Achievement Gap & Behavior Problems in Middle Childhood

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Week Four: Parenting Middle Childhood

BEHS343: Parenting Today

Instructor: Xiaofang (Bethanie) Wang Lanterman, Ph.D., M.Ed., M.S., LGMFT

Welcome to Week Four of Parenting Today. This week, we turn our attention to parenting children in middle childhood.

Parenting Middle Childhood

Middle Childhood –5/6-12 years – “school aged”

Middle childhood lasts from about 6 to 12 years of age, but the ending of this stage is dictated partially by the start of middle school and by the beginning of puberty, so there is some variability here.

Role of parents across age groups

Promote Physical Development

Promote Intellectual Development

Promote Emotional Development

Promote Autonomy

Remember from last week that the role of parents across age groups is the same throughout childhood.

Parents must promote physical development – remember we talked last week about safety, health, nutrition, and sleep –

and they must promote intellectual development . In infants, intellectual development includes providing proper stimulation for the growth of skills like language.

Parents must also foster emotional development, including continuing to strengthen attachment bonds throughout childhood.

Finally, parents are responsible for promoting autonomy. While autonomy is not much of an issue for infants, by the time children are 2, they begin to see themselves as separate from parents, and from this point on, parents slowly give up more and more power and autonomy to the child. Remember the ultimate goal of parenting is to raise responsible and competent adults. By the time a child reaches adulthood, they should be more or less fully autonomous, though some might argue that children depend on their parents - at least emotionally – throughout life.

Development of 6-12 year olds (School-aged)

Now let’s take a closer look at school aged children from 6 to 12 years of age.

School-aged: 6-12 years

Major tasks for child:

School adaptation

Self-confidence

Peer group membership

Close friendships

Parental role:

Open communication

Acceptance

Indirect monitoring

As children work their way through elementary school,

the major tasks for the child change a bit.

They become “really good” at school and settle into a routine and habits based around being students

And as they become more competent, they grow in self-confidence

This is the time when children strongly identify with their peer group

And they begin to form their first truly close friendships. This is when most children can identify a best friend.

Parents during this stage must be able to exhibit certain qualities in order to be effective.

They must encourage open communication with their children and make an effort to know what children are learning in school.

They must show acceptance and encouragement for the growing independence of their children

And supervision becomes a little more indirect, monitoring from a distance rather than closely supervising every move. Here we see children becoming their own people, and while they are still emotionally connected to their parents, they are beginning to make their own decisions out of the parents’ immediate view.

Physical development

No differences in stature between boys and girls

Age 5: average height = 42”, weight 40-45 lbs

Age 10: average height = 52”,weight 75-80 lbs

Good coordination

Gross and fine motor skills reached by age 7

Gross motor skills: bigger movements using large muscles

Fine motor skills: small movements using small muscles

In terms of physical development, as in the preschool years, there are no differences in stature between boys and girls

At the age of 5, average height is 42” and weight is 40-45 pounds.

By the age of 10, average height is 52” – a full 10” taller – and weight nearly doubles to about 75-80 pounds

Children become very coordinated

With gross and fine motor skills being very solid by the age of 7.

Intellectual development

3 new milestones

General reasoning ability – observation of objective properties, beginning of abstract reasoning

Independent ability to organize information

Learn within a structured setting (school) – beginning of evaluated performance

In terms of intellectual development, school aged children achieve 3 important milestones

First, their general reasoning ability improves and they begin to show evidence of abstract reasoning. That is, they can draw conclusions based on facts or information that are not visible or concrete.

Second, the ability to abstract allows children of this age to organize information on their own – they don’t need mom, dad or teacher to provide them with explicit instructions.

Finally, children learn within a structured setting – that is, school. In school, children for maybe the first time begin to have their performance evaluated in the form of tests, assignments, and report cards. Because of this, the intellectual development of children begins to be shaped according to the expectations of a social institution.

School

Structures daytime hours and evening hours for children and parents

Foundation for later life – higher education, work, income, social skills

Can protect against risk factors in later childhood (drug use, crime)

Can be a place of rejection and low self-esteem

School is a very important factor in childhood development.

It structures the day for children. They get into the routine of going to school in the daytime and spending time with family in the evening.

School is the foundation for later life. How well a child navigates the demands of school dictates whether they can expect to get a college education, it dictates the kinds of jobs and income children can expect to get and it helps to build the social skills children need to function as adults.

The lessons learned in school can help to protect children against risk factors in later childhood. For example, drug education, sex education, civics class and so on all provide valuable information about how personal conduct intersects with societal laws.

School can also be a place where children learn bad habits or form bad associations which set them up for failure. For some, it can be a place of rejection and low self-esteem.

COMMUNITY

personnel

Parts of the school system

parent

teacher

peers

CHILD

We can think of the school system as an intersecting set of systems that all impact the child. This is reminiscent of Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological theory of nested social systems. In the figure you see, there are multiple elements that are embedded within a larger community, represented by the dark background. The child is positioned in the center, and his or her success in school depends on a variety of factors, represented by the other circles. Of course, parents play an important role in making sure that children are prepared and present in school. Teachers become a secondary parental figure in the elementary school years. They spend so much time with children that they come to know them very well and can identify potential barriers to success. These teachers are supported by other personnel like school administrators, librarians, technology specialists, and counselors who might be called upon to provide resources that support the child. And finally, the behavior of peers can be influential in a child’s success in school.

Roles of interested parties

Parents:

Involvement predicts achievement

Calm and positive encouragement

Clear, fair, realistic expectations

Advocates for child when necessary

Schools:

Teachers are strong attachment figures

Clear, fair, realistic expectations

Provide instructional and emotional support

Identify high risk students

Research on the role of parents during these years suggests that involvement in the home predicts achievement in school. Calm and positive encouragement and setting clear, fair, and realistic expectations with homework, building study skills, or discussing frustrations of the day can help to empower children, but when this is not enough, being an advocate for children when necessary is a parent’s responsibility. For example, when homework demands are constantly unreasonable, parents need to speak up.

Schools have responsibilities for helping children to develop as well.

Primarily this is the responsibility of teachers, who become strong attachment figures for children

Like parents, teachers must set clear, fair, and realistic expectations of children and

Provide instructional and emotional support as needed

Teachers must also be vigilant in identifying students who are at risk for learning disabilities, behavioral problems, and emotional difficulties and work with parents and professionals to develop a plan of action.

Roles of interested parties

Peers

Sources of intellectual, social and cultural information

Practice skills

Emotional support

Sometimes negative and traumatic

Peers, as I mentioned earlier, can be highly influential. Most children form close highly bonded friendships with other children. Peers can be sources of intellectual, social and cultural information. They help one another out and practice skills on one another. They also provide emotional support. On the other hand, some children might be scapegoated and bullied, and once this starts, the impact on children can be traumatic and long term. Peer relationships, both positive and negative, can profoundly impact success in school.

State of US Schools

According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) – triennial assessment

In 2015, United States ranked 38thout of 71 countries in math and 24th in science despite spending $115K per child

In 2015, US was 20th in reading, 19th in science and 31st in math out of 35 OECD member countries

In mathematics, the United States performed below the OECD average and fell significantly from between 2012 and 2015

2015 PISA: https://www.oecd.org/pisa/PISA-2015-United-States.pdf

Pew Research Center: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/02/15/u-s-students-internationally-math-science/

The top ten countries were:

Singapore

Hong Kong

South Korea

Japan

Taiwan

Finland

Estonia

Switzerland

Netherlands

Canada

20th in reading

19th in science

31st for Math

As always, I try to move beyond the parent-child dyad and examine the larger picture. In terms of education, you might wonder how we measure up compared to the rest of the world. Certainly, parents in the US ought to be concerned about the quality of education their children are receiving. After all, the US pays about $115,000 per student, one of the highest rates in the world. Unfortunately, this high price tag does not appear to be yielding very good results.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) measures the performance of 15 year olds in 76 economically developed countries every year. In 2015, the US was ranked 28th overall.

The Programme for International Student Assessment or PISA is another global academic performance indicator. The PISA is a triennial survey of 15 year olds. The last one that we have results for was in 2012 – US was 26/34 countries; 17th in reading, 20th in science, and 27th in math.

SES is a major explanatory factor, meaning that there is a significant relationship between socioeconomic status and how children perform on academic measures.

2015 PISA Results -The Top 30 Countries in Each subject: Reading

You might be wondering who did well. Well, this flag is a hint. Can you guess which school system is #1 in the world?

According to the OEDC the answer is Singapore!

Here is the top 30 countries in reading. You can see that the top 5 performing countries are Singapore, Hong Kong (China), Canada, Finland, and Ireland in that order, while U.S. ranked 24th.

2015 PISA Results -The Top 30 Countries in Each subject: Science

In Science, The top 5 performing countries are Singapore, Japan, Estonia, Taiwan, and Finland in that order, while U.S. ranked 25th.

2015 PISA Results -The Top 30 Countries in Each subject: Math

In math, the top 5 performing countries in math are all from Asia: Singapore, Hong Kong (China), Macao (China), Taiwan, and Japan in that order, while U.S. outside of the top 30 list (US: 31st in math out of 35 OECD member countries.)

In summary, the top 5 performing countries are most from Asia. Finland, a country with a very different approach to education, was ranked #4 in reading and #5 in science in 2015.

The poor showing of the United States in education mirrors the poor showing in terms of health care. We are paying a lot of money for both, but not getting great results. Should parents and the nation be concerned? Absolutely. The underperformance of US children impacts the job market, economic development, and national security. And parents who want their children to be upwardly mobile and to do better than the generation that came before may find that a subpar educational system makes this all but (nearly) impossible.

Emotional Development

Identity development

Self-esteem

Self-concept

Gender identity

Racial/Ethnic identity

Sexual orientation

Prosocial development

Moral development

Self-regulation

We’ve talked about physical and intellectual development of school aged children. Now let’s take a look at emotional development. Freud called this age period the “latent” phase, because on the face of it, it appears that children are not doing anything other than going to school and learning new skills. As it happens, this is a very busy time for emotional development, and it has to do with the fact that children spend a lot of time in social environments. As a result, they inevitably make comparisons between themselves and their peers.

The end result is the consolidation of several forms of identity

This includes self-esteem – which is how people feel about themselves (for example, low self-esteem means that people don’t particularly like themselves) –

and self-concept, which is a collection of beliefs that people hold about who they are

This can include perceptions about gender, or what we call gender identity – am I a boy or a girl?

And racial or ethnic identity which can include ideas about race, national origin and so forth

We’ll talk more about sexual orientation in the adolescent phase, but know that this is yet another form of self-identity that develops in childhood.

Understanding who you are is an important aspect of emotional development. You can imagine that being confused about any of these identities can lead to feelings of uncertainty and isolation.

Another important part of emotional development in children is prosocial development –all this word means is that children need to learn how to get along in socially acceptable ways.

During the school years we also see the development of moral identity and as it happens, children develop morality in predictable ways as we’ll explore in a moment.

Finally, emotional development during this age period requires children to become increasingly self-regulated. They must learn to control themselves in order to be a functioning member of society. So we can see that the school aged years are not just about learning reading, writing and arithmetic, emotional development is tied very closely to how students learn to get along with others. Obviously, parents must play a key role in helping children to understand which customs, traditions, and values to embrace in order to have a healthy sense of self that blends well with the world outside the home.

Self-Esteem

Linked to two factors:

Feelings of competence where it matters

Physical appearance

Social acceptance

What else?

