Infancy: Social and Emotional Development Truth or Fiction

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Chapter 7InfancySocial and Emotional
Development
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Infancy Social and Emotional Development
Truth or Fiction?

• Infants who are securely attached to their
  mothers do not like to stray from them.
• You can estimate how strongly infants are
  attached to their fathers if you know how many
  diapers per week the father changes.

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Infancy Social and Emotional Development
Truth or Fiction?

• Child abusers have frequently been the victims of
  child abuse themselves.
• Autistic children may respond to people as if
  they were pieces of furniture.

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Infancy Social and Emotional Development
Truth or Fiction?

• Children placed in day care are more aggressive
  than children who are cared for in the home.
• Fear of strangers is abnormal among infants.

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Infancy Social and Emotional Development
Truth or Fiction?

• All children are born with the same
  temperament. Treatment by caregivers determines
  whether they are difficult or easy-going.
• Girls prefer dolls and toy animals, and boys
  prefer trucks and sports equipment only after
  they have become aware of the gender roles
  assigned to them by society.

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Attachment

• Bonds That Endure

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What is Meant by Attachment?

• Enduring emotional tie between one animal/person
  and another specific individual
• Separation anxiety
• Experienced by infant when contact can not be
  maintained with caregiver
• Attachment is assessed by Strange Situation

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Patterns of Attachment?

• Secure attachment
• Mildly protest mothers departure, seek
  interaction upon her return and are easily
  comforted by her
• Avoidant attachment
• Least distressed by mothers departure, ignore
  mother upon her return
• Ambivalent/resistant attachment
• Show severe distress when mother leaves and
  ambivalence upon her return, clinging and pushing
  away their mother
• Disorganized/disoriented attachment
• Dazed, confused or disoriented

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Developing in a World of Diversity

• Cross-Cultural Patterns of Attachment

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Is it Better for an Infant to be Securely
Attached to its Caregiver?

• Securely attached infants and toddlers
• Happier, more sociable, more cooperative
• Use mother as secure base for exploration
• Have longer attention spans, are less impulsive
  and better problem solvers
• At 5 and 6, are better liked, more competent,
  less aggressive and have fewer behavioral problems

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What are the Roles of the Parents in the
Formation of Bonds of Attachment?

• High-quality care contributes to security
• Siblings develop similar attachment relationships
  with their mother
• Infants temperament and caregivers behavior
  both contribute to attachment
• What determines an infants attachment to their
  father?
• Quality of the time the father spends with the
  baby
• Amount of affectionate interaction between father
  and infant

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Stability of Attachment?

• When caregiving remains constant attachment
  persists
• When caregiving changes attachment can change
• Early attachment patterns tend to endure even
  into adulthood

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What did Ainsworth Learn about Stages of
Attachment?

• Three phases of attachment
• Initial-preattachment phase
• Birth to 3 months indiscriminate affection
• Attachment-in-the-making phase
• 3 to 6 months preference for familiar figures
• Clear-cut-attachment phase
• Begins at 6 months intensified dependence on
  primary caregiver
• Most children form more than one attachment

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Figure 7.2 The Development of Attachment
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How do Different Theorists Emphasize Nature or
Nurture in their Explanation of the Development
of Attachment?

• Cognitive View of Attachment
• Infant must develop object permanence prior to
  forming attachment
• Behavioral View of Attachment
• Infants become conditioned to caregivers
• Psychoanalytic Views of Attachment
• Caregiver becomes a love object
• Harlows View of Attachment
• Content comfort is key to attachment

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How do Different Theorists Emphasize Nature or
Nurture in their Explanation of the Development
of Attachment?

• Ethological View of Attachment
• Attachment is an inborn fixed action pattern
  (FAP) which occurs during a critical period in
  response to releasing stimulus.
• In humans, babys smile in response to human
  voice or face
• 2-3-month emergence of social smile
• In non-humans, FAP occurs during critical period
  imprinting

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A Closer Look

• Hormones and AttachmentOf Mice and Men and
  Women and Infants

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When Attachment Fails
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What are the Findings of the Harlows Studies on
the Effects of Social Deprivation with Monkeys?

