expect their needs will be met • A balance needs to be struck between trust in the caregiver and the need to teach the child to form a healthy sense of mistrust necessary for self-protection • Cultural differences exist in feeding and comforting practices

12. Attachment • Attachment is the emotional bond with caregivers. • Attachment to primary caregiver usually occurs by 8 to 9 months of age. • Mary Ainsworth studied attachment with 12-to-18-month-old toddlers in a setting known as the “strange situation.” • Ainsworth concluded that there are two main styles of attachment: • Secure • Insecure • Resistant • Avoidant • Disorganized/disoriented

13. Video Clip • Ainsworth’s strange situation • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTsewNrHUHU

14. Ainsworth’s Strange-Situation Paradigm

15. Attachment • Effects of Attachment • Longitudinal studies show dramatic differences in personality and social development of securely and insecurely attached infants as early as 18 months • Secure infants are more curious, sociable, independent, and competent than their insecurely attached peers • Insecure children may exhibit hyperactivity or chronic stress, higher levels of aggressiveness, depression, and have feeding problems

16. Explaining Attachment • Why and how does the attachment relationship develop? • Conditioning and reinforcement based on needs being met • Attachment may be an imprinting behavior • Harry Harlow’s studies suggest that a social bond is more important than food and physical presence • According to Bowlby, attachment depends on the synchrony between infant and caregiver • When parents are responsive, stronger attachment results

17. Video Clip • Harlow’s test of the importance of contact comfort • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLrBrk9DXVk

18. Bowlby’s Stages of Attachment

19. Attachment and Trust • Securely attached infants are more apt to achieve trust • When attachment goes awry, mistrust is likely to develop • Insecure attachment may mean that children are emotionally and physically deprived, even subject to abuse and neglect

20. Separating from the Caregiver • Stranger anxiety – fear of strangers • Separation anxiety – fear of separation from caregiver • Both are closely tied to cognitive development. • Separation anxiety may result when infants are exposed to the unexpected—discrepancyhypothesis • Infants may express anxiety when they see it in others, as they engage in social referencing

21. The Development of Autonomy • During second year, children establish a sense of their own autonomy • According to Erikson, this stage is a conflict between autonomy versus shame and doubt • Autonomy is facilitated when trust has been established in infancy

22. The Development of Autonomy • Parents must set limits on children’s behavior through use of appropriate discipline • Appropriate discipline is, in effect, feedback about the child’s behavior • Feedback may include praise or scolding • Negative feedback must focus on the behavior, not the child

23. Prosocial Behavior • During the second year, children learn to cooperate, share, help and respond emphatically to others—prosocial behavior • The development of empathy—the ability to understand another’s feelings and perspective—is closely linked to secure attachment • Children of warm and loving mothers are more likely to express empathy at the age of 2

24. Development of Self • By 7 months, children are beginning to realize they are separate and unique beings (and this is when they develop stranger anxiety) • They begin to learn that they can make things happen • By 18 months they can recognize themselves in the mirror • They become aware of their sex and start to exhibit gender-specific behaviors at about 21 months • By the end of their second year, their language is filled with references to “me” and “mine,” a sure sign of a sense of self

25. Attachment and Separation • Becoming attached and learning to separate from the caregiver are fundamental development tasks of the first two years of life • Temperament, attachment, social referencing, parental discipline, and development of self-concept are all factors in the development of personality during infancy and toddlerhood

26. The Family System: A Broader Context • Fathers play a greater role in childrearing in the United States today than they have in the past • Mothers are still the primary caregivers in most U.S. families • Fathers tend to be more physical and spontaneous with play • Other family members assist in child care, especially in collectivist cultures • Grandparents usually form their own attachment relationship with children

27. Child Care • Due to modernization and social changes, many more women work out side the home • Child care is needed in most U.S. households of infants and toddlers today • 60% of mothers with children under the age of 3 and 63% of mothers with children ages 3 to 5 work outside the home and need child care • There is almost no public or government assistance for childcare, unless the family has a very low income

28. Infants and Toddlers with Special Needs • Visual Impairments • Unknowing caregiver may mistake poor vision for lack of responsiveness • Hearing Impairments • May not be detected until child is 2 years or older • Hard-of-hearing child may be mistaken as being disobedient • Severe Disabilities • Such as cerebral palsy or severe retardation may put children at risk for parental rejection or withdrawal • Having a severely disabled child puts stress on family and challenges caregivers

29. Abuse and Neglect • Child Abuse • Intentional infliction of physical or psychological injury • Child Neglect • Failure to respond to and provide for needs of child; may be unintentional • More subtle than abuse • Effects of abuse and neglect • Interferes with attachment • May lead to developmental delays (cognitive and language) • Failure-to-thrive syndrome • Children may need to be removed from abusive and neglectful homes and placed in foster care

30. Summary • During the first two years of life, infants experience social and emotional development, as they learn emotional control and establish critically important relationships with their caregivers • Babies develop attachments to their caregivers and learn to separate from them as they gain a secure sense of themselves • Temperament refers to the inborn, characteristic way a person reacts to the world, and temperament is often stable across development

31. Summary • Erik Erikson saw the task of this stage of development as achieving a sense of trust versus a sense of mistrust • Trust development when infants feel that they can depend on their caregivers to meet their needs • Attachment usually occurs by 8 or 9 months, and it is the most influential social relationship that infants establish • Harlow’s research with infant monkeys showed that healthy attachment requires more than food and physical presence—it is a social bond

32. Summary • Emotional and social development takes place within the context of the family • Since the mid-20th century, fathers in the United States have played an increasingly important role in child care, but the primary responsibility for child care still falls to the mother • Grandparents fill an important role in child care, especially in single-parent families or when both parents work, and 61% of mothers of children under the age of 3 work outside the home. • Finding good and reliable child care is a major challenge for working parents

33. Summary • Children with special needs provide special challenges to parents and caregivers, especially children with severe disabilities • Child abuse and neglect impact a child’s physical, cognitive, and emotional development Attachment is particularly affected. • Programs are needed to address the underlying causes of abuse, such as poverty, drug abuse and mental illness