1. Early Childhood: Social and Emotional Development
Chapter Eight

2. Dimensions of Child Rearing
Warm parents are more likely to be affectionate toward their children and less likely to physically discipline their children than cold parents
Cold parents may not enjoy their children and may have few feelings of affection for them
Children of warm parents are warm, accepting, more likely to develop internalized standards of conduct and a moral sense or conscience
Parental warmth related to child’s social and emotional well-being
Child rearing is reflected by imitating parent’s own upbringing, their parental beliefs and genetics

3. Dimensions of Child Rearing Continued
Authoritative parenting style — firm, consistent enforcement of rules combined with strong support and affection
If too much “restrictiveness,” meaning physical punishment, interference, or intrusiveness, the child may end up disobedient, rebellious, and have lower cognitive development (Authoritarian)
Permissive parenting style — parents supervise children much less; allow children to do what is “natural”, may also allow children to show some aggression, intervening only when child is in danger

4. Dimensions of Child Rearing Continued
Inductive methods — teach knowledge that will enable children to generate desirable behavior on their own; main technique is reasoning or explaining why one behavior is better than another
Power-assertive methods — includes physical punishment and denial of privileges; rationalize physical punishment due to noncompliance of children; the greater the use of this method the less likely child to develop internal standards of conduct; parental rejection and punishment linked with aggression and delinquency

5. Dimensions of Child Rearing Continued
Withdrawal of love method — isolation or ignoring misbehaving child; loss of love oftentimes more threatening than physical punishment
Preschoolers comply better when asked to do something rather than not do something
Good method is to engage child in something else when involved in unacceptable activity or behavior
Physically aggressive parents serve as role models for aggression and also stoke child’s anger

6. Parenting Styles: How Parents Transmit Values and Standards
Baumrind (1989, 1991b) developed grid of four parenting styles based on whether parents are high or low on each of the two dimensions
Authoritative — parents are highly restrictive, make strong demands for maturity, reason with their children and provide them strong support and feelings of love; these children demonstrate self-reliance, independence, high self-esteem, high levels of activity and exploratory behavior, and social competence; highly motivated and do well in school

8. Parenting Styles: How Parents Transmit Values and Standards Continued
Authoritarian — these parents value obedience with little explanation for their reasoning; do not communicate well with their children; do not respect child’s view point; these parents mostly cold and rejecting; sons of these parents relatively hostile and defiant; daughters low in independence and dominance; children are less friendly and less spontaneous in social interactions; have low self-esteem and are low in self-reliance

9. Parenting Styles: How Parents Transmit Values and Standards Continued
Permissive-indulgent — parents are low in their attempts to control their children and in their demands for mature behavior; parents are easygoing and unconventional; permission accompanied by high warmth and support; children less competent in school but high in social behaviors
Rejecting-neglecting — parents are low in demands for mature behavior and low in attempt to control their children; outcomes for children include: lowest competence, lack of responsibility, immature and prone to problem behaviors; less competent in school

11. Effects of the Situation and the Child on Parenting Styles
Parenting styles change due to the situation
Power assertion more likely to occur when parent believed the child knew the rules and were capable of behaving appropriately
Power assertion likely to occur when dealing with aggressive behavior
Stress contributes to parental use of power

12. Social Behaviors
During early childhood, siblings’ interactions are positive (cooperation, teaching, nurturance) as well as negative (conflict, control, competition)
Older siblings more likely to be more caring and dominating than younger ones
Younger siblings more likely to imitate older siblings and to accept their direction
Typical sibling rivalry can contribute to better social competence, the development of self-identity, and the ability to rear their own children
The more parents play favorites the greater the conflict

13. Adjusting to the Birth of a Sibling
Preschoolers may feel stress due to the birth of a sibling and the changes within the family
Older child may feel resentful due to the attention given to the new baby
Regression to baby-like behaviors, such as increased clinging, crying, and toilet accidents may occur
Same children may show increased independence by dressing themselves and helping to take care of the baby

14. Birth Order
First born children are more highly motivated to achieve than later born children; perform better academically, are more cooperative, more adult- oriented and less aggressive than later born children; they obtain higher standardized test scores; first born and only children show greater anxiety and are less self-reliant than later born children
Later born children may compete for attention by acting aggressively; self-concept lower but social skills translate into greater popularity with peers; tend to be more rebellious, liberal, and agreeable than first born; parents are more relaxed with later born children