Amount of social support

Image source: http://cdn.empoweringparents.com/EP/images/children-low-self-esteem.jpg

Self-esteem is linked to 2 factors.

First, self-esteem is about feeling competent in areas that are important to you, so

If you place a lot of stock in your physical appearance and that’s important to you, your self-esteem will hinge on how good you think you look.

If you place a lot of stock in being socially accepted, your self-esteem will hinge on how well others accept or include you.

I’m sure there are other dimensions of self that you can think of that might be important to your self-esteem. Things like intelligence, academic achievement, service, faith, money. The list goes on and on. Basically, anything that makes you feel potentially good or bad about yourself is what we’re talking about here.

The second factor linked to self-esteem is the amount of social support you receive for the qualities that are important to you. So, if your self-esteem hinges on being physically fit, the positive support of others telling you that you look great will boost your self-esteem. On the other hand, if you think you look good, but no one else comments, your self-esteem can take a hit. In the case of children, the approval of adults, particularly parents, is essential in building a strong sense of self and self-worth. If you’ve ever seen babies ham it up (overact) for an audience, you know that they love the attention, but even more, they are looking for approval.

Development of self-identity

Children with high self-esteem like to explore, adapt more easily to frustration

Children with poor self-esteem:

Mothers often more cold and angry

Sensitive to negative feedback

Generalize the negative feedback from mothers to others (e.g. “If mom doesn’t like me, then no one likes me” )

It’s important for parents to build self-esteem in their children. I know some would argue that building self-esteem too much is the same as spoiling, but there is evidence that children with high self-esteem are more likely to explore and adapt more easily to frustration. Both of these qualities lead to children who do well in school.

In contrast, children who have poor self-esteem

tend to have mothers who are more cold and angry in their parenting style.

Perhaps as a result of this, children with low self-esteem are hypersensitive to negative feedback.

And they will generalize any negative feedback from mother to others. So for example, they may tell themselves, if mom doesn’t like me, then no one must like me. Again, another instance of the importance of parents in helping children to develop well.

Development of Self-Identity

Toddlers learn through exploration that they are separate from parents

Preschool children begin to see themselves in dichotomous terms (good-bad, pretty-ugly) that relate to behavior

School aged children view themselves in more general terms (characteristics) rather than their behaviors

More balanced view of abilities

Evaluate their own behavior

If we trace the development of self-identity, we can see that it actually begins in toddlerhood, when toddlers begin to see themselves as separate from their parents. That is, they begin to recognize that they have an independent “self.”

When children enter the preschool years, they see themselves in dichotomous terms, for example, good versus bad, pretty versus ugly. Usually they learn these words from parents and often these terms are linked with behavior. These ideas are simple abstractions, so we shouldn’t be surprised that young children, who have trouble with abstraction - are black and white in their thinking.

By the time children are school aged, they can view themselves in terms of more general characteristics that are separate from behavior.

And they have a more balanced view of their abilities (for example, not good or bad, but somewhere in the middle) and they

Have the ability to evaluate and correct their own behavior.

This is a good time for children to get involved in activities that build skills because they are eager to learn and are mature enough to know how to make improvements. This can include sports, music lessons, art lessons, and so on.

Promoting self-identity

Parents’ Role:

Allow children to make more choices as they grow

Sensitivity and responsivity

Model confidence and flexibility

Image source: http://c4228740.r40.cf2.rackcdn.com/baby-girl-choosing-her-clothes.jpg

http://cdn.sheknows.com/articles/2011/08/kids-activities.jpg

How do parents help to promote self-identity?

Well, remember that parents need to slowly relinquish power over time. Part of this is allowing children to make more choices as they grow. With toddlers, this can include letting children pick out their clothing for the day. If the clothes don’t match, parents can encourage children to change their minds, but if they don’t, it’s ok. Giving a toddler a greater sense of responsibility and empowerment is far more important than whether they match! As kids get older, parents might suggest that they choose an extracurricular activity to pursue. Extracurriculars are a good way for children to learn new skills, persistence, and frustration tolerance. Parents should help to structure the child’s practice and encourage them not to give up.

Of course, parents need to be sensitive and responsive. If it seems like children are involved in activities that are not a good fit, they need to know how to change course without damaging the child’s self-esteem.

The more parents can model confidence and flexibility in the face of challenges, the more likely the child is to adopt those same qualities.

Gender Identity

“an individual’s personal experience of what it means to be a boy or girl, man or woman”

Continues throughout life

Shaped by biology, culture, child-rearing practices, social norms, etc.

Cuddy, Crotty, Chong, & Norton (2010). Men as Cultural Ideals: How Culture Shapes Gender Stereotypes.

Another form of identity that develops in early childhood is that of gender identity,

which is defined as “an individual’s personal experience of what it means to be a boy or girl, man or woman.”

Believe or not, this identity is continually revisited and refined throughout life and

is shaped by several factors including biology, culture, child-rearing practices, and social norms.

For example, three studies have shown how culture shapes the contents of gender stereotypes, such that men are perceived as possessing more of whatever traits are culturally valued. In Study 1, Americans rated men as less interdependent than women; Koreans, however, showed the opposite pattern, rating men as more interdependent than women, deviating from the “universal” gender stereotype of male independence. In Study 2, bi-cultural Korean American participants rated men as less interdependent if they completed a survey in English, but as more interdependent if they completed the survey in Korean, demonstrating how cultural frames influence the contents of gender stereotypes. In Study 3, American college students rated a male student as higher on whichever trait – ambitiousness or sociability – they were told was the most important cultural value at their university, establishing that cultural values causally impact the contents of gender stereotypes. (Cuddy, Crotty, Chong, & Norton, 2010).

Gender roles also change over time. A survey of 3,500 Americans in 2009 found that young men and women alike are challenging traditional gender roles and expecting to share in paid work as well as tending the household and children (Lewis, K, 2018).

Gender Identity

2 years – gender identification occurs

3-5 years – gender is stable across time

5-7 years – gender is consistent (regardless of appearance)

“Gender schema” – an organized set of thoughts and beliefs about what it means to be a boy or a girl, male or female

Gender identification begins at age 2 and becomes stable between 3 and 5 years of age. When gender identity is stable, children know that they identify as a boy or a girl and that this is not going to change. Between 5 and 7 years of age, gender identity becomes consistent, meaning that children recognize that being a girl or boy isn’t altered by changes to appearance, so if a girl cuts her hair and dresses in boy’s clothes, she is still a girl.

Part of developing gender identity is forming a gender schema, an organized set of thoughts and beliefs about what it means to be a boy or a girl, or a male or a female. This schema may include gender stereotypes like the fact that pink means girl and blue means boy, or that boys are strong and tough while girls are delicate and soft. These stereotypes are deeply rooted in our socialization process.

Socializing gender roles

Parents teach children about gender roles:

Model gender behaviors directly

Stimulate gender-stereotyped behaviors in their interactions with children

Often subtle

Mothers more responsive to irritable infant sons, talk more to daughters

Infant boys tossed in the air more than infant girls

Toddler boys given more autonomy than girls 1

Leaper, 2002

How do children learn these gender schema? Through parents, of course!

Parents teach gender roles by modeling gender behaviors directly (mom cooks, dad mows the lawn)

And they stimulate gender stereotyped behaviors through their interactions with their children.

These behaviors can be very subtle. For example,

One study showed that mothers are more responsive to irritable infant sons, but they talk more to infant daughters. I’m sure if you asked these mothers, you’d find that they weren’t even aware of the differences in their behaviors.

Another study showed that when you dress an infant in boy clothes, they are tossed higher in the air than if you dress the same baby in girl clothes. Clearly, there is a belief that girls are more fragile and boys are more tough.

And yet another study showed that when you ask parents about what they allow their toddlers to do, toddler boys are given more autonomy than girls.

Gender differences

No major differences in behaviors until 18 months

2 years

Boys more active, like building things

Girls like arts, crafts, and reading

3 years

Same gender peer groups form

Boys more aggressive and active

Girls more helpful and sometimes fearful

And these differences in parental behavior result in changes in infant behavior that show up around 18 months of age – about the time that children become really mobile

At 2 years of age,

studies have found that boys are more active and like building things, while

Girls are more likely to like art, crafts, and reading – quieter activities

By 3 years,

Boys and girls start to prefer same gender peer groups. You can see this in pre-K and in play groups.

At 3, boys are more aggressive and active than girls, while

Girls are more helpful and sometimes express fear in response to the aggression of boys.

Ethnic identity

“A psychological attachment to a group sharing a common ancestral heritage based on nationality, language, and culture.”

Image source: http://data.whicdn.com/images/45846976/large.png

Another form of identity that I mentioned is ethnic identity, which is “a psychological attachment to a group sharing a common ancestral heritage based on nationality, language, and culture.” Ethnicity is more salient for some families than others. Children of families that are of different racial and religious backgrounds, or come from a different country of origin (i.e. immigrants) are more likely to develop a salient ethnic identity than children who are born into a mainstream family.

Ethnic identity

Age 3 – recognize ethnic identity if based on easily recognized characteristic (e.g. physical appearance)

Age 5 – recognize ethnic identity if based on less obvious characteristics (e.g. religion)

Age 7 – realize ethnicity is stable

Like gender identity, children develop an ethnic identity early on.

By the age of 3, children can recognize their ethnic identity if the are easily recognized through a physical characteristic. For example, children from a different racial group will notice that they are different from the mainstream group at around 3 years of age.

By the age of 5, children will recognize that they are ethnically different along characteristics that are less obvious. For example, a child born into a Jewish family may not be physically different looking from his mainstream peers, but the child will know by the age of 5 that he is Jewish because of what he learns from his parents.

By the age of 7, children know that their ethnicity is stable and lifelong.

Socializing Ethnic identity

Exposure to customs, rituals, dress and cuisine reinforce pride in ethnicity

Can be the source of shame if child faces negative reaction from peers

Positive identity is achieved through affirmation by parents, relatives, friends

Image source: https://greenwalledtower.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/kimbap.jpg

How do children know about their ethnicity?

From birth, they are exposed to the customs, rituals, dress and cuisine of their ethnic background. Generally speaking, these reinforce pride in being ethnically different, however,

as children move into the school aged years, ethnicity can also be a source of shame if the child encounters negative reactions from peers. In some cases, children from different ethnic backgrounds can be mocked or bullied for being different, and this can negatively impact self-esteem.

To counteract this, children must develop a positive sense of identity that is affirmed by parents, family, and friends.

Development of Relationships

Now that we’ve talked about the different types of identity that form in early childhood, let’s talk about the important relationships that must be in place in order for a child to develop normally.

Key relationships

Parent-parent

Parent-child

Siblings

Peers

As children grow, their social circles widen. Each type of relationship plays an important role in child development. We’ll focus on

The parent-parent relationship

The parent-child relationship

Sibling relationships

And peer relationships

Parent-parent relationship

The most important relationship for a child (even more than parent-child)

Parental conflict creates anxiety in children

Gender roles still evident

Mothers spend twice as much time in housework and childcare 1

Bianchi, Robinson, & Milkie (2006)

The relationship between parents is the most important relationship for a child, even more than that of the parent-child relationship. (In some cultures, for example, in China, parent-child relationship is valued as more important than parent-parent relationship, which may create some problems for both the parents and the child in the long run.)

This is because the relationship between parents is the primary dyadic relationship that teaches babies about how grown ups are supposed to interact. A strong and positive relationship between parents also ensures that baby is well-cared for. When the parent-parent relationship is conflicted, it creates considerable anxiety in children which is detrimental to normal development.