• Monkeys reared in isolation
• Later avoided contact with other monkeys
• Did not attempt to fend off attacks by other
  monkeys
• Females who later bore children ignored or abused
  them
• Attempts to overcome effects of deprivation
• Deprived monkeys are placed with younger monkeys
• Eventually expand contacts with other monkeys
• Children socially withdrawn and placed with
  younger playmates make gains in social and
  emotional development

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What do we Know about the Effects of Social
Deprivation on Humans?

• Institutionalized children with little social
  stimulation encounter developmental problems
• May become withdrawn and depressed
• Infants may require sensory stimulation and
  social interference more than a specific
  relationship with a primary caregiver
• Infants have much capacity to recover from
  deprivation

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Figure 7.7 The Development of Adopted Children
Separated from Temporary Foster Parents
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What is the Incidence of Child Abuse and Neglect?

• Nearly 3 million American children are neglected
  or abused each year
• 1 in 6 experiences serious injury
• More than 150,000 are sexually abused
• Researchers believe 50- 60 of abuse and neglect
  go unreported
• Abused children show high incidence of personal,
  social problems, and psychological disorders
• Less securely attached to parents
• Less intimate with peers
• More aggressive, angry and noncompliant with
  other children

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A Closer Look

• How Child Abuse May Set the Stage for
  Psychological Disorders in Adulthood

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Causes of Child Abuse

• Situational stress
• History of child abuse
• Lack of coping and problem solving skills
• Deficiency in child-rearing skills
• Substance abuse

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Why Does Child Abuse Run in Families?

• Parents are role models, even abusive ones
• Exposure to violence may lead to violence as a
  norm
• Rationalization of hurting children

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Dealing with Child Abuse

• Reporting child abuse
• Many states require suspicions to be reported
• Preventing child abuse
• Strengthening parenting skills
• Home visits to high risk groups
• Providing information, ie. child abuse hotline

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A Closer Look

• What to Do if You Think a Child Has Been the
  Victim of Sexual Abuse

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Autism Spectrum Disorders
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What are Autism Spectrum Disorders?

• Characterized by impairment in communication
  skills, social interactions, and repetitive
  stereotyped behavior
• Becomes evident by age 3
• Forms of autism spectrum disorders (ASDs)
• Aspergers disorder social deficits and
  stereotyped behavior
• Retts disorder physical, behavioral, motor and
  cognitive abnormalities, begins a few months
  after normal development
• Childhood disintegrative disorder loss of
  previously acquired skills, begins 2 years after
  normal development

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What is Autism?

• Children with autism do not show interest in
  social interaction, may avoid eye contact and
  have weak or absent attachment
• Features of autism
• aloneness
• communication problems
• intolerance of change
• stereotypical behaviors
• mutism
• echolalia
• self-mutilation

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What are the Origins of Autism Spectrum Disorder?

• Biological factors
• Evidenced by genetic studies
• Focus on neurological involvement
• Abnormal brain wave patterns or seizures
• Structural differences in brains
• Fewer receptors for neurotransmitters

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What Can be Done to Help Children with Autism
Spectrum Disorders?

• Behavior modification
• Drug therapies are under study
• Use of SSRIs and major tranquilizers

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Day Care
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Does Day Care Affect Childrens Bonds of
Attachment? Does it Affect Social and Cognitive
Development?

• No highly likelihood of insecure attachment for
  infants in day care
• Social development of children in day care
• More independent, self confident, outgoing,
  affectionate and more cooperative
• Cognitive development of children in quality day
  care
• Outperform children who remain at home
• Children in day care show more aggression
• Aggression may indicate independence

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A Closer Look

• Finding Day Care You
• (and Your Children) Can Live With

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Emotional Development
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What are Emotions?

• A state of feeling that has physiological,
  situational, and cognitive components
• Physiological body reaction
• Situational environmental presence
• Cognitive ideas and thoughts

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How do Emotions Develop?