15. Peer Relationships
Peer groups foster social skills, teach how to lead and how to follow, help increase physical and cognitive skills through interactions; provide emotional support
By age 2 children show preference for particular peer
Children 1 to 6 years old keep friendships from one year to the next; some 3 years

16. Peer Relationships Continued
Preschoolers like the toys and activities of their friends
Primary school children base friends on doing things and having fun
Older children/adolescents base friendship on trust, communication, and intimacy

17. Play — Child’s Play, That Is
Play is meaningful, voluntary, and internally motivated
Play contributes to the development of motor skills and coordination
Dramatic play (trying on new roles) contributes to development of cognitive qualities such as curiosity, exploration, symbolic thinking, and problem solving
Play may help with children learning to control impulses

18. Play and Cognitive Development — Piaget’s Characteristics of Play
Functional Play — occurs during sensorimotor stage; involves repetitive motor activity like rolling a ball or laughing
Symbolic Play — occurs at end of sensorimotor stage; involves creating settings and scripts
Constructive Play — common in early childhood; children uses objects or materials to make something
Formal Games — games with rules; may be invented by the children; involves social interaction as well as physical activity and rules; may be played for a lifetime

19. Parten’s Types of Play
Parten (1932) observed six types of play among 2 to 5 years old children
Solitary play/onlooker play — nonsocial play; occurs in 2 to 3 year olds
Parallel play/associative play/cooperative play; social play; associative and cooperative common by age 5; girls more likely to engage in social play
Parallel constructive play demonstrated when preschoolers play with puzzles or blocks near other children
Girls more likely to play with boys’ toys than vice versus

21. Sex Differences in Play
In preschool and early elementary boys prefer vigorous physical activities
In middle childhood boys prefer playing in groups of five or more children engaging in competition
Girls more supervised; more likely to engage in arts and crafts; spend more time playing with one child than with a group
Play choices determined by environmental influences as well as biological factors such as strength

22. Sex Differences in Play Continued
Children by age 2 prefer same sex playmates; tendency strengthens by middle childhood
Sex differences may be due to boys preferring play that is aggressive and rough; may also be due to lack of response to girls’ polite requests; girls try to protect themselves from aggression and unresponsiveness by avoiding boys; boys may avoid girls because they see them as inferior

23. Empathy
Empathy — sensitivity to the feelings of others and is connected with sharing and cooperation
Infants may cry when another infant cries
Empathy promotes prosocial behavior and decreases aggression; at age 2 many children approach other children and adults in distress and try to help them
Unresponsive children more likely to behave aggressively
Girls more empathetic than boys

24. Prosocial Behavior
Prosocial Behavior — altruism; intent to benefit another without expectation of reward
At preschool and early school years age children engage in prosocial behavior
Siblings observed helping more than sharing, affection, and reassuring (Grusec, 1991)
Prosocial behavior linked to development of empathy and perspective taking

25. Development of Aggression
Preschoolers’ aggression instrumental or possession oriented
Older preschoolers more likely to engage in resolving conflicts over toys by sharing rather than fighting
Aggressive behavior causes rejection
By age 6 or 7 aggression is hostile and person oriented
Boys more likely to show aggression
Aggressive 8-year-olds more aggressive than peers 22 years later; more likely to have criminal records, abuse their spouse and drive drunk

26. Theories of Aggression
Genetic factors may be involved in aggressive behavior as well as criminal and antisocial
MZ twins high concordance rate for criminality
Males more aggressive than females, possibly due to testosterone
If child believes in legitimacy of aggression, more likely to engage in aggression when presented with social provocations
Aggressive children lack empathy and perspective-taking
Reinforcement and observational learning may contribute to aggression

27. Media Influences
Bandura’s bobo doll study suggested that televised models influence children’s aggressive behavior; children observing adult hitting Bobo in turn hit Bobo sometimes more aggressively
Children who watch 2 to 4 hours of TV a day will see 8,000 murders and another 100,000 acts of violence by the time they have finished elementary school
Children learn aggression through observational learning (watching models on TV)
Media violence and aggressive video games increase level of arousal; humans more likely to be aggressive under high levels of arousal