The parent-parent relationship also teaches children about gender roles and from an early age teaches children about gender-based expectations that they keep with them until adulthood.

For example, mothers still spend twice as much time doing housework and childcare as men, despite the fact that many mothers are working full time.

Parent-child relationship

Role of parents 1

Be an interactive partner with child

Be an instructor for the child

Provide activities and opportunities for growth

Children begin to disobey and test limits

Parents must begin to teach rules and encourage self-regulation

Parke and Buriel (2006)

Of course, the parent-child relationship is also very important. Parents must be interactive partners with the child and act as a child’s first teacher, providing activities and opportunities for growth. As children grow, they begin to disobey and test limits, and so parents teach rules and encourage self-regulation.

Parent-child relationship - goals

Attachment

Builds on the work of earlier years

Builds security and trust in relationships

Motivates child to learn family values and rules

Socialize gender and ethnic identities

Sharing family stories to build language and strengthen autobiographical memory

Stimulate physical, emotional, and intellectual growth through play

Remember that I told you that attachment is the primary task in infancy.

As children get older, reinforcing the bonds of attachment that begin at birth is still a top priority and in so doing,

children learn to feel secure and have trust in others.

Attachment between parent and child and the desire of children to please their parents motivates children to learn the values and rules of the family.

A second goal of the parent-child relationship is to help children socialize and develop the gender and ethic identities mentioned earlier.

By sharing family stories, parents help to build language and strengthen autobiographical memory, something that further strengthens a child’s sense of identity.

Finally as parents play with their children, they stimulate physical, emotional and intellectual growth.

Parent-child relationship changes

Parents have half as much time with children in elementary school than they do with preschoolers

Show less affection

Secure attachment => school success

“Co-regulation” - Control shifts from parent to child – children make decisions, parent monitor, supervise and approve

Conflicts arise around rules, behavior and personality

As children grow, the parent-child relationships changes. For example, when children transition to elementary school, parents spend half as much time with their children as they did when their kids are in preschool. This fundamentally changes the parent-child relationship

The relationship becomes less affectionate

And the concerns about secure attachment present in earlier years becomes concerns about school success

As children enter school, parents are forced to give them some independence and control. Children begin to make decisions, but

parents haven’t completely relinquished control as the child’s decisions are supervised and must be approved of by the parent. The sharing of power at this stage is called “co-regulation.”

Not surprisingly, as children get a taste of being able to make decisions for themselves, there are inevitable moments of conflict around rules, behaviors and ways in which children express their personalities.

Father-child relationship

Fathers have a unique role in childrearing

Role of “father” has evolved in the past century

Image source for “Father Knows Best” : http://www.chicagonow.com/token-female/files/2013/05/FatherKnowsBest.jpg

Image source – modern father: https://regesquattuor.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/kings-at-tnc.jpg

Jeynes, W. H. (2016). Meta-Analysis on the Roles of Fathers in Parenting: Are They Unique? Marriage & Family Review, 52:7, 665-688, DOI: 10.1080/01494929.2016.1157121

Livingston, G. (2014). Growing Number of Dads Home with the Kids. Pew Research Center. Retrieved on July 11, 2018: http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2014/06/05/growing-number-of-dads-home-with-the-kids/

Oftentimes, when we refer to the “parent-child” relationship, we’re really talking about mother as the primary caregiver. Let’s take a second to look at the father-child relationship because fathers seem to have a special role, a role that has evolved over time.

On the left, you see a typical nuclear family from the 1950’s – this is a picture from a series called “Father Knows Best,” a popular television series where dad worked, mom was a homemaker, and the children were clean and well-behaved. Dinner was on the table every night and of course, father knows best. Since then, we have noted that there are many new ways to be a family.

The image on the right shows a picture of a dad who has chosen to be a stay-at-home parent, something that was unheard of until fairly recently.

A meta-analysis of 34 studies published in 2016 has indicated that the role of fathers in raising children is unique and can be distinguished in kind from the role of mothers in childrearing, and the father’s unique role held across the age of the child (older, age 7–22 years, versus younger youth, age 0–6 years).

The overall trend for all age groups indicated that mothers tend to be more nurturing and emotionally supportive than are fathers (Denham, Hideko, & Wyatt, 2010; Rubin, 2010; Tam, 2009; Zeman et al., 2010).

However, fathers tend to focus more than do mothers on preparing children for their lives ahead (Denham et al., 2010; Tam, 2009; Thomas, Farrell, & Barnes, 1996; Zeman et al., 2010).

Fathers also tended to have greater perception than mothers into the likely long-term trajectories of the behavior patterns of their children (Denham et al., 2010; McKinney & Cliff Renk, 2008), and

The effects for the uniqueness of the father’s role held for both boys and girls for the general measure of the uniqueness of the father’s role but also for the father’s role in social outcomes, psychological measures, and academic achievement.

Fathers do supply a unique contribution that is associated with positive psychological, social, and academic outcomes of children.

This meta-analysis also found that the effects of the unique role of fathering was about the same for boys and girls. Even though fathers provided more emotional support for their daughters than they did their sons. In fact, the emotional support provided by fathers for their daughters was often the same and at times exceeded that provided by mothers.

However, in the past half century, a rising share of fathers don’t live with their children at all. About 16 percent of fathers with young children lived apart from all of their children.

Whites are significantly more likely than blacks and Hispanics to be living with their children.

Fathers with higher levels of education are also more likely than less educated dads to be living with their kids.

The role of fathers has evolved over time. On the top right, you see a typical nuclear family from the 1950’s – this is a picture from a series called “Father Knows Best,” a popular television series where dad worked, mom was a homemaker, and the children were clean and well-behaved. Dinner was on the table every night and of course, father knows best. Since then, we have noted that there are many new ways to be a family. The image at the bottom shows a picture of a dad who has chosen to be a stay-at-home parent, something that was unheard of until fairly recently.

Father-child relationship: Stay-at-Home Dads (Pew Research, 2013)

A survey conducted by Pew Research Center revealed that

The number of fathers who are at home with their children for any reason has nearly doubled since 1989, when 1.1 million were in this category. This number has risen markedly in recent years, up to 2 million in 2012, as revealed in graph 1 on the left.

While most stay-at-home parents are mothers, fathers represent a growing share of all at-home parents – 16% in 2012, up from 10% in 1989. As revealed in graph 2 in the middle, roughly a quarter of these stay-at-home fathers (23%) report that they are home mainly because they cannot find a job. Nearly as many (21%) say the main reason they are home is to care for their home or family. This represents a fourfold increase from 1989, when only 5% of stay-at-home fathers said they were home primarily to care for family.

Still, the largest share of stay-at-home fathers (35%) is at home due to illness or disability. This is in sharp contrast to stay-at-home mothers, most of whom (73%) report that they are home specifically to care for their home or family4; just 11% are home due to their own illness or disability.

As demonstrated in graph 3 on the right: The public is largely supportive of the idea of mothers staying at home with their children, but they place less value on having a stay-at-home father.

In a 2013 Pew Research Center survey, fully 51% of respondents said children are better off if their mother is home and doesn’t hold a job. By comparison, only 8% said children are better off if their father is home and doesn’t work. On the other hand, 34% of adults said children are just as well off if their mother works, while 76% said the same about children with working fathers.

In 2012, about 16 percent of fathers with young children lived apart from all of their children.

Father-child relationship: Evolving Role of New American Fathers (Pew Research, 2013)

Being a father in this era of changing family structures and converging gender roles means more than bringing home a paycheck or delivering punishment to a misbehaving child. A nationally representative survey of 1,004 adults conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2013 found that Americans expect dad to be more of a moral teacher and emotional comforter than a breadwinner or disciplinarian (Figure 1).

Compared to the role of mothers, 41% of the survey respondents said that being an income providers is an extremely important role for father, compared with just 25% who felt that way about mothers

This gap is notable in light of a recent Pew Research Center report, based on U.S. Census Bureau data, which showed that mothers are the sole or primary breadwinner in 40% of all households that have a child or children under the age of 18, up from 11% in 1960.

When it comes to providing emotional support to children. Some 61% of survey respondents say this is an extremely important role for mothers, compared with 52% who say the same about fathers

Father-child relationship: New American Fathers’ Role by Demographics (Pew Research, 2013)

There are some differences by age, race, parental status and gender in the pattern of responses.

Adults under the age of 65 are consistently more likely than older people to say that it is “extremely important” for a father to provide each of the four items tested for his children.

Blacks and whites1 broadly agree on the importance of three of the paternal roles tested in the survey. The one clear exception: the relative importance of both fathers and mothers to provide income to support their families. According to the survey, blacks are far more likely than whites to see earning a living as a top responsibility of dads and moms.

Father-child relationship

Fathers have a unique role in childrearing

Distinguished in kind from the role of mothers in childrearing

Held across the age of the child

Focus more than on preparing children for their lives ahead

Greater perception into the likely long-term trajectories of the behavior patterns of their children

Held for both boys and girls

Provide more emotional support for their daughters vs. sons, and >=that provided by mothers.

The effects the same for boys and girls

Fathers have a unique role in raising children. A meta-analysis of 34 studies published in 2016 indicated that the role of fathers in raising children can be distinguished in kind from the role of mothers in childrearing, and the father’s unique role held across the age of the child (older, age 7–22 years, versus younger youth, age 0–6 years).

The overall trend for all age groups indicated that mothers tend to be more nurturing and emotionally supportive than are fathers

However, fathers tend to focus more than do mothers on preparing children for their lives ahead

Fathers also tended to have greater perception than mothers into the likely long-term trajectories of the behavior patterns of their children, and

Fathers do supply a unique contribution that is associated with positive psychological, social, and academic outcomes of children.

However, in the past half century, a rising share of fathers don’t live with their children at all. About 16 percent of fathers with young children lived apart from all of their children.

Whites are significantly more likely than blacks and Hispanics to be living with their children.

Fathers with higher levels of education are also more likely than less educated dads to be living with their kids.

Father-child relationship

Fathers play more, mothers perform more child care, schoolwork, and reading1

Fathers more involved with sons than daughters

Greater involvement => better cognition2, better self-efficacy2, greater success3, fewer behavioral problems 3

Feeling unloved by father => problems for the child regardless of the relationship with mother 4

1 – Raley & Bianchi (2006)

2 – Dubowitz, Black, Cox, & Kerr (2001)

3 – Lamb & Tamis-LeMonda (2004)

4 – Khalique & Rohner (2002)

Some research about the father-child relationship in families that have traditional gender roles also have found that:

Fathers play more with children while mothers focus on child care, schoolwork, and reading

Fathers pay more attention to sons than daughters. Of course, this is wildly variable from family to family, father to father, and even child to child.

Research has found that when dads have greater involvement with children, the children have better cognitive skills and better self-efficacy- the sense of being able to take on tasks with confidence. Children with involved fathers also enjoy greater success and have fewer behavioral problems.

On the flip side, when children feel unloved by their fathers, there is a greater chance that children will have problems regardless of how strong their relationship is with the mother. So fathers clearly play an important role in building well-adjusted children

Sibling relationships

Image source: http://www.bestwayguides.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Sibling-Rivalry-1.jpg

What about sibling relationships? Are they important? The look on the little boy’s face on the right suggests that the answer is “yes.” What are the issues we need to be aware of when it comes to things like sibling rivalry?

