Cultural Perception Of Childhood

There are various discourses of childhood that help us understand how childhood is viewed and how children themselves are seen. It is important to also look outside the system world and look towards the life worlds as it gives a more realistic view of various childhoods and shows how diverse the concept of childhood is because children do not share the same experiences. Regardless if you are looking at the system or life world the notions of rights, opportunities and capabilities are often discussed. These notions aids us in understanding childhood, however they can often obstruct us as well.

At preschool age, guilt is a common aspect expressed by children when they do something they know they shouldn’t. Erikson’s theory is initiative versus guilt. By now the child has become convinced that they are a person all their own, discovering who they are as a person. Their emotional development is also a growing awareness of self, which is linked to the ability to feel a wide range of emotions. This allows them to make sense of other people’s reactions and to control their own. After a negative behavior, a child will feel guilt or shame after being told what they did was bad.

The purpose of this paper is to express the different ways culture affects child-rearing practices. Culture and child rearing are both essential in child development. Culture and ethnicity can have a deciding effect on the child-rearing techniques that families implement throughout the world. Differences such as methods of discipline, expectations regarding acceptance of responsibilities and transmission of religious instruction will vary among families. The paper includes interviews from three families from different backgrounds about child-rearing practices.

This involved checking in while the child was 1 month all the way until they were 54 months of age. These assessments occurred as well when the child was in kindergarten until sixth grade and then finally at age 15. Early child care was assessed through phone interviews as well as in person interviews from when the children were born until four and a half years old. At each assessment, the parents had stated the types of care that were provided for the children as well as how much. Observation was another method used during this study. The researchers visited the participants for to half days within a two-week span from 6 to 36 months. Questionnaires were also given to show the adolescent’s academic progress as well as their standing among other students. Student’s selected options that included “mostly A’s, B’s, C’s,” and so on. From these surveys the results were then concluded. Self-reports were also used to report behavioral adjustment. The article had stated that for this aspect “Delinquent Behavior and Aggressive Behavior scales” were used. This involved answering questions that involved answers such as “somewhat or sometimes true”, or “very true or often true.” The participants had also answered questions on whether they had engaged in any risky behaviors. These different methods of conducting research were used to come to conclusions about early child care and behavior as well as

The children observed were found at the children’s center located on the California State University in Sacramento. The children’s center is a day care/preschool for children ranging in ages from 6 months to 5 years old. The researchers focused on preschool aged children (3-5 years old). All participants in this study will be assigned labels of target 1, target 2 and so forth. The group observed was made up of 3 boys and 2 girls, as well as their childcare giver. The childcare giver will be referred to as Adult. Adult was a woman around the age of 50 with a degree in child development and early childcare. The setting of the observation was in one of the many classrooms the children’s center provides. The classroom was large with around 15

The social phenomenon of childhood has, across many generations, been debated and refined through social, cultural and historical frameworks. Perhaps one of the more well-rounded definitions can be understood through Sorin and Galloway’s (2006) suggestion of childhood as a structure that is developed and enforced on “children” by “adults”. Furthermore, the United Nations paints childhood, based upon the 'Rights of the Child ' policy (UNCRC) (NSPCC, 2009), with a more simplistic biologically focused definition that a child is any person under the age of eighteen, irrelevant of gender. Thus it would appear that there is not one thesis of childhood that is globally accepted, but rather a structure of theories of childhood bred constructed through the roles of adults and framed through cultural, social, geographic and historical themes and experiences. Based on this preface, this study will seek to identify and analyse five constructs that are recognised within various cultures, eras and societies and how they have influenced constructs of childhood in today’s world.

Raising a child is one of the most beautiful, difficult and rewarding jobs that most people will ever have. How one chooses to raise their child depends entirely on how one sees fit; however many other things come into play such as genes, family, culture, and community. Through these environmental factors each child is raised to a particular norm within a culture; this paper hopes to explore cultural differences in child rearing across the globe.

This literature review was undertaken in an effort to investigate the question: Does the use of our cultural conditioning influences have a positive correlation between parental attachments towards developing positive characteristics in early childhood development? An analysis of rearing children in unhealthy parenting environments reveals several challenges facing children’s emotional, social, psychological and mental and cognitive development. In order for children to be ready to enter school there are core characteristics such as the importance of touch and bonding, intensity levels of modeling efficacy, sensory reinforcers, and operant conditioning(SR-theory).

