Social Development in Early Childhood

1. Social Development in Early Childhood The Development of Children (5th ed.) Cole, Cole & Lightfoot Chapter 10

2. What do you think? Individual development seems to us a product of the interplay of two trends, the striving for happiness, generally called “egoistic,” and the impulse towards merging with others in the community, which we call “altruistic.” Sigmund Freud Civilization and Its Discontents

3. Social Development: Two-Sided Personality Development Socialization Acquire the standards, values, and knowledge of society Develop unique patterns of feeling, thinking, and behaving Integrated into the larger social community Differentiated as distinctive individuals

4. Overview of the Journey • Acquiring a Social and Personal Identity • A New Moral World • Developing Self-Regulation • Aggression and Prosocial Behavior

5. Acquiring a Social and Personal Identify Sex-Role Identity Ethnic and Racial Identity Personal Identity

6. Identification • Psychological process in which children try to look, act, feel, and be likesignificant people in their social environment • Essential to the process of socialization

7. Sex-Role Identity • 2-year-olds:“Wanting to be near” mother (first love object) • 3- to 4-year-olds:“Wanting to be like” same-sex parent • Girls: Seek to become like the person with whom they have had the closest relationship • Boys: Required to become different from the person with whom they have had the closest relationship

8. Psychodynamic View (Freud) • Boys: Identification through differentiation from mother andaffiliation with father • Oedipus complex: Desire to take father’s place in mother’s affection (resolution  sexual identity) • Girls: Identification through affiliation only • Freud: Woman’s psychological makeup never becomes as independent of its emotional component as does a man’s • Chodorow: Males achieve identity through separation and are threatened by intimacy; females achieve identity through attachment and are threatened by separation

9. Social-Learning View (Bandura) • Identification through observation & imitation • Adults not only provide models for children to imitate, but also reward sex-appropriate behavior and punish cross- sex behavior

10. Social-Learning View (Bandura) Differential reinforcement • The process by which girls and boys are differently rewarded for engaging in gender-appropriate behavior • Parental encouragement is one reason boys assume traditional masculine roles, such as that of cowboy

11. Cognitive View (Kohlberg) • Identity formation as conceptual development • “I am a boy; therefore I want to do boy things; therefore the opportunity to do boy things (and to gain approval for doing them) is rewarding.” • Results from child’s active structuring of his/her experience

12. Cognitive View (Kohlberg) Three stages: • Basic sex-role identity: By 3 years old, children can label themselves as “boy” or “girl” • Sex-role stability: During early childhood, they begin to understand that sex roles are stable over time • Sex-role constancy: Completed when they understand that their sex remains the same no matter what the situation

13. Gender Schema Theory • Combined mechanisms(i.e., observation, imitation, and schema formation) • Long before they have any conceptual knowledge of sex roles, boys and girls behave differently • Males are more active and engage in more rough-and-tumble play (e.g., play “ramming” games) • Females are more likely to retreat from a “tug-of-war” and simply observe; seek to avoid collisions • These differences in play styles tend to result in self-segregation (confirmed across cultures)

14. Gender Schema Theory A girl is given 4 objects to play with. Asked about these toys later on, she will remember more about the doll than about the truck.

15. Ethnic & Racial Identity • Children are aware of ethnic group and racial differences by the time they are 4 years old • Little support for the idea that minority-group children’s recognition that they are members of a relatively powerless group translates into a negative personal sense of themselves

16. Ethnic & Racial Identity • Research finding: Young children of parents who were active in promoting Native American cultural awareness and social rights more often chose dolls representing Native Americans (Beuf, 1977)

17. Racial Socialization Racial messages communicated to children • Cultural socialization: Emphasizes racial heritage and pride • Preparation for bias: Stresses racial discrimination and prejudice • Promotion of racial mistrust: Encourages mistrust of the majority race • Egalitarianism: Emphasizes the equality of members of all races