• Bridges and Stroufes Theory of Emotion
• Born with one emotion diffused excitement
• Other emotions differentiate over time
• Cognitive development is necessary for
  differentiation of emotions
• Izards Theory of Emotion
• Born with several emotional states
• Appearance of those emotions is linked to
  cognitive development and social experiences

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Figure 7.8 Illustrations from Izards Maximally
Discriminative Facial Movement Scoring System
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Is Fear of Strangers Normal?

• Fear of strangers stranger anxiety is normal
• Appears at about 6 to 9 months
• Development of stranger anxiety
• 4 5 months smile more at mother than
  strangers
• Older infants show distress
• Fear peaks at 9 to 12 months and decline in 2nd
  year, or
• Second peak at 18 to 24 months and decline in 3rd
  year
• Show less distress when mothers are present
• Closer to stranger, more distressed

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When Does Social Referencing Develop?

• Social referencing seeking anothers perception
  of a situation to help form our own view
• Development of social referencing
• Appears as early as 6 months
• Use caregivers facial expression and tone of
  voice

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What is Emotional Regulation?

• Refers to ways young children control their own
  emotions
• Caregivers help infants learn to regulate
  emotions
• Interplay between caregiver and infant
• Secure mothers children more able to positively
  regulate emotions

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Personality Development
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What is Self-Concept?

• The sense of self
• Emerges gradually during infancy
• Development of self-concept
• Mirror technique 18 months - infants
  demonstrate self concept
• 30 months can point to their own picture
• Presence of self-awareness allows
• Sharing and cooperation
• Self-conscious emotions

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Psychoanalytic Views of Self-Concept

• Separation-individuation
• Necessary for self-concept (5 months through 3
  years)
• Erikson task is to develop autonomy
• Freud - task is to develop independence and
  control but focuses on childs bodily functions
• Demonstration of autonomy and independence
• Noncompliance with parental requests

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What is Meant by the Temperament of a Child?

• Characteristic way of relating and adapting to
  the world present very early in life
• Basic core of personality
• Has a genetic component
• Research establishes characteristics of
  temperament

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What Types of Temperament do we Find among
Children?

• Thomas and Chess (1989) three types of
  temperament
• Easy (40 of sample)
• regular schedule, adapts easily, generally
  cheerful
• Difficult (10 of sample)
• irregular schedule, slow at accept and adapt to
  change, responds negatively
• Slow to warm up (15 of sample)
• somewhat irregular schedule, respond negatively
  to new experiences, but adapt slowly after
  repeated exposure

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Goodness of Fit

• Good fit
• Parents modify expectations, attitudes and
  behaviors to assist child In developing a more
  positive temperament
• Poor fit
• Discrepancy between childs behavior style and
  parents expectations

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How do Girls and Boys Differ in their Social,
Emotional and Other Behaviors?

• Infant behaviors
• Girls sit, crawl and walk earlier than boys
• By 12 to 18 months difference in toy preference
• girls prefer dolls, doll furniture, dishes and
  toy animals
• boys prefer transportation toys, tools, and
  sports equipment
• Adult behaviors
• Adults respond differently to boys and girls
• Parent behaviors
• More rough and tumble play with sons
• Talk to and smile at daughters more
• Favorable reactions when child plays with
  appropriate gender toys

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Lessons in Observation Gender

• Are sex differences present at birth or learned?
  Support your answer with research.What evidence
  can you find in the video to support the idea
  that sex differences are present at birth or
  learned.
• How do the adults in the video describe their
  children in terms of gender?How do parental
  expectations contribute to childrens ideas of
  gender-appropriate roles and activities?

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Lessons in Observation Gender

• In what ways does the physical environment
  reinforce gender role stereotypes and
  gender-typed behavior?Give examples from the
  video.
• At what age do children begin to engage in
  gender-specific play.Describe the play
  interactions illustrated on the video. Are the
  children engaged in gender specific play
  activities?Do they learn to choose these play
  activities, or are they biologically based? Why?