2021-03-13

EARLY CHILDHOOD
PSYC 333

Erik Erikson – Psychosocial stages

 Initiative
 New sense of purposefulness
 Eagerness to try out new tasks/skills,
join activities
 Planning, judgment
 Guilt
 Overly strict superego causing too
much guilt
 Related to parental:
 threats
 criticism
 punishment

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Shame vs. Guilt: Subsequent prosocial behavior

 Shame: primitive feeling felt when personally humiliated
~ withdrawal, fury, and feelings of revenge

 Guilt: experienced when personal moral standard or hurtful action to

another human being occurs
~ connections and attempts to make amends

Understanding of Self
Self-awareness: The ability to observe our abilities and actions from an outside frame of
reference and to reflect on our inner state

What allows for socioemotional development during Erikson’s stage of Initiative vs. Guilt?

Emotion regulation Motivation

Initiative vs. Guilt

Self-concept
Preschool children motivated
with a drive or reason to
pursue a goal that comes from
within
Possible as limbic system
connects with prefrontal
cortex Understanding who you are in
relationship to self-esteem,
appearance, personality, and
various traits
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All photos: Fancy Collection/Superstock EXCEPT for boy in astronaut costume, which is moodboard/Superstock

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Understanding of Self: Infancy

 Self-awareness – The Rouge Test (Gordon Gallup Jr, 1970)

Understanding of Self
 Self-concept: set of attributes, abilities, attitudes, values that an individual
believes defines who he/she is. This mainly consists in:
 observable characteristics
 typical emotions and attitudes
 Self-esteem: judgments made about our own worth and feelings associated
with those judgments. This influences:
 Future behavior
 Emotional experiences
 Future psychological adjustment

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Understanding of Self: Childhood

 By elementary school, children engage in social comparison

Characteristics Behaviors Possessions

• She is taller • He can run • He has a

• He is bigger faster new XBOX
• They are • She scored • She has a
smarter higher on puppy
test

Prosocial behavior: Sharing, helping, caring actions

Altruism: Prosocial behaviors that are carried out for selfless, non-
egocentric reasons

Acting these ways depends on experiencing following

emotional states:

Empathy Feeling same/similar emotion that another

person is experiencing

Sympathy Feeling upset for another person’s plight

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Aggression
Aggression: any hostile or destructive act

Type of AggressionThe Forms of AggressionBehaviour

Proactive (a.k.a. instrumental) Calculated act to inflict harm to gain
aggression something

Reactive (a.k.a. emotional) aggression Impulsive act of inflicting harm, often

caused by strong emotion (anger, fear)
Direct (a.k.a. overt) aggression Everyone can see it.

Relational aggression Carried out indirectly, through damaging

or destroying the victim’s relationships.

Play behavior emerges in toddlerhood

and has a purpose, other than being
fun
Play allows children to practice adult Rough-and- Play that involves shoving,
roles tumble play: wrestling, and hitting, but in
which no actual harm is intended
Play allows children a sense of control

Play furthers child’s understanding of Fantasy play: Play that involves making up and
acting out a scenario
social norms
There are different categories of play.
E.g. Collaborative Fantasy play in which children work
(a.k.a. cooperative) together to develop and act out the
pretend play: scenes

Gender- Play in which boys and girls

segregated play: associate only with the
members of their own sex

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Socioemotional development
 Gains in emotional competence:
 emotional understanding
 emotion (self) regulation
 Self-conscious emotions (guilt, shame, embarrassment, pride) and empathy &
sympathy
 Preschoolers correctly judge:
 causes of emotions
 consequences of emotions
 behavioral signs of emotions

Socioemotional development
Emotion regulation: capacity to manage one’s emotional state

Externalizing tendencies Internalizing tendencies

• lashing out at others or breaking things
• difficulty with emotional regulation
• expression of powerful feelings
• uncontrolled physical or verbal outbursts
• blames others for their failures
• turning emotions and distress inward
• difficulty with emotional regulation
• excessively feeling guilt, shame, worthlessness
• may develop learned helplessness (feeling powerless
over their fate)

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Socioemotional development
 By ≈age 4 years, aware of strategies for emotion self-regulation. This
is affected by:
 Temperament
 Parenting

Parenting
 Parenting (Baumrind,1971) – 2 dimensions:
 Parental responsiveness
 Provision of “structure”/rules

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Parenting: Styles
Discipline (structure/rules)
High Low

High
Authoritative Permissive
Style Style
Nurturance
(responsiveness)
Authoritarian Rejecting-
Low
Style neglecting
Style

Parenting: Styles
Authoritarian Authoritative Permissive Neglectful/Uninvolved
• High standards • Sets limits but listens • High nurturance and • Indifference
• Strict punishment • Flexible communication • Unaware of child
• Little communication • Little discipline or
control of misconduct

Parenting involves different types of behavior, not just love and discipline
Criticisms: are these parenting Parenting varies with culture
styles too simplistic?
Parenting changes based on the environment 22

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Temperament and Parenting

 Muhtadie et al. 2013: Examine relations of early parenting styles (authoritative and authoritarian)
and early temperament (effortful control, sad, angry) to internalizing problems (6-9 years)

↑ Anger x authoritative parenting ~

↓ internalizing problems ↓ Effortful control x authoritarian parenting ~
↑ internalizing problems
Adapted from Muhtadie et al. 2013

How much do parents matter?

 Our peers socialize us to become adults
(Harris, 1995, 1998, 2002, 2006)
 Acculturation

 Learning is context-specific

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Parenting: Repercussions
 Authoritative
 Self-control, moral maturity, high self-esteem
 Authoritarian
 Anxiety, unhappiness, low self-esteem, anger, defiance
 Permissive
 Impulsivity, poor school achievement
 Uninvolved
 Depression, anger, poor school achievement

Corporal punishment: use of physical force to discipline a child

Professionals are still debating the use of corporal punishment...

Some psychologists view spanking as Other psychologists have proposed

never appropriate guidelines for spanking:
Never spank an infant
Light spanking with preschoolers when a
behavior needs to be stopped immediately

Explanation should accompany spanking

Reserve spanking as a backup technique

Use any other alternative disciplinary
technique first
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Alternatives to harsh punishment

 Positive disciplinary techniques:
 Use transgressions as opportunities to
teach
 Reduce opportunities for misbehavior
 Provide reasons for rules
 Have children participate in family
duties and routines
 Try compromising and problem-solving
 Encourage mature behavior

Child maltreatment: Types

Child maltreatment: Any act that seriously endangers a
child’s physical or emotional well-being

Type of Abuse Definition

Physical abuse Assault resting in child’s physical injury

Neglect Failing to meet child’s needs

Emotional abuse Continual shaming or serious acts such as terrorizing or

exploiting a child
Sexual abuse Rape, incest, fondling, pornography…

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Child maltreatment: Repercussions

 Emotional consequences:
 poor emotion self-regulation
 impaired empathy/sympathy
 depression
 Adjustment/Behavioral consequences:
 substance abuse
 violent crime
 Consequences on learning:
 impaired executive functions
 low academic motivation

Resilient children
 Qualities:
 Superior emotion regulation
 Special talent(s)
 Optimistic world view
 At least one warm, loving relationship
 “Good” genes: easy temperament, superior intellectual and social skills

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