Testing

• Emotional regulation


  Ability to control when and how emotions are expressed
• Emotional regulation


  • Possibly due to connections between limbic system and prefrontal cortex
  • Most important psychosocial accomplishment between ages 2 and 6
• Effortful control


  Ability to regulate one's emotions and actions through effort, not simply through natural inclination
• Initiative versus guilt


  Erikson's third psychosocial crisis where children undertake new skills and activities and feel guilty when they do not succeed at them
• Guilt


  Self-blame that people experience when they do something wrong
• Shame


  People's feeling that others blame them, disapprove of them, or are disappointed in them
• Self-concept


  A person's understanding of who he or she is, incorporating self-esteem, physical appearance, personality, and various personal traits
• Self-concept


  Connected to parental confirmation
• Protective optimism


  Young children are not realistic (Erikson). They believe they are strong, smart, attractive, and able to achieve any goals. Confidence in self helps young children to persist.
• Brain maturation


  • Growth of prefrontal cortex at about age 4 or 5
  • Myelination of the limbic system
• Improved behaviors and abilities

  • Longer attention span
  • Improved capacity for self-control
  • Social awareness and self-concept become stronger
• Factors related to emotional regulation

  • Maturation
  • Learning
  • Culture
• Intrinsic motivation


  Drive, or reason to pursue a goal, that comes from inside a person (e.g., need to feel smart or competent)
• Extrinsic motivation


  Drive, or reason to pursue a goal, that arises from the need to have achievements rewarded from outside (e.g., by receiving material possessions or another person's esteem)
• Imaginary friends


  Make-believe friends who exist only in a child's imagination, increasingly common from ages 3 through 7, they combat loneliness and aid emotional regulation
• Imaginary friends are an example of intrinsic motivation
• Play


  • Universal and timeless
  • Most productive and enjoyable activity that children undertake
  • Increasingly complex social play is due to brain maturation coupled with many hours of social play
  • Form of play changes with age and culture
• Playmates


  • People of about the same age and social status
  • Provide practice in emotional regulation, empathy, and social understanding
  • Preferred play partners over parents
• Types of social play (Parten 1932)

  • Solitary play
  • Onlooker play
  • Parallel play
  • Associative play
  • Cooperative play
• Rough-and-tumble play


  • Mimics aggression with no intention to harm
  • Contains expressions and gestures signifying that the child is "just pretending"
  • Is particularly common among young males
  • Advances children's social understanding but increases likelihood of injury
  • May positively affect prefrontal cortex development
• Sociodramatic play


  • Enables children to explore and rehearse social rules
  • Learn to explain ideas and persuade playmates
  • Practice emotional regulation
  • Develop self-concept in nonthreatening context
• Many young children are using screens three hours a day, and with far reaching consequences, in obesity, emotional immaturity, intellectual growth
• Caregiving styles (Baumrind)


  • Authoritarian parenting
  • Permissive parenting
  • Authoritative parenting
• Neglectful/uninvolved parenting


  Parents are indifferent toward their children and unaware of what is going on in their children's lives
• Children of authoritarian parents

  • Become conscientious, obedient, and quiet but not especially happy
  • May feel guilty or depressed and blame themselves when things do not go well
  • May rebel as adolescents and leave home before age 20
• Children of permissive parents

  • Are unhappy and lack self-control, especially in peer relationships
  • Suffer from inadequate emotional regulation
  • Are immature and lack friendships (main reason for their unhappiness)
  • Tend to continue to live at home, still dependent, in early adulthood
• Children of authoritative parents


  • Are successful, articulate, happy with themselves, and generous with others
  • Are well-liked by teachers and peers, especially in societies in which individual initiative is valued
• Physical punishment


  Punishment that physically hurts the body, such as slapping
• Physical punishment increases obedience temporarily, but it also increases the possibility of later aggression
• Children of authoritative parents

  • Successful
  • Articulate
  • Happy with themselves
  • Generous with others
  • Well-liked by teachers and peers, especially in societies in which individual initiative is valued
• Physical punishment


  Punishment that physically hurts the body, such as slapping or spanking
• Physical punishment


  Increases obedience temporarily, but it also increases the possibility of later aggression
• Physical punishment


  Correlates with delayed theory of mind and increased aggression
• Many children who are spanked do not become violent adults; other factors (e.g., poverty, temperament) are stronger influences
• Psychological control


  Disciplinary technique that involves threatening to withdraw love and support and that relies on a child's feelings of guilt and gratitude to the parents
• Psychological control


  • Higher parent control; lower child math scores
  • Depressed child achievement, creativity, social acceptance
  • Increased relational aggression
• Time-out


  Disciplinary technique in which a child is separated from other people and activities for a specified time
• For some children in some cultures, sitting alone is an effective punishment
• Sometimes time-out produces an angry child without changing the child's behavior
• Evaluation of time-out effectiveness is confounded by different styles/uses of time-out