Sibling Relationships

Preschoolers often experience the birth of a sibling

“Child effects” – change in parenting behavior depending on birth order

1 - Belsky, Gilstrap, & Rovine (1984)

Image source;: https://img1.etsystatic.com/139/0/12486447/il_570xN.997339037_863w.jpg

Preschoolers often experience the birth of a sibling.

We know that there are “child effects” – changes in parenting behavior depending on birth order.

Sibling Relationships: Child effects

Changes family dynamic considerably –Parents are more affectionate, attentive, and engaged with first born/only children 1 – “child centered”

Older children lose parental attention and child-centered parenting when siblings are born

Parents have less time

Become more directive and controlling (parent-centered)

Resources are stretched

Can lead to anxiety, conflict

The birth of a second child changes the family dynamic considerably. Studies show that parents are more affectionate, attentive, and engaged with their first born child, and this level of attentiveness declines for subsequent children.

The arrival of a sibling can be traumatic for a first child because older children lose parental attention. Parenting stops being child-centered. Why?

Not because parents love older children less, but because they simply have less time

As a result, parenting becomes more directive and controlling - or parent-centered

In addition, having an additional mouth to feed can stretch resources thin which

can increase stress, anxiety, and conflict within the household

Sibling Relationships

Mothers tend to be consistent in attention and responsiveness across children – may be more competent with younger children

Parents model and promote positive relationships between siblings

Parents’ relationship with each other is paramount

Parents naturally compare children in order to differentiate them

Parents respect the differences between children

While firstborns might feel some shock at no longer being the center of mom’s attention, research shows that mothers tend to be consistent in their attention and responsiveness across each of their children. In other words, moms tend to spread their love and attention equally among all their kids. It also seems to be the case that mothers become more competent and relaxed with younger children even though they are likely to be busier.

The relationship between parents sets the tone for relationships between siblings. Children model their parents’ behavior and for this reason,

The relationship between parents is paramount. As before, the parent-parent relationship is more important that any other relational dyad in the family

Parents will naturally compare children in order to differentiate them; that is just human nature, but

Good parents respect the differences between children and are sensitive and responsive to the unique needs of each child

Sibling Relationships

Siblings mirror the parental relationship

In secure homes:

Siblings spend quality time during elementary school years

Older siblings will provide care for younger ones

In chaotic homes, sibling relationships may be conflicted => anxiety, depression

As I just mentioned, children model their parents, and it is the case that sibling relationships mirror the parental relationship.

In homes that are secure,

Siblings spend quality time during elementary school years and exhibit closeness

And older siblings provide care for younger ones

But in chaotic homes, relationships between siblings may be conflicted and this can lead to anxiety and depression in children

Sibling Rivalry

Increases if children sense differential treatment

As children learn about cooperation, negotiation, and empathy, conflict decreases

Sibling relationships become the most important relationship in old age

Shared history and values

Longest relationship people are likely to have

Image source: http://www.famlii.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Grandaunt-or-Great-Aunts-making-bunny-ears-700x357.jpg

What about sibling rivalry? Does it exist?

It certainly can exist if children sense that parents treat them differently, particularly if one child is identified as the favored child.

As children get older and learn about cooperation, negotiation, and empathy, conflict between siblings usually decreases

Importantly, sibling relationships become the most important relationship in old age, even when siblings have drifted apart in early adulthood.

This is because they have a shared family history and generally share the same values, and also because

Sibling relationships are likely to be the longest relationships people will have in their lives.

Addressing sibling rivalry

Parents can enlist older children as helpers

Engage in sociodramatic play – use a doll to teach older children about what babies can and cannot do

Fun

Informative

Strengthens parent-child bond

Model verbal strategies instead of hitting, biting

Teach children mutual problem solving (i-messages, active listening)

Value each child as an individual without making comparisons and treat all children the same

What can parents do in cases of sibling rivalry?

Well, for starters, they can enlist older children as helpers. Since children want to please their parents, giving older children responsibility for younger siblings helps children to feel more grown up and this is likely to reduce feelings of rivalry.

Parents can also engage older children in sociodramatic play in which they use a doll to teach children about babies and what to expect when baby comes

For older children, this is playtime and it’s fun,

Informative and instructional,

And strengthens the parent-child bond

Other ways to help children deal with sibling rivalry is to model verbal strategies that can be used instead of hitting or biting

By teaching children how to get over their feelings of rivalry, parents teach children mutual problem solving strategies. Some examples of this including teaching i-messages or active listening which we’ll come back to later.

Parents can avoid sibling rivalry by valuing each child as an individual without making comparisons and treating all children the same. Labeling children “the smart one” or “the pretty one” can create resentment among siblings as well as unreasonable expectations.

Managing sibling conflict

Parental control

Tell children to stop

Give a warning with subsequent consequences

Passive non-intervention

Letting children work it out

While most parents feel that parental control is more effective, studies have shown that parents are more likely to rely on passive non-intervention

Parents sometimes don’t know the best way to manage conflict between siblings. There are two approaches that can be taken. The first, exerting parental control, may be as simple as telling children to stop or giving them a warning with a consequence. The other approach is passive non-intervention, which is simply letting children work it out on their own.

Most parents feel that parental control is more effective, but studies have shown that parents are more likely to rely on passive non-intervention for reasons that are unclear.

Peer Relationships

Infants and toddlers

Share and take turns

Play with peers

Develop friendships

Pre-schoolers

Gender-segregated groups

Watch others play

Engage in solitary play

Engage in parallel play

Talk to other children

Engage in interactive play

Image source: http://media.parentsociety.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/three-kids-on-playground.jpg

Of course, the other important type of relationship for children are the bonds formed with same aged peers.

For infants and toddlers, peer relationships are where they learn to share and take turns, master the art of play, and develop their first friendships with a small number of other children. Because these children are too young to have strong language skills, these friendships are superficial and focused in the moment.

As children get a little older and enter the pre-school years, we see that they start to play in gender-segregated groups – boys with boys and girls with girls. They are great observers and can play by themselves or engage in parallel play – that is, they play by themselves, but they sit in close proximity to other children who are playing by themselves. At the end of the pre-school stage, children are more comfortable talking to one another and begin to engage in interactive play.

Peer Relationships

Middle Childhood

Talk about roles

Make up rules

Negotiate differences

Form close, stable relationships

Image source: http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2218/1884347897_0e26400724_m.jpg

In middle childhood, children are firmly ensconced (positioned) in the routine of school. When together, children talk about roles (things like leader, follower, grown-up, child, etc), and make up rules for play and interaction. They negotiate differences when there is conflict and they are capable of forming, for the first time, close stable relationships. This is when we see children have one or two best friends.

Peer Relationships

Children like similar others, but also those who are trustworthy and supportive

Quality friendships are more important than popularity

Shy children with a supportive best friend don’t feel rejected or victimized

Bullying starts to appear – peaks in early adolescence

Who do children form peer relationships with?

Children tend to like similar others, but they can also form friendships with those they find to be trustworthy and supportive even if they are not similar to one another. You can see this in many elementary aged children where classmates in a single class are all friends with one another. I think many adults could probably stand to learn a lot from these kids, don’t you?

At this age, children are not consumed with popularity – they are more interested in the quality of their friendships, which is why best friends at this age are intensely invested in one another

It’s been found that shy children who have a supportive best friend don’t have feelings of rejection or victimization, which speaks to how powerful friendship is at this age

Unfortunately, towards the end of middle childhood, we begin to see bullying appear. Bullying peaks in early adolescence, but occurs to a lesser degree near the end of elementary school.

Parenting and peers

Secure attachments to parents lead to good peer relationships

Insecure attachments to parents leads to perception that people are rejecting

Again, the quality of parenting predicts the quality of peer relationships.

Secure attachments to parents is associated with good quality peer relationships

While insecure attachments to parents leads children to be suspicious of peers, believing that people are rejecting

Identity in relation to others

Early childhood – children begin to compare themselves to other children

Emergence of self-evaluative emotions

Pride – due to mastery

Shame – failing to meet standards

Guilt – violation of rules – implies beginning of morality

As children form peer relationships, it’s only natural that they begin to compare themselves to other children, and this has an impact on their self-identity

In making comparisons, children begin to evaluate themselves and make judgments about themselves and others. Some of the emotions that emerge during this age period of middle childhood are

Pride – as a result of developing mastery in school and elsewhere

Shame – when they fail to meet standards expected of them, and

Guilt – when they violate rules. This awareness that there is a difference between right and wrong, between obeying the rules and breaking the rules shows that children of this age group are beginning to develop morality.

Empathy

Children become aware of the needs of others

Can problem solve to make others feel better

Children model parents empathic behavior

Fairy tales and other stories with moral themes teach children lessons about good and evil

It’s during this stage that children learn empathy.

They become aware of the needs of others

They can problem solve to make others feel better, which they only do because they are able to feel anxiety about the unhappiness or discomfort of others

How do children learn how to deal with this empathy that they feel? Of course, they model their parents! When parents are kind, sympathetic, and considerate of the feelings of others, they raise children to be the same way. Similarly, children of parents who lack empathy are likely to lack empathy themselves.

One way that parents teach empathy is through fairy tales and other stories like the boy who cried wolf. These stories have moral themes that teach children about good and evil. Typically, good conquers evil, and thus parents socialize their children to be well-behaved and upstanding citizens.

Prosocial Development

“Voluntary behavior intended to benefit another”

Are we born with it?

Hopefully you are seeing that as children get older, they are almost required to become more social. The lessons that parents teach about morality and goodness are all intended to help children become responsible, socially appropriate adults. An important aspect of socialization is what we call “prosocial development” which is

Voluntary behavior intended to benefit another. I’ve talked about the development of empathy which is necessary for prosocial development to occur. You might wonder why prosocial behavior is important to humans, and the answer is simple. Society cannot function without the cooperation of its members. Throughout life, prosocial behavior serves many functions, from simple enjoyment, to relationship building, to reputation enhancement, to explicitly moral aspirations.

Prosocial behavior is so important that we see evidence of it even as early as birth.

Prosocial Development

Newborns: cry empathically with other infants

We know that early on, newborns pick up on the discomfort of other babies. In nurseries, it has been noted that one baby cries, they all begin to cry, demonstrating a sort of primitive empathy

Prosocial Development

Early toddlers:

12-month infant:

Inform adults of unseen events by pointing out

Offer instrumental help

Seek comfort for themselves when others are upset

When children reach toddlerhood, they are sensitive to the upset of others and experience discomfort.

Infants as young as 12 months will inform adults of unseen events by pointing these out, and will also offer instrumental help by assisting adults complete thwarted tasks, such as picking up an out-of-reach object.

but at this age, they don’t know how to make others feel better. Instead, because they feel uncomfortable, they seek comfort for themselves.

Prosocial Development

Late toddlers:

Comfort people in distress

Sharing resources

Undifferentiated by gender

Exist across diverse cultures, but have cross-cultural and individual variability across all ages

Offer comfort by sharing what makes them feel better

Near the end of toddlerhood, around the age of 3, toddlers are more reliably able to comfort people in distress, for example, by hugging someone who is hurt, and sharing resources with those who express a need for food or a toy. And these early appearing prosocial behaviors are relatively undifferentiated by gender.

Cross-cultural studies find the same basic forms of prosocial behavior in infants across diverse cultures, and there is evidence that individual differences in prosociality are heritable. However, there is also substantial cross-cultural and individual variability in prosociality across all ages.