29. Media Influences Continued
Media violence “primes” or arouses aggressive ideas and memories
Humans become habituated to repeated stimuli; repeated exposure to TV violence may decrease viewers’ sensitivity to real violence
Children exposed to violence find it more normal
There is no simple one-to-one connection between media violence and violence in real life, however, exposure to violence in the media increases probability of violence by the viewers

30. Personality and Emotional Development
Personality development becomes more complex as children age
Children describe themselves in terms of certain categories such as baby, child, and sex (girl, boy)
Categorical self — self-definitions that refer to concrete external traits
Preschool children who have good opinions of themselves more likely to show secure attachment and have parents who are attentive to their needs

31. Personality and Emotional Development Continued
Preschool children make evaluative judgments about their cognitive and physical competence as well as their social acceptance by peers and parents
Preschoolers do not make distinction between different areas of competence such as being good in school but poor in sports
During middle childhood personality traits become more important

32. Initiative versus Guilt
Children engage in learning new skills on their own
Children during this stage strive to achieve independence from their parents and master adult behaviors
During these years it is learned that not all dreams can be realized
Fear of violating parental constructs may impede efforts to master new skills
Parents should encourage child to attempt to learn and explore without being critical and punitive

33. Fears: The Horrors of Early Childhood
Number of fears peak between 2 ½ and 4 years old
Preschool years marked by decrease in fears of loud noises, falling, sudden movement, and stranger
Preschool fears include animals, imaginary creatures, the dark, and personal danger
Real objects such as lightning, thunder, high places, sharp objects and being cut, blood, unfamiliar people cause fear
During middle childhood fears are more realistic

34. Development of Gender Roles and Sex Differences
Gender roles may be seeped in stereotypes
Feminine gender-role stereotypes include traits such as: gentleness, helpfulness, warmth
Masculine gender-role stereotypes include traits such as: aggressiveness, self-confidence, independence, competitiveness, and competence in business, math and science
Children stereotype into traditional roles by ages of 3 and 9 or 10
Children and adolescents perceive their own sex in a better light (eg. More hardworking, nicer)

35. Sex Differences
Sex differences in infancy small and inconsistent
Preschoolers display some differences in their choices of toys and play activities
Boys engage in more rough-and-tumble play and are more aggressive
Girls tend to show more empathy and report more fears
Girls show greater verbal ability, whereas boys show greater visual-spatial ability

36. Theories of the Development of Sex Differences
Evolutionary psychologists believe sex differences fashioned by natural selection in response to problems in adaptation that were repeatedly encountered by humans over thousands of generations
Genes that increase the likelihood of an organism’s chances of survival are most likely to be passed on to next generation
Males place value on physical attributes in mate selection; females place it on personal factors such as financial status and reliability

37. Organization of the Brain
Brain may be female and male differentiated
Studies on rats and humans have indicated males and females rely on different parts of the brain when they are navigating
Females rely on the hippocampus in the right hemisphere along with the right prefrontal cortex
Males use the hippocampus in both hemispheres when they are navigating

38. Social Cognitive Theory
Children learn masculine or feminine by observing and imitating models of the same sex
Socialization by parents, teachers provide children with information about expected gender-typed behaviors
Rewards include smiles, respect, companionship when “gender-appropriate” behaviors are displayed
Boys encouraged to roam further from home, to be more independent than girls
Primary schoolchildren show less stereotyping if mothers frequently engage in traditionally masculine household and child-care tasks

39. Cognitive-Developmental Theory
Kohlberg’s (1966) theory maintains the first step in gender typing is attaining gender identity — knowing whether you are male or female
Gender stability — realizing sex is for lifetime
Gender constancy — changing dress, hair or wearing an apron does not change your gender
Kohlberg’s theory cross-cultural; gender typing occurs in the same order of stages

40. Gender-Schema Theory
Sex is used as a way of organizing perception of the world
Gender schema — cluster of concepts about male and female physical traits, behaviors, and personality traits
Gender identity can inspire “gender-appropriate” behavior; boys and girls seek information concerning gender-typed traits and try to live up to them
Boys show better memory for boy toys, activities and occupations
Does not address biological component of gender

41. Psychological Androgyny
Cultural stereotypes polarize females and males by pushing them to imagined ends of a continuum of gender-role traits
Male and female traits can be found within the same individual; people who score high on measures of masculinity may score high in measures of femininity
People with both stereotypical feminine and masculine traits are called psychologically androgynous
Psychologically androgynous children are relatively well adjusted, have better social relations, show greater creativity