18. Personal Identity The predictable pattern in how children describe themselves • Early childhood: Focus on specific concrete characteristics (e.g., physical attributes “I am a girl with brown hair”, what they can do “I can run fast”, their possessions “I have a cat”, social relations “I have a big brother”, and preferences “My favorite color is red”) and tend to be unrealistically positive (“I know all my ABCs”) • Later: Combine these into generalized traits (e.g., being “smart” or a “good athlete”)

19. Personal Identity Double-sided: • “I” (Subjective, looking from the inside out) – Person who exists over time and who acts and experiences • “Me” (Objective, looking from the outside in) – Includes “visible” characteristics (e.g., physical appearance, abilities, personality traits)

20. Personal Identity • Autobiographical memory: Personal narrative that helps children acquire an enduring sense of themselves • Adults assist in its formation through the recall and interpretationof events

21. A New Moral World Learning about Right and Wrong Role of Internalization

22. Learning about Right and Wrong • Heteronomous morality • Based on externally imposed controls (morality of constraint) • Autonomous morality • Based on an understanding of rules as somewhat arbitrary agreements that can be changed if everyone agrees • Appears when children enter middle childhood (Piaget)

23. Learning about Right and Wrong Three levels of rules • Moral rules: Most general; based on principles of justice and the welfare of others; cannot be transgressed • Social conventions: Important for social coordination; includes school rules, forms of address, attire and appearance, sex roles, etiquette • Personal rules: Children can make decisions based on personal preference; are able to develop individual uniqueness

24. Internalization External culturally organized experiences  internal psychological processes  organize how people behave • Id: Present at birth; is unconscious, impulsive, and concerned with the immediate satisfaction of bodily drives • Ego: Indicates the emergence of the first phase of self-regulation;serves as the intermediary between the demands of the id and the demands of the social world, which are often at odds with each other • Superego: Formation of the conscience occurs around age 5; results from children’s internalization of adult standards, rules, and admonitions

25. Internalization • Conscience emerges once children have developed generalizable, internalized standards for the way they behave • Involves self-observation, self-guidance, and self-discipline • Gives a capacity for feelings of shameand guilt

26. Internalization • In essence, children must have both the ability and the desire to behave in socially acceptable ways

27. Developing the Ability to Regulate Oneself Self-Control Regulating Thought and Action Regulating Emotions

28. Self-Control • Ability to inhibit initial impulses (i.e., stop and think before acting; balance personal desires and internalized social standards) • Inhibition of movement (e.g., “Simon says”) • Inhibition of emotions (e.g., decide not to cry when they fall down and a friend is near) • Inhibition of choice (e.g., delayed gratification – not until the age of 12 do children choose to wait for larger candy bar the next day) • Inhibition of conclusions…

29. Inhibition of Conclusions Between ages of 5 and 10, children become increasingly cautious in responding to the task of matching figures. For children older than 10, the task becomes relatively easy.

30. Regulating Thought and Action • Generates and maintains a mental representation that directs her behavior • “I need to hold up the string and put the end through the hole in the bead.” • Monitors her own progress • “I got one on; now I’ll try another.” • Modifies her problem-solving strategies • “This bead won’t go on; I need one with a bigger hole.”

31. Emotions in Transition: Infancy to Early Childhood • Emergence of secondary emotions (the self-conscious, social emotions) • Such as pride, shame, and embarrassment • Join the primary emotions (pain, anger, joy, etc.)

32. Regulating One’s Own Emotions • Babies: Suck on their fingers or pacifier, rock themselves • Ages 2-6: Avoid or reduce emotionally charged information by closing their eyes, turning away, or putting hands over their ears • Also use language to reassure (“Mommy said she’ll be right back”) and encourage themselves (“I’m a big girl; big girls can do it”) • Use active engagement (focus attention on something else) to control their interest in a forbidden toy • Preschool children who display characteristics of socioemotional competence are better liked by both their peers and teachers

33. Cultural Regulation of Emotion

34. Aggression and Prosocial Behavior Development and Causes of Aggression Controlling Aggression Understanding Others’ Emotions Developing Prosocial Behavior