During this stage, you may find that Instead of offering comfort by sharing what would make the other person feel better, they offer comfort by sharing what makes them feel better. In this picture for example, you see the little boy offering his favorite treat - a lollipop - to make the little girl feel better, but perhaps she would feel better if she was given an ice cream.

Throughout infancy, parental behaviour contributes to the early development of prosocial behaviour, for example through talking about others’ emotions and mental states with their toddlers (e.g., ‘sad,’ ‘remember’12), and by structuring affiliative and collaborative interactions to facilitate young children’s participation in prosocial events as well as their imitative learning.3

Prosocial Development

Childhood/ School age: Reflecting on self and others

Unequal resource division based on effort, need, group membership, cost, and historical experiences

Engage in prosocial lying

Appreciate necessary harm leading to a greater good

Importance of language

By the age of 4, children become more sophisticated in thinking about their own and others’ actions. Whereas infants expect equality in the partition of goods, as children acquire more complex social understanding, resource division may come to be unequal, as they take factors such as effort, need, group membership, cost, and historical experiences, into consideration when distributing goods.

As children begin to understand the emotions of their friends and peers, and the expectations of schools and teachers, they begin to engage in prosocial lying to protect another’s feelings or, in some cultures, to appear modest.

Similarly, children also learn to appreciate that necessary harm, such as pulling someone off an unsafe play structure, may lead to a greater good.

Older children have the advantage of having more advanced language skills which allow them to simply ask what would help. Here, we can imagine that the girl on the right might have asked the girl on the left, “Do you need a hug?”

Prosocial Development

Adolescents:

Declines in early adolescence, but then recovers

volunteerism, civic engagement, group support

In adolescents and teens, we see evidence of prosocial behavior in the form of volunteerism and group support. In fact, when teens seek psychotherapy, group therapy as opposed to individual therapy is often considered the best form of intervention.

Prosocial behaviour tends to decline in early adolescence, partly in relation to hormonal and other physiological events of puberty, but then recovers.

A new form of prosociality, civic engagement and volunteering, emerges as adolescents become more socially independent.

Participating in church groups, playing or coaching sports, and involvement in school clubs, which require maintenance of prosocial activity over time, contribute to a sense of agency, that one’s acts can make a difference in the lives of others, and the development of identity. Volunteering in adolescence is linked to later civic engagement.

Moral Development

What is morality?

“ beliefs about what is right behavior and what is wrong behavior”

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/morality

Prosocial behaviors presume that we share a common set of beliefs about appropriate ways to behave. A closely related concept is that of morality, which according to Merriam-Webster is

beliefs about what is right behavior and what is wrong behavior. The process that children undergo to acquire morality is called “moral development.”

Lawrence Kohlberg (1927-1987)

Most prominent moral development theorist

Based on Piaget’s stages

The most prominent moral development theorist was Lawrence Kohlberg, a Harvard psychologist who based his theory of moral development on Piaget’s cognitive development stages that we learned about in Week 2. Kohlberg’s stage theory suggests that children demonstrate different levels of morality that are related to their cognitive abilities. Remember that Piaget said that children aren’t able to engage in abstract thinking until about the age of 12? Kohlberg argued that for this reason, children are not capable of making strong moral decisions until they are at least 12 because they aren’t able to think about abstract concepts like justice.

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTzBrjxKHLg

Heinz Dilemma

"In Europe, a woman was near death from a special kind of cancer. There was one drug that the doctors thought might save her. It was a form of radium that a druggist in the same town had recently discovered. The drug was expensive to make, but the druggist was charging ten times what the drug cost him to make. He paid $200 for the radium and charged $2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz, went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get together about $ 1,000 which is half of what it cost. He told the druggist that his wife was dying and asked him to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said: "No, I discovered the drug and I'm going to make money from it." So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man's store to steal the drug-for his wife. Should the husband have done that?" (Kohlberg, 1963).

Kohlberg studied his stage theory by presenting children and adults with the scenario you see on the screen and recording their responses. This scenario, called the Heinz Dilemma, asks participants to make a judgment about whether a fictional character is justified in the actions he takes in response to an impossible situation. Kohlberg didn’t care so much about the actual judgments that participants made. Instead he was interested in the reasoning participants used to justify their response.

Here’s is the scenario: (read screen)

Level 1 Preconventional morality

Stage 1: Punishment orientation (5 years) Rules are obeyed to avoid punishment (determined by what’s punished)

Stage 2: Instrumental orientation or personal gain (reward orientation) (7-8 years) Rules are obeyed for personal gain (determined by what’s rewarded)

Level II Conventional morality

Stage 3: “Good boy” or “Good girl” orientation (10-11 years) Rules are obeyed for approval (significant other’s dis/approval)

Stage 4: Maintenance of the social order/Authority Orientation (late adolescence) Rules are obeyed to maintain the social order

Level III Postconventional morality

Stage 5: Morality of contract and individual rights (Social Contract Orientation) (adult) Rules are obeyed if they are impartial; democratic rules are challenged if they infringe on the rights of others (Societal laws/rules which are negotiated to bring the greatest good and protection from anarchy)

Stage 6: Morality of conscience (Individual Principles/Conscience Orientation) (adult – may not be achieved) The individual establishes his or her own rules in accordance with a personal set of ethical principles that promote justice (Abstract ethical principles emphasizing equity/justice/spirituality)

http://www.cs.umb.edu/~hdeblois/285L/Kohlberg'sMoralStages.htm

After analyzing his results, Kohlberg proposed a 3 level theory of moral development. He called his levels “Preconventional morality,” “Conventional morality,” and “Postconventional morality.” Kohlberg broke each level into stages and in total his theory has 6 stages.

Preconventional morality occurs between 5 and 8 years of age and during this level, children’s morality focuses on individuals rather than on society.

Stage 1 takes place in the early preconventional stage. Stage 1 is called “Punishment orientation,” and children in this stage are concerned about obeying rules because of the potential for being punished. So, a 5 year old with a punishment orientation might say that Heinz should not have stolen the drug because he will be thrown in jail. In fact most children in Stage 1 will say that Heinz should not steal the drug.

As children approach the age of 7, they move into Stage 2, or the “instrumental orientation.” Children in this stage realize that different people might have different opinions. In this stage, children make decisions that serve self-interest or personal gain. So, in this stage, an 8 year old might say, Heinz should steal the drug because it will save his wife and his wife is very important to him because she takes care of him and their children. Or, as one child actually told Kohlberg, “Heinz might steal the drug if he wanted his wife to live, but that he doesn't have to if he wants to marry someone younger and better-looking.”

In level 2, conventional morality, children begin to think in terms of behaving in socially acceptable ways or in ways that benefit others.

Stage 3 is called the “Good boy” or “Good girl” orientation and can be seen in children ages 10 to 11. In this stage, children believe rules should be obeyed for approval or for the sake of doing what is good or avoiding what is bad. A child in Stage 3 might say something like, “Heinz should steal the drug because it’s good to save a life” or “Heinz should steal the drug because the druggist is wrong to allow someone to die.”

As children become adolescents, their moral decisions shift. In Stage 4, adolescents base their judgments on whether social order is maintained. What is good for society as a whole is emphasized. A typical response in Stage 4 might be, “I feel sorry for Heinz, but he is wrong to steal the drug, because what if everyone stole things or broke the law? It would lead to chaos.” Note that Stage 4 is the time when children develop the ability to abstract, so while they tend to object to Heinz stealing the drug like their younger Stage 1 counterparts, their reasoning is much more advanced because they can understand the concepts of law and order.

As people enter adulthood, they enter the Postconventional morality stage.

In Stage 5, the first stage of adult moral reasoning, people understand that law and order may not necessarily serve society well. They think about the qualities that make for a good society and believe that morality and human rights like life and liberty supersede unjust laws. A stage 5 response would be something like this: “It is the husband's duty to save his wife. The fact that her life is in danger transcends every other standard you might use to judge his action.”

Finally, Kohlberg proposed a Stage 6 – morality of conscience. In this stage, decisions are made according to universal principles of justice that treat all people equally even when those principles run contrary to the law. Kohlberg said that only a few people ever achieve this stage. An example of someone with Stage 6 moral reasoning would be someone like Martin Luther King, Jr. who believed that civil disobedience and peaceful protest were necessary because the laws concerning minorities were unjust. In Stage 6, people are willing to disobey laws if justice is served. The rules of justice that a Stage 6 person follows may be highly personal and quite different from what society deems is just. Such a person might respond to the Heinz Dilemma by saying that Heinz should steal the drug because saving a human life is a much higher moral obligation than money or property regardless of whether the drug was for his wife or for a stranger.

Problem with Kohlberg’s theory

Doesn’t explain why children disobey

Doesn’t explain why very young children show moral behavior

Conforms to US culture – cultural bias

Male-centric

As with any theory, Kohlberg’s theory, which emerged in the 1960’s, had it share of critics.

For one, the theory doesn’t explain why children disobey. That is, while it tries to explain how morality develops, it doesn’t explain amoral behavior.

In addition, it doesn’t explain why children younger than 5 show moral behavior and do the right thing even without being rewarded for it.

The theory also conforms to US culture, and is therefore culturally biased. Do we think that these stages would hold true in a collectivist society? Perhaps, but likely the concepts of order and justice would be somewhat different.

And finally, Kohlberg’s theory, like Freud’s, is considered to be too male-centric.

Carol Gilligan

Feminist theorist

Colleague of Kohlberg

Proposed morality theory based on

care orientations rather than justice

Recognizes that female decisions are often based on relationships, not laws

The person who was the staunchest critic of Kohlberg’s male oriented theory was Carol Gilligan who happened to have an office right down the hall from Kohlberg at Harvard. She is a feminist theorist famous for her book “In a Different Voice” and she argued that morality is different for men than it is for women because of the different roles that women play in society.

While Kohlberg’s theory emphasized justice, Gilligan’s morality theory suggested that for women, relationships and care orientations are most important in decision making.

She recognized that women make their moral judgments based on relationships rather than laws.

Intuitively, this makes sense, doesn’t it? Women are socialized to be caregivers. In the Heinz dilemma, a man in stage 5 might say: “It is the husband's duty to save his wife. The fact that her life is in danger transcends every other standard you might use to judge his action,” but a woman might answer quite differently. She might say, “The husband must steal the drug because the impact of the wife’s death on the family and her community could be devastating.” (Do you see the difference? Do you see how a woman frames the problem differently? Does this make her less moral than a man? Kohlberg might say, “yes,” but Gilligan says “no.”)

Promoting Self-Regulation

Ok, we’ve talked about the need to promote prosocial behavior and the importance of moral development. In addition, parents need to make sure they guide children to be self-regulated. Self-regulation means the ability to control oneself.

Self-regulation

The ability to manage emotions, behavior, attention, and thoughts

Depends on physical maturation and social interactions

Rules of life – learned from parents, siblings and peers

Rules of society – learned from parents and teachers

Rules of morality (shaming, teasing, helping, fighting) – learned from interactions with other children

More specifically, it is the ability to manage emotions, behavior, attention, and thoughts.

Self-regulation is dependent on physical maturation (remember what I said about brain development and the slow maturation of the pre-frontal cortex) – and it is also shaped by social interactions

In order to improve self-regulation, children need to know the rules of life such as routines around sleeping, eating, bathing and so forth. These are learned from parents, siblings, and to a lesser extent peers

They must also learn the rules of society. These are learned predominantly from parents and teachers, a child’s primary authority figures

Finally, children must learn the rules of morality and this includes the rules around things like shaming, teasing, helping, and fighting. These are learned primarily from interactions with other children.

