Infancy and Childhood

Social Development

Stranger Anxiety

• The fear of strangers that infants commonly display, beginning by about 8 months of age.

Attachment• An emotional tie with another

person; shown in young children by their seeking closeness to the caregiver and showing distress in separation.

Factors of Attachment

• Body Contact• Familiarity• Responsive Parenting

Body Contact• It was first assumed that infants

became attached to those who satisfied their need for nourishment.

Then this guy came along……..

Harry Harlow and his

Discovered that monkeys preferred the soft body contact of a cloth mother, over the nourishment of a hard/wirily mother.

Familiarity

• Attachments based on familiarity are formed during our critical periods.

Critical Periods: the optimal period shortly after birth when an organism’s exposure to certain stimuli or experiences produce proper development.

Imprinting

• The process by which certain animals form attachments during a critical period very early in life.

Do human’s imprint?

Responsive Parenting

Do parents play a part in your attachment?

•Mary Ainsworth Stranger Paradigm

•Van den Boom’s Research

Dad’s Matter Too

• We are not just mobile sperm banks!!!!

•Paternal separation puts children at increased risk for various psychological and social pathologies.

Secure Attachment Predicts Social Competence

Deprivation of Attachment• Often withdrawn, frightened and in

extreme cases speechless.

• Harlow’s monkeys would either cower in fright or act extremely aggressive. Many could not mate and if they could, the mothers were unresponsive parents.

• Is there a connection between crime and lack of childhood attachment?

Daycare

• High Quality daycare has shown no detrimental effects on children over the age of two.

• The studies go both ways for children under the age of two- no clear answer yet.

Self - Concept

• A sense of one’s identity and self-worth.

When does self-awareness start?

Child-Rearing Practices• Parenting styles have been shown to have

a positive correlational effect on a child’s self-concept

Three General Classifications of Parenting Styles:

Authoritarian Parents• Impose rules and

expect obedience.

•“Why, because I said so!!!!”

Permissive Parents

• Parents submit to their children’s desires, make few demands and use little punishment.

Authoritative Parents• Parents are both

demanding and responsive.

• Exert control by setting rules, but explain reasoning behind the rules.

• Encourage open discussion.