As a 7 year old female child, Anna’s worldview is still unique as she is transitioning from early childhood to middle childhood. According to Erikson’s psychosocial perspective, Anna is in the beginning of the industry versus inferiority stage (6 years-to puberty); which is when children enter school and gain competence in their academic skills and recognize they enjoy learning (King, 2013). Considering Anna is a good student and delights being in school, she is welcoming the industry versus inferiority stage in the academic sense of this stage versus the psychosocial part of it. Bearing in mind the neglectful parenting from Anna’s biological parents, it is assumed Anna may have struggled demonstrating personal power during the initiative versus guilt phase as she demonstrates her shyness and is reserved in large group settings. This assumption also aligns the reasoning why Anna is below average in her social, language and emotional development. The initiative versus guilt phase is when a child learns what kind of behaviors pleases adults/peers along with learning how to read social cues and if they struggle in this stage, they will appear to be shy and withdrawn in the industry versus inferiority stage (Smith-Adcock & Pereira, 2016). Although Anna is still developing her social, language and emotional skills, her health history indicated she reached all of her developmental milestones on time. She is also on average with her physical and intellectual development as

There are many cultural factors that come into play in the raising of children. One major factor is the role of the mother and father in early childhood interactions. Kathleen Berger points to the obvious differences between the way mothers and fathers interact with their young children. She states that mothers tend to “caress, read, sing…” where as fathers tend to “swing the baby through the air” (Berger 146). What is more, mothers tend to stay home from work to raise the children more than fathers (Berger 154). Yet the best-case scenario in raising children is for a father and mother to both be involved. One such evidence is sited by Berger when she states, “Close father–infant relationships can teach infants (especially boys) appropriate

It has recently been noted by the researchers that there is growing concern among psychologists that as more parents who are working entrust the responsibility for caring their infants of a very young age to day care centers, some of these babies may face harm of a psychological nature. The research findings of the researchers in this field focus on children who re less than eighteen months of age who are left in day care centers more than twenty hours a week. For children who are at that most formative age, say the researchers, day care seems to increase the feeling of insecurity. One of the foremost leading researchers in this field says that he isn't sure how the increase in the feeling of insecurity happens, but it is his guess that the stress that a child undergoes each and every day as a result of the separation from the parent can be a contributing causal factor here.

During this stage, children “are generally engaged in a variety of learning tasks.” When the child finishes the task successfully, they feel they have accomplished something. If the child is not successful, their self-esteem and competence level decrease. (Licht, 2014) When I was in fourth grade, we were given a task, learning how to multiply a double digit by another double digit. My teacher wrote several problems to be solved on the board. She called me and numerous others to solve in front of the class. Everyone finished their problem, except for me. I was unable to finish the task successfully. I cried in front of the class. This type of issue continued to happen throughout grade school, and even at

In individualistic cultures such as in the USA, the overriding goal of parents is to make a child independent and self-reliant (Small, 2002). In America, parents aim to bring up a highly verbal, independent, emotionally controlled, and self-reliant child, such social skills as seen as essential to success in an individualistic society (Small, 2002). Whilst self-esteem is a major factor for American’s and their children, this term is not easily translated into other languages, due to the trait not being part of the value system in many cultures. Which may be something that people in collectivistic cultures to not comprehend, where children think of themselves as part of a “we”-group or in-group. Families from collectivistic cultures teach their children to be dependent, and to engage in appropriate levels of relatedness- as such, to be an obedient, calm, polite and respectful individual. Thus, child rearing practices differ greatly, such as sleep solitary (individualistic/independent) vs. co-sleeping (collectivistic/interdependent), or with the feeding process and toilet training (Carteret, 2016).

At age two, the infant moves into the toddler years. Between the ages of 2 and 3, the child’s crisis move from trust/mistrust to shame versus doubt. It is during this stage that the child begins to gain greater control over their motor skills and their body in general. The child will begin to explore its environment, take ownership and possessions of items, places and things within the environment and attempt to become independent in the process. Although the child will attempt independence and exert some authority, it is

Not a single parent will ever say raising a child is easy. In fact, raising a child is, indeed, difficult. It costs money, and a great deal of emotional, psychological and physical energy; just to name a few. Most importantly, parenting never seems to happen as many parents have imagined or wished. However, the intention of this paper is not to greaten the sufferings of the parents by provoking their frustrations. It is rather to provide an insight or an option to make parenting less painful and more enjoyable as it should have been in the first place. Out of many adjustments a parent can make for the betterment of his/her child and their relationship, one major component is discipline. There are already many cases of failures of either over-discipling or under-discipling a child. However, with a well balanced and prepared methods of disciplining, one’s child can maximize to his/her potential.