Promoting self-regulation

Encourage compliance early on

Securely attached children are better self-regulated

Reason and explain – shows respect for child

Model good behavior

Establish daily routines – consistency, predictability

Discuss rules and reasons for them

13 months – rules center on safety

18 months – self-care, behavior, restraint

24 months – polite behavior, family chores

In young children, parents play the most important role in promoting self-regulation. Parents who encourage self-regulation early in life

have children who are securely attached and better self-regulated

are more likely to explain and provide reasons why self-regulation is important and in so doing they let the child know that the parents believe in them, which is a form of showing respect

These parents are also more likely to model good behavior and

Establish daily routines like meal time, bath time, and bed time. These routines establish consistency and predictability that promote self-regulation. So routine is good.

Along with routine, parents who discuss rules and the reasons for them have children who are better self-regulated

Typically, around 13 months when children begin to walk, parents establish rules that center on safety

At 18 months, rules center around self-care, behavior, and restraint. This is the age when parents have to say “no” a lot as their baby becomes more active and more curious.

By 24 months, parents establish rules of polite behavior – for example, you see parents encouraging their children to say “thank you” – and effective parents begin to enlist the help of children in performing family chores. While children are limited in what they can do, having them help to put their toys away begins to teach the child about order and cooperation while building a child’s sense of competence.

Self-regulation in pre-schoolers

Pre-schoolers know right from wrong

Do what adults want them to do whether right or wrong

Judge success of their actions based on outcomes – “All’s well that ends well”

Want to avoid punishment, but still get what they want (even if it means breaking rules)

When children reach the preschool years, they start to know right from wrong.

They are eager to please adults and will do whatever an adult asks them to do whether right or wrong

Preschoolers are only concerned with the outcome of their actions, not on correctness of their actions. For them, all’s well that ends well. For example, if a parent tells a preschooler to steal cigarettes from a convenience store and then rewards the child with candy, the child will regard that outcome as successful even though they know that stealing is wrong.

At this age, children want to avoid punishment but still get what they want, even if it means breaking the rules. They aren’t too concerned about whether something is right or wrong.

Self-regulation in pre-schoolers

Children who are not well self-regulated often have multiple stressors in the home

Often aggressive and unhappy

Do worse cognitively and academically

We know that children who are not self-regulated often come from homes where there are multiple stressors. As a result, they may be aggressive and unhappy, and they tend to do less well on cognitive and academic tasks.

Behavioral Problems

Thus far, I’ve talked mostly about normative development in children, but let’s turn our attention now to parenting when children exhibit behavior problems.

Challenges to parenting young children

High activity levels

Aggression

Fear

Social withdrawal and inhibition

Sleep disturbance

Temper tantrums

Sibling rivalry

Some common behavioral issues that parents face in young children are things like:

High activity levels

Aggression

Fear

Social withdrawal and inhibition

Sleep disturbance

Temper tantrums, and

Sibling rivalry that we mentioned before. So let’s take a look at some of these.

High Activity Levels

Occurs when:

Brain is immature

Child has a lot of anxiety

Child models parents’ activity level

Seen as uncooperative, disobedient, aggressive, dominant, competitive by peers and teachers

Image source: https://wildomarmagazine.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/whirlwind.jpg

A common problem seen in young children is high activity levels – or hyperactivity.

This can happen because the brain is still immature – remember that the prefrontal cortex that controls self-management is not fully developed until a child reaches adulthood

It can also happen when a child has a lot of anxiety and doesn’t know how to channel that energy productively

Also, if parents have high activity level, children can sometimes model this

Unfortunately, when children have a lot of excess energy, they can be seen as uncooperative, disobedient, aggressive, dominant, and competitive by both peers and teachers, and this can lead to negative consequences

ADHD – Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder

Excessive activity, inattention, impulsivity

Evident across settings

Can be associated with learning delays, conduct disorder

Affects 5-7% of children early in life (first 5 years)

Affects boys twice as often as girls

Some “grow out of it” by adolescence

Medication is a common treatment

Image source: http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2011/04/18/article-0-0BACD94700000578-523_468x286.jpg

An increasingly common manifestation of excessive energy run amok (get out of control) is Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or ADHD.

ADHD is characterized by excessive activity, inattention, and impulsivity

And these behaviors are evident across all settings, so it is not situation-specific

It can be associated with learning delays and conduct disorder

And affects 5-7% of children early in life, and by that we mean within the first 5 years.

Boys are affected twice as much as girls, and because this disorder is often due to immature brain development,

Many are able to “grow out of it” by adolescence

Stimulant medication has been found to be effective in treating ADHD, but this is surrounded by controversy because the numbers of children being medicated have been steadily rising since the 1980’s

Parenting high activity levels

Parents often have same traits – intrusive, authoritarian

Parents more likely to be harsh, inconsistent, and reactive 1

1 – Johnston & Mash, 2001

When children have high activity levels because they are modeling their parents, there is research that connects this to parenting style.

High activity parents are more likely to be intrusive and authoritarian

And they are more likely to be harsh, inconsistent, and reactive in how they interact with their children.

Remember what this means in terms of Ainsworth’s theory of attachment. Children of inconsistent, reactive parents are more likely to be insecurely resistant in their attachment style. These were the babies that were unable to be soothed and push their mothers away. As these children grow, they have difficulties with confidence and trust, and you can imagine that if these same children are also annoyingly overactive and get into trouble with teachers and peers, they are being set up for a lifetime of challenges.

Addressing high activity levels

Impose structure – more constructive use of energy

Self-instruction – parents show and tell child how to do something and child verbalizes what needs to be done

Providing rewards for good behavior - “Catch the child being good”

Leisure activities that involve construction (puzzles, legos) – improves focus and attention - fast moving video games are counterproductive

Physical activities that burn off energy

Image source: http://dullesmoms.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/lego-1.jpg

How do parents deal with high activity levels? Assuming that they have good control over their own levels of activity, there are things that can be done to help children focus.

First, parents need to impose structure and show children how to make more constructive use of their energy. For example, if a child is running around the house aimlessly, parents can channel that energy into something that helps the family, like helping mom or dad around the house.

Parents can also model and explain to a child how to be constructively engaged and have the child verbalize what they need to do. In helping the child to “self-instruct,” they help him to apply those instructions and activities to other times and places.

An effective but tricky method for addressing hyperactivity is to positively reinforce children when they are behaving. This requires parents to “catch the child being good” which is sometimes easier said than done!

Parents can also help rein in a child’s activity level by providing leisure activities that involve constructing things. Toys like puzzles, legos, train sets, all improve focus and attention. Importantly, research has shown that fast moving video games are actually counterproductive for hyperactive children. I would guess that this is because children are being overly stimulated by what is happening on the screen but are not actually physically burning off any energy while seated in front of a monitor or screen.

Physical activity, as we know, is important for all children. At least 60 minutes a day is the recommendation, but for hyperactive children, involvement in physical activities that burn off excess energy is especially important.

Aggression

Most children are not aggressive

3% children are highly aggressive

What about aggression in children? Well, the good news is that most children are not aggressive, so this is not a problem we have to worry too much about in the average family; however, about 3% of children are classified as highly aggressive, and for these children, we have concerns not so much about the aggression itself, but about the underlying factors that cause it.

Aggression

Relationship with mother predictive of aggression in children ages 2-9:

Education

Psychological stability

Number of stressors

Level of sensitivity and responsiveness

Level of stimulation

Between the ages of 2 and 9, we can predict how aggressive a child will be by examining the relationship between the mother and the child.

Mothers with lower education, psychological problems, and a number of life stressors are more likely to have aggressive children.

In addition, mothers who are not sensitive and responsive to their children – the qualities I mentioned before as essential to good parenting – are more likely to have aggressive children.

Mothers who do not provide adequate stimulation for their children are also likely to have more aggressive children. So once again, we see the importance of parents and attachment in helping children to develop normally.

Aggression

Associated with childhood problems

Academic

Social

Emotional

Attention

Compliance

Children who are aggressive encounter many problems in childhood that include academic, social and emotional problems. They often also have problems with attention and compliance which get them into trouble across different settings.

Remedy for Aggression

Positive attention from parents

Reward good behavior

Avoid criticism and harsh punishment

Consistent and stable environment

There is a remedy for aggression. Unfortunately, parents of aggressive children, having issues of their own, may not be best equipped to administer the remedy.

In any case, when aggressive children receive positive attention from their parents and are rewarded for being good, their behavior improves.

Similarly, when parents refrain from criticism and harsh punishment, behavior improves. This is good old behaviorism at work, right?

Of course, none of this is effective if it is only a temporary measure. To rid children of aggression, a consistent and stable environment of positive reinforcements over time is necessary.

Fear

New fears develop in early childhood

Animals

Dark

Imaginary creatures

Natural disasters

Time of many transitions and expectations

Creates free-floating anxiety

In early childhood, fear becomes a behavioral problem that parents must address.

As children become more independent in toddlerhood and the pre-school years, new fears emerge about

animals

The dark

Imaginary creatures

And natural disasters

We shouldn’t be too surprised by these fears. This is an age when there are many transitions and expectations placed on children, and this creates what Freud called

“free floating anxiety” – a general sense of uncertainty and anxiety that can’t be described or named. Fears of a specific thing like the dark or something under the bed help to create a target for free-floating anxiety.

Fear

Partly biological

Pre-wired to have some fears and anxiety

May have evolutionary utility

Why do we feel fear? Well, it’s partly biological.

We are pre-wired to have some fears and anxiety, and this is actually to our benefit. If we are pre-wired to react quickly in response to danger, we are more likely to behave in ways that keep us safe. We call this “the fight or flight response” and this instinct has evolutionary utility.

Fear

Cultural interpretation

Fearfulness or caution?

Wariness or sensitivity?

Independence versus interdependence

Fear can also be influenced by cultural interpretations. For example,

what is fear in one culture might be caution in another.

Some children might be called wary if they are slow to warm, or they might be called sensitive.

We talked about independent and interdependent cultures before, with the US being primarily an independent culture. If we look at the picture on the right, looking at it through American eyes, we might interpret this as a little girl approaching a stranger’s car and that she might potentially be in danger. But if we place this in a collectivist or interdependent culture like Italy or China where everyone in the community looks out for children, we might interpret this scene much differently. So what elicits fear may be culturally based.

Fear

Role of parents in creating fear

Inhibited infants and toddlers

Parents overprotective

Inhibited early childhood

Parents often more harsh, directive in telling child to “get over it”

Better approach – encouraging independence and overcome fears

Parents may inadvertently (accidentally, without intention) create fear in their children.

When we see inhibited infants or toddlers who are afraid to venture far from parents, we might suspect

That parents are overprotective and subconsciously convey the message that the world is a dangerous place

In early childhood, children who are more inhibited or fearful may have their fears worsened if

Parents are more harsh and tell their children to “get over it” or words to that effect

A better approach for these parents is to gently encourage children to be more independent in an effort to overcome their fears.

Can you be too overprotective?

2002 study found that overprotective parents have children with more adjustment and behavior problems

2010 study in Japan

Scanned the brains of people in their 20’s who had overprotective parents

Children of overprotective parents had less gray matter in a particular region of the prefrontal lobe as compared to those who had healthier relationships.

Holmbeck et al, 2002

So I just mentioned that in infants and toddlers, overprotective parents can inadvertently increase fearfulness, but how much of a problem is this? Is it possible to be too overprotective?

The answer appears to be “yes.”