35. Development of Aggression • Aggression: Committing acts intended to hurt another • Instrumental aggression: Directed at obtaining something (e.g., hitting another child to obtain a toy) • Hostile aggression: Aimed at hurting another person as a means of establishing dominance (e.g., bullying)

36. Development of Aggression Changes in aggression • Between ages of 1 & 2: Rapid increase in instrumental aggression due to new sense of self • Age 2: More likely to tease than hurt physically; begin to worry about “ownership rights”; boys become more aggressive, although girls more frequently rely on relationship aggression (“We don’t want to play with you”) • Ages 3-6: Physical tussles over possessions decrease, while verbal aggression increases; hostile aggression (bullying) makes its appearance

37. As children approach their second birthdays, teasing becomes much more frequent than physical aggression.

38. As children approach their second birthdays, acts of aggression decline significantly among girls but increase slightly among boys.

39. Causes of Aggression • Aggression is rewarded • Victim gave in or retreated, resulting in “victory” • Adults provided positive reinforce-ment by paying more attention, laughing, signaling approval, or simply by stopping coercing the child

40. Causes of Aggression • Children imitate the behavior of older role models • Physical punishments, particularly with anger, may inadvertently teach children to behave aggressively • Research: Aggressive behavior of children who had observed adult aggression was substantially higher than that of children who had watched non-aggressive interactions; made little difference whether the adult models were live or filmed…

41. Youngsters Imitate Aggressive Behavior

42. Individual Differences Research findings • Trends: Children at age 3 who behave defiantly and disobediently with adults, are aggressive toward their peers, and are impulsive and hyperactive are likely to still have these problems during middle childhood and adolescence • Genetics: Increased levels of hormone testosterone and decreased levels of neurotransmitter serotonin associated with aggressive behavior

43. Individual Differences Research findings • Environment: Poverty associated with increased aggression (parents are likely to use harsh and inconsistent discipline, perhaps due to increased stress) • Cognition: Aggressive children more often misinterpret social interactions in negative ways that fosters aggressive responses

44. Controlling Aggression 1. Development of hierarchical systems of control • Once children know their position in such a hierarchy, they challenge only those whom it is safe for them to challenge, leaving others alone and thereby reducing the amount of aggression within the group

45. Controlling Aggression 2. Vent negative feelings in a “safe way” before they explode violently (i.e., catharsis, “blowing off steam”) • However, little evidence to support this claim • Representative finding: Frustrated boys who shot at targets delivered just as many “shocks” as children who had solved arithmetic problems

46. Controlling Aggression 3. Punish aggressive behavior • Most likely to suppress aggressive behavior when the child identifies strongly with the person administering the punishment and it is employed consistently • Used inconsistently, however, punishment is likely to provoke children to further aggression • Furthermore, attempts to control children’s behavior by means of physical punishment, or by threats to apply raw power, also increase aggressiveness

47. Controlling Aggression 4. Reward non-aggressive behavior • Since young children sometimes become aggressive in order to gain attention, one strategy is to ignore it and to pay attention to children only when they are engaged in cooperative behavior • For example, an adult may step in between the children involved and pay attention only to the victim (i.e., comfort the child, give the child something interesting to do) • Side benefit: Other children who may have observed that it is appropriate to be sympathetic to the victim of aggression

48. Controlling Aggression 5. Cognitive training • Short, individual discussion with the aggressor focusing on • Aggression hurts another person and make that person unhappy • Aggression does not solve problems and only causes resentment in the other child • Children can often resolve conflicts by sharing and taking turns • In essence, helping children to become aware of the feelings of others decreases aggression

49. Berkowitz’s Model of Aggression Initial emotional reactions to an event are significantly modified by cognitive processes.

50. Understanding Others’ Emotions • 6-7 months: Babies can “read” their mothers’ faces as a guide to how they should feel about a situation • 2 years old: Know that other people feel bad when you hit them and that giving them something nice makes them feel good • 3 years old: Usually interpret other children’s emotions correctly • 5-6 years old: Agreed with adult assessment of others emotional states and of the events likely to have caused them more than 80% of the time