Studies have found that overprotective parenting is associated with children who have more adjustment and behavioral problems

And in 2010, a study in Japan

Scanned the brains of people in their 20’s who reported having overprotective parents

The results showed that these people have differences in the amount of gray matter in the prefrontal cortex compared to a control group.

Loosely interpreted this could mean that children who are overprotected are not made to do as much for themselves, and as a result, the areas of the brain responsible for decision making, planning, mental control, and attention are underdeveloped. So, again, it does appear that overprotective parents end up damaging their children’s normal neurological development.

Sleep

How much is enough?

Birth – 2 years: 16-20 hours of sleep

2-5 years: 11-12 hours of sleep

5-12 years: 10 hours of sleep

Teens: 9-10 hours of sleep

10-30% children sleep-deprived

Last week we addressed the topic of sleep and stressed how important it is. We revisit the topic of sleep here because it can be the source of some behavioral problems. We may have already covered this before. If so, a quick review.

How much sleep is enough?

From birth to 2 years, children need between 16 and 20 hours of sleep a day. Remember how much time they are spending in brain development

From 2 to 5, children need 11 to 12 hours of sleep, nearly half the day

From 5 to 12, children need 10 hours of sleep a day, and

Teens need 9-10 hours of sleep.

What’s important is that we often think of 8 hours as being enough, but that rule of thumb doesn’t apply to children.

Because we routinely underestimate the amount of sleep that children need, 10-30% of kids are sleep-deprived

Sleep disturbances

Night Fears

Unable to sleep due to fear of monsters

May be due to anxiety – loss of control over toileting, siblings, peers

Parents should comfort child so they can sleep

Bedtime routine

Later bedtime

Check in with child periodically

And poor sleep habits can result in specific kinds of sleep disturbances. The first type of disturbance are night fears. Night fears happen before a child falls asleep and are irrational fears that make children afraid to go to sleep.

With night fears, children may be unable to sleep due to fear of monsters or other imaginary creatures

And it happens most commonly with children in toddlerhood. This may be due to free-floating anxiety that centers around the loss of control over toileting, having new siblings, or uncertainty in making friendships

When night fears happen, parents should comfort their child so they can sleep, and they can also try the following:

Establish a bedtime routine so that children become accustomed to a pattern around sleeping

Move bedtime to later when the child will be more sleepy

And check in with the child periodically to make sure that he or she has fallen asleep and is sleeping soundly.

Sleep disturbances

Nightmares

Waking during light REM sleep

Wakes child up with memory of the dream

Peak when child enters school and between 9 and 11 years

Parents should comfort the child

Frequent nightmares may indicate adjustment problems or anxiety during daytime hours

Another common sleep disturbance is nightmares.

This is when children wake during a light REM sleep. Since REM sleep is when we dream,

Children who wake up in light REM may have a lingering memory of a dream they were having when they woke up and this can be interpreted as a nightmare

Nightmares are most frequent in kids who just start school as well as children between the ages of 9 and 11.

When nightmares happen, parents should comfort their children,

But if nightmares become a frequent occurrence, it may be an indication of adjustment problems or anxiety during the day and may require professional attention.

Sleep disturbances

Partial Wakings

Night terrors

Sleepwalking

Sleeptalking

Difficulties transitioning between light and deep sleep

No memory

Not awake

Will not be comforted

Parents should guide child back to bed

Other sleep disturbances fall under the category of partial wakings and include

night terrors, which are when people wake up screaming or appear to be otherwise terrified

sleepwalking, and

Sleeptalking.

These partial wakings occur because of trouble transitioning between light and deep sleep

What’s interesting is that while these incidents can scare parents or other members of the household half to death, the sleeper will wake with no memory of the event

Because they are not awake

Those with night terrors will not be comforted no matter how hard the parent tries to console them.

What should parents do? The best thing to do is to guide the child back to bed and put them back to sleep.

Temper Tantrums

Differentiate between manipulative and temperamental tantrum

Manipulative tantrum

Attempt to get something

Completely within child’s control

Temperamental tantrum

Response to frustration or fatigue

Child out of control

Let’s move on to behavioral problems that take place while a child is awake. One problem that parents of young children inevitably deal with is that of temper tantrums.

It’s important to notes that there are two types of tantrums.

A manipulative tantrum

Is when a child attempts to get something they want by manipulating the parent with an outburst.

The manipulative tantrum is one that is completely within a child’s control, that is, it is a willful response.

In contrast, a temperamental tantrum is

A response to frustration, fatigue or discomfort

And are not really within a child’s control. They are, in fact, literally out of control and need help to get back into control.

Temper tantrums

Parental response to manipulative tantrum

Ignore it or remove child from the situation

Refuse to give in

Parental response to temperamental tantrum

Mutual problem solving (active listening)

Calm, comforting, sympathetic approach

Correct correctable situations

Wait out the tantrum, then insist on behavior change

Parents need to know the difference between these two types of tantrums because they should be handled differently.

In response to a manipulative tantrum,

Parents need to ignore it or remove the child from the situation.

Importantly, parents need to refuse to give in. And actually, sitting through a long tantrum and eventually giving in will make the tantrums worse because the child learns that they just need to outlast you!

In response to a temperamental tantrum, parents need to find out what the source of distress is

This is a time for mutual problem solving and active listening where the parents talk to the child and determine how to fix the issue. You can see this is a different approach from how to handle manipulative tantrums, right?

Parents need to be calm, comforting, and sympathetic

And correct what can be corrected. For example, if a child is having a tantrum because she is tired, find a place for her to take a nap. If a child has had an accident in his pants, find a way to change him.

For this kind of tantrum, parents should wait out the tantrum, correct the problem if possible, and then insist on behavior change. This means that the parents must instruct the child on better ways to deal with the situation if it ever happens again.

Managing Stress

Temperamental temper tantrums are an example of poor stress management in children, particularly young ones. As children get older, how do they manage stress?

Expressing emotions

Younger children confide in parents, caregivers and friends

As they get older, girls begin to confide more in peers. Boys are socialized to express their feelings less.

Image source: http://f.tqn.com/y/grandparents/1/W/K/Z/-/-/Shocking_TomGrill_a0056-000119-2-.jpg

One way to handle stress is through the expression of emotions. Of course, temper tantrums are one way to express emotions, but young children can be taught the proper way to discuss how they are feeling.

Early on, children confide in parents, caregivers and friends,

but as they get older, children become more peer focused. Girls shift their confidences from parents and caregivers to friends. Boys, from an early age, are socialized to express their feelings less, but when they do, they too are more likely to shift to friends as confidantes as they get a little older.

Stress

Most stressful events for children universally are:

Fear of losing of a parent*

Parental fights

Embarrassing situations

School

Gender differences:

Boys – external situations are more stressful

Girls – internal states are more stressful

What are the main sources of stress for children?

It turns out that these stressors are pretty universal.

The number one stressful event for children across the board is fear of losing a parent.

After that, parental fights are stressful for kids as well

Being in embarrassing situations, and

School are also major stressors for children

There are gender differences that have been noted.

For boys, external situations are more stressful. This might include the need to perform well in sports or in school.

For girls, internal states are more stressful. Concerns about being liked, being accepted – these things are more stressful than how they perform to the rest of the world.

Loneliness

Children begin to experience loneliness at 5-6 years

Lack of friends

Being shy

Internalizing failures and inadequacies

Behaviors are self-fulfilling and exacerbating

Stress can also be felt in the form of loneliness. We know that children may first experience loneliness at 5 to 6 years of age. Think about why this might be. This is around the age that children begin school in earnest. Those who struggle to make friends, are painfully shy, or have the tendency to internalize failures and inadequacies are much more likely to feel lonely.

Unfortunately, children who are lonely may exhibit characteristics like sadness or poor eye contact that keep other children at bay (prevent other children from getting/advancing nearer), which only increases feelings of loneliness. So loneliness can be both self-fulfilling and exacerbating.

Cascading Events

All negative behaviors have a tendency to get worse over time

Behavior problems =>

Poor socialization =>

Isolation or marginalization =>

Anxiety or depression =>

Poor academic performance =>

Poor achievement =>

Poor chances for success in adulthood

What I hope you see in all of these problematic behaviors is that left unchecked, negative behaviors have a tendency to get worse over time. Regardless of the type of behavior problem, there is a common cascading (成瀑布落下) pathway that they all follow.

Behavior problems lead to

Poor socialization, which leads to

Isolation or marginalization, Which leads to

anxiety or depression, Which leads to

poor academic performance, which leads to

Poor achievement , which leads to

Poor chances for success in adulthood.

It’s the role of parents to intervene at any point in this cascade. Doing so improves a child’s chance to change or even reverse any of these potential outcomes. For example, helping a child to improve their academic performance may well decrease anxiety and depression, which changes how a child interacts with others, thereby reducing isolation. Do you see how stepping in at any point can make a broader difference for the better?

Discipline

So that brings us to the topic of discipline. Discipline can be used to correct any negative behavior, but it’s really important to understand what discipline is and what it isn’t.

Origin of the word

From the Latin “disciplinam”

for

“instruction”

The word discipline comes from the Latin “disciplinam” (dee see plee num). Most people associate the word discipline with the word punishment or control, but actually, the word means something very different and it may surprise you.

Discipline means

Instruction. So discipline was never meant to be about punishment; rather, it’s about teaching children how to grow

Main goals of discipline

Helping children to get along with others

Teaching child right from wrong

Allowing children to learn from mistakes

Shift control for behavior from parent to child – builds autonomy, competence

Image sources: http://parentingforeveryone.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/child_development_stages.jpg

The main goals of discipline are pretty simple. Parents use discipline to help children get along with others, to teach them right from wrong, to allow them to learn from their mistakes, and to gradually shift control for behavior from the parent to the child by helping them to build autonomy and competence.

Natural and Logical Consequences

Natural consequence = events that follow a physical act

Example: If a child doesn’t eat, he will be hungry

Logical consequence = events that follow a social act

Example: If you lie, people won’t trust you

Also, used if a natural consequence is too dangerous

http://www.extension.umn.edu/family/school-success/families/building-stronger-parent-child-relationships/using-natural-and-logical-consequences/

If we think back to learning theory and the work of behaviorists, remember that behavior is shaped by reinforcers. In terms of parenting, two types of reinforcers are natural and logical consequences.

Natural consequences are events that naturally follow a physical act.

For example, the natural consequence of eating a good meal is feeling full. If a child complains about eating the vegetables on the plate, parents can give the child the option to eat or not eat. If the child choose to not eat, the natural consequence is that he will be hungry.

Parents can also use logical consequences, which are events that follow a social act and typically take the form of choices that the parents give children to guide behavior.

A simple example of a logical consequence is, if you lie, the logical consequence is that people won’t trust you.

In another example, if Mikey was told not to bounce his basketball against the house because it might break a window, but he does it anyway, a logical consequence would be to take the ball away for a reasonable amount of time and explain why, without anger or judgment.

The only time you wouldn’t want to let a natural consequence happen on its own is in cases where children might get hurt. So for example, the natural consequence of a child touching a hot stove is that they will get burnt, right? Well, the child would certainly learn a powerful lesson, but most would agree that parents should prevent this from happening. Replacing a natural consequence with a logical consequence might be equally instructive. As an example, if a child keeps trying to touch a hot stove, a parent might say, “I don’t want you to touch the stove because it is hot and you can get hurt, so I would like you to go into the other room until I am finished cooking so that you won’t get hurt, or you can sit and watch me from the other side of the counter.”

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A word about punishment

Natural and logical consequences work because:

The consequence is closely tied to the behavior

It focuses on behavior, not the child.

Children learn to be responsible for their own actions

It is calm, reasonable, and non-judgmental

It usually involves choice

In contrast, punishment (e.g. spanking) is less effective

No relationship to the child’s behavior

Used to assert parental authority rather than “instructing”

I want to say a word about punishment in relation to natural and logical consequences.

Natural and logical consequences work because

The consequence is closely tied to the behavior

It focuses on behavior, not the child.

Children learn to be responsible for their own actions

It is calm and non-judgmental

It usually involves choice

In contrast, punishment (e.g. spanking) is less effective

Remember that the purpose of punishment is to reduce an undesired behavior, and while punishment is effective at reducing a negative behavior, it does not increase positive behavior because

the punishment has no relationship to the child’s behavior. If a father tells his daughter to clean up her room and she doesn’t do it, throwing all the toys out is irreparable and doesn’t teach her how to clean up her room. Rather, giving the child the option to put away her toys or have them taken away for a reasonable amount of time gives the child a choice.

The other problem with punishment is that it is almost always done in anger and is used to assert parental authority rather than “instructing”

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Mutual problem solving

For older children

Use I-messages

Behavioral contracts

Use rewards to encourage appropriate behavior, not punishments

As children get older, it is best to employ mutual problem solving as a disciplinary strategy.

The use of I-messages can be effective.

I-messages are simply a way of phrasing a sentence that does not make people defensive. It takes the form, “When you do _____, I feel______.” For example, if a teen stays out beyond curfew, a parent can say, “When you ignore your curfew (宵禁), I feel worried that something terrible might have happened to you.” or “I feel like you don’t respect me.” This is a far more effective approach than saying “ How dare you disobey your curfew. You could have been killed” or “You have no respect for me.” The difference is that children can’t disagree with I statements, and I statements also allow parents to express concern rather than anger.

Parents can also use behavioral contracts with older children. These are written contracts that

Use rewards to encourage appropriate behavior rather than punishments.

An example might be a contract that tells teenagers that if they are ever at a party where drinking or drug use takes place, the teen agrees to call the parents for a ride and the parent agrees to not ask questions until the day after. This sends the message that the parents are first and foremost concerned about their child’s well-being and safety, and it eliminates the anxiety that teens feel about having to admit to illegal activity.

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Negative Consequences

Used to decrease undesirable behaviors

Intervene early

Stay calm and objective

State the rule that was violated

Mild negative consequence (devalues the activity)

Be consistent – inconsistency reinforces behavior

Reinforce positive behaviors

What do you do with kids when natural and logical consequences aren’t easy or possible? Well, there are a few principles for administering negative consequences that might be helpful.

Keep in mind that the goal of negative consequences is to decrease undesirable behaviors. In order to this to be effective,

Parents must intervene early. As soon after the negative behavior is exhibited as possible. That more closely links the behavior to the consequence

Parents should stay calm and objective, even if they are furious – in fact, especially if they are furious!

Parents should state the rule that was violated in clear and simple terms, and then

Apply a mild negative consequence. The reason the consequence should be mild is that it devalues the activity. If you make a big deal over something small, children are more likely to think that the behavior is worth doing.

Parents should always be consistent – remember back to Skinner’s reinforcement schedules – inconsistent reinforcement schedules actually reinforce or strengthen behavior

And as I stated before, catch your child being good and reward positive behaviors to increase the likelihood that they will happen again

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Negative consequences

Types of consequences:

Ignore the behavior – best for annoying but not harmful behaviors

Social disapproval

Parents state their disapproval and the consequences

Time out – best for aggressive or destructive behaviors

Cool down period

1 minute/age

Consistency

What are some types of negative consequences?

Ignoring the behavior is a good technique for reducing annoying but not harmful behaviors.

(Don’t say if no time) This meme from the Family Guy where Stewie keeps repeating “mom mom mom mom” until she can’t take it any more is a good example of something that can be reduced by ignoring the behavior. Unfortunately, Lois’ giving in unintentionally reinforces and strengthens his behavior as he knows that he can get her to react by persisting.

Social disapproval is a second method of negative consequence – this is simply when parents state their disapproval and the consequences for continuing the behavior.

And third, time out is a popular form of negative consequence. This is best when a child is being aggressive or destructive or is otherwise out of control.

It works because it gives the child time to cool down and gain control again

And the rule of thumb is 1 minute per year of age. So a 3 year old would sit in time out for 3 minutes.

The key to time out, again, is consistency. If a child knows that every single time he misbehaves he will end up in time out, the behavior will reduce pretty quickly, but if a parent is inconsistent, a child quickly learns to hedge his bets and the behavior will continue.

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What doesn’t work?

Review of >300 studies

inconsistent discipline (within or between parents)

harsh, explosive discipline (violence, threats)

low supervision, low involvement

inflexible, rigid discipline

All lead to increased aggression and rule-breaking

Thus far, we’ve talked about natural and logical consequences, mutual problem solving, and negative consequences as effective disciplinary strategies. So, what doesn’t work?

A meta-analysis of over 300 studies looking at disciplinary approaches showed the what doesn’t work in changing behavior is

Inconsistent discipline (within or between parents), so if one parent is not consistent or if parents have disciplinary methods that are different from each other

Harsh, explosive discipline including threats or violent outbursts

Low supervision or low involvement

Inflexible or rigid discipline. For example, spanking 100% of the time regardless of the offense.

All of these forms of discipline lead to increased aggression and rule-breaking in children. So punishment and lack of involvement are not effective forms of discipline.

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Discipline across age groups

Toddlers

Early Childhood

Middle Childhood

Does discipline change across age groups? Of course it does. You don’t see 16 year olds on time outs and you don’t see 3 year old signing behavioral contracts. Let’s take a look at how discipline changes across three age groups: toddlers, early childhood and middle childhood.

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How discipline changes

p. 169 in textbook

This graph clearly shows changes in discipline in the first 4 years.

The things to note are that negotiation is the more popular form of discipline across all age groups, meaning that simply telling a child to do something is usually enough to change behavior.

You can also see that the need for discipline appears to rise with age. Three year olds especially need discipline.

The most dramatic shift seems to be that withdrawing privileges increases dramatically from 2 to 3 years of age and by the time children are 4, parents use negotiation, withdrawing privileges, and yelling to the same degree.

What’s interesting is that spanking, according to this study, is used the least frequently as a form of discipline. Whether this is really true or whether parents didn’t want to admit to spanking is unclear, but in a couple of slides, we’ll see evidence that this is a case of underreporting, not underspanking.

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Toddlers (1-3 y/o)

Bad behavior often stems from testing limits

Misbehave 3.5 – 20 times/hour 1

Recommended discipline approaches

Time out – 1 minute per year of age

Diverting attention

Consistent, calm approach

Image source: http://www.parentcoachplan.com/img/child-time-out.png

1 – Dix, 1991; Wahler & Dumas, 1989

Why is discipline different across age groups? Well, because kids are different at each age.

For toddlers, bad behavior occurs because they are busy testing limits

They misbehave anywhere from 3 ½ to 20 times per hour

At this age, experts recommend using

Time out when children are out of control – again, 1 minute per year of age

Another recommendation is to divert the toddler’s attention – kids this age are pretty distractible

And experts recommend being consistent and calm during this age.

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Early Childhood (3-8 y/o)

90% of parents spank children under the age of 6 1

Children asserting autonomy and independence

Misbehavior often stems from frustration, lack of competence

“Timeouts” lose effectiveness, distractions don’t work

Recommended discipline approaches

Listen, don’t lecture – ask questions

Give choices where possible

Ignore tantrums

Model good behavior

1 – Straus & Stewart (1999)

Image source: http://www.scottsdaledaycare.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/stock-fresh-BULLY.jpg

According to one source, by the time children enter early childhood or the preschool years, 90% of parents say they spank their children

Children are asserting their independence and autonomy at this age

And their misbehavior often stems from frustration at feeling incompetent

By the age of 5 or 6, timeouts begin to be less effective and distractions don’t work

So the recommended discipline approaches are to

Listen, don’t lecture – learn to ask questions to uncover the child’s source of frustration

Give choices where possible

Ignore tantrums – at this age they are almost all manipulative

And model good behavior. Remember at this age, children are beginning to role play and look to authority figures as examples of how to be adults.

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Middle Childhood (9-11/12 y/o)

Only 30% spank children by the time they reach the end of middle childhood (10-12 years old) 1

What does work?

Withdrawing privileges

Use humor to diffuse situations

Remind child of personal responsibilities

Use of psychological control (e.g. guilt)

Image source: http://tbrelearning.org/sites/default/files/imagecache/Slideshow/images/no%20mobile.jpg

1 – Straus & Stewart (1999)

Collins, Madsen, & Susman- Stillman, 2002

By middle childhood (9-12 years),

Only 30% of parents spank their children

What seems to work?

Withdrawing privileges

Using humor to diffuse situations

Reminding children of their personal responsibilities

And using psychological control (for example guilt or shame) over physical control

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What about spanking?

Parents who spank are more commonly:

Female

Single

African-American

Rural

Southern

Religious conservatives

Lower to middle class

Parents of children with behavior problems

I know people are always interested in spanking, so let’s talk about it for a bit. We know from statistics that parents who spank are more likely to be

Female

Single

African-American

Rural

Southern

Religious conservatives

Lower to middle class

Parents of children with behavior problems

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What about spanking?

Children who are spanked are more commonly:

Preschoolers

Boys

Non-compliant, difficult

And children who are more likely to be spanked are preschoolers, boys and children considered to be difficult or non-compliant.

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What about spanking?

Most parents have spanked

Children usually between 2 and 5

Most are angry when they spank

Most regret spanking but do it because:

They think it is useful

They grew up with it

They have an authoritarian parenting style

Of child’s bad behavior

We also know that most parents have spanked

Usually when their children were between 2 and 5

Most are angry when they spank

And most regret spanking, but do it because:

They think it is useful

They grew up with it

They have an authoritarian parenting style

Of child’s bad behavior

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Impact of spanking

Mild spanking (Baumrind)

Increased behavioral difficulties over time

BUT, if parent is warm and supportive, spanking does not lead to behavioral problems

Moderate to severe spanking

Increased behavioral difficulties

Long term effects

What is the impact of spanking? Well if you ask Diana Baumrind, she discourages spanking because in her work

she found that children who were even mildly spanked were more likely to have behavioral difficulties over time,

But overall, she felt that if a parent compensated for the spanking by being a warm and supportive parent in other ways, spanking does not necessarily lead to long term behavioral problems.

However, she noted that parents who use moderate to severe spanking were more likely to have children with

Increased behavioral difficulties that

Last a long time

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Effects of spanking

p. 178 in online text greater risk of physical child abuse

Finally, I want to share this graph from your online text. It shows that spanking is very effective in getting immediate compliance, and if that was all we wanted to do, that would be great, but remember that discipline is about teaching and instruction, and what studies have shown is that while spanking is effective in getting immediate compliance,

it leads to a host of other negative consequences including increased aggression, delinquency, and risk of physical child abuse.

It also has a negative impact on moral decision making and mental health.

So it would appear that spanking as discipline is indeed instructive, however, what it teaches children is not necessarily positive.

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Resources

Zero to Three: https://www.zerotothree.org/

PBS Parents: http://www.pbs.org/parents/

Focus on the Family: Parenting: https://www.focusonthefamily.com/parenting