L11: Life Cycle I: Infancy to Preschool

Question 1

Infancy. a.) What is the age? b.) What is the major / primary psychological task for the infant? What is the factor that allows for developmental tasks to occur? c.) Describe developmental periods that occur during infancy. What are parental tasks?

Answer 1

• A.) Birth to 18 months - B.) Psychological task: to establish a secure attachment to mother (or caregiver) leading to basic trust. Development tasks require neurological development that allow for attachment to occur. - C.) Establishment of symbiotic relationship (less than 5 months): requires that parents are sensitive and attuned and have capacity to: be aware of baby’s signals, accurately interpret baby’s signals, respond appropriately and promptly. Hatching (5-10 months): attention shifts from inside the symbiotic relationship to outside. Result of maturation and increasing pleasure in all stimulation from outside world. Child has periods of withdrawal into self in sleep and calm pondering. Parents must respect child’s need for quiet, must be neither too intrusive or withdrawn. They must help build confidence given emerging abilities and provide environment conducive to development. Threats is in this periods are fear of losing mother parent that leads to protest, despair and detachment. Good attachment in first 6 months followed by prolonged separation leads to child being depressed. Stranger anxiety seen here when child has developed attachment preferences and has made progress with differentiation. Stranger anxiety requires that infant has ability to remember mother’s face, compare it with another face, realize difference and realize mother is not there. Around 7 months, peek-a-boo is important to helping develop infant’s object permanence. Infant has some control over appearance and disappearance of significant figures, which helps decrease anxiety. Serves as a way to practice separation from parent. Practicing (10-16 months): begins with ability to move away from the mother, ends with ability to walk alone. Infant is developing abilities, coordination through crawling, walking and manipulating. Increasingly able to make things happen on own. There is increased separation from mother during this time, but “powers” are shown to parent by infant. Vacilation between autonomy and mastery, and self-doubt and dependency. Grandiosity, pride and willfulness occurs during this period. Peak of separation anxiety occurs here around 14 months, gradually resolves after. Parents need to: build self-esteem, minimize shame and humiliation. They need to encourage and praise efforts, help child become comfortable with trying and failing short. Parental delight and frustration must be managed. Support dependency needs and encourage new achievements. Don’t be so delighted that center of attention becomes delight. Transitional objects seen during this time, which aids in development of self-soothing. Self Awareness (15-18 months): child develops self-awareness.

Question 2

Describe the role of the parent in creating a symbiotic relationship during infancy. What are the results of this parenting?

Answer 2

• Sensitive and attuned parent is key and requires: be aware of baby’s signals, accurately interpret baby’s signals, respond appropriately and promptly. - Results of following these tasks: infants cry less, develop a wider repertoire of communication and are more obedient to commands of the mother.

Question 3

What are characteristics that symbiotic attachment has failed?

Answer 3

• inability to keep rules, lack of guilt experience, indiscriminate friendliness, inappropriate craving for attention, inability to make lasting relationships, affectionless

Question 4

In what children does failure of symbiotic attachment typically occur?

Answer 4

• Those who are adopted or have been institutionalized for first 2-3 years of life.

Question 5

What are areas to consider when evaluating disrupted attachment?

Answer 5

• Age of child at time of disruption - Quality of early relationship with mother, or primary parent figure(s) - Presence of other attachment bonds (substitutes and quality of this bond)

Question 6

What is a transitional object?

Answer 6

• It is an object to which a child forms an attachment and aids in development of capacity to self-sooth. It is under the child’s direct control. It represents child/mother. Used for comfort, especially in absence of primary attachment figures. Is used for calming prior to sleep and / or after periods of distress. Loss of this leads to crisis.

Question 7

Toddler. a.) What is the age? b.) What is the major / primary psychological task for the infant? What is the factor that allows for developmental tasks to occur? c.) Describe developmental periods that occur during infancy. What are parental tasks?

Answer 7

• a.) 18 months – 3 years - b.) Self-assertion and increased bodily control and self-regulation - c.) Rapprochement (16-24 months): period of increased separation from mother – autonomy. Sense of omnipotence is threatened by real world experiences – parental dependency as source of power is reinforced. Internalization of rules and demands leads to development of superego. Concern about loss of parent’s love. Parental tasks include: supporting dependency needs while encouraging achievements in world; be receptive to child’s moving out and moving back; encourage freedom to will her own action, while also teaching acceptance and respect for parental limits. Threats for toddler include loss of parents’ love and support if their will is increasingly asserted AND idea of loss of self assertion an automy (if I stay merged with you, I keep your love, but I lose myself). Terrible 2s seen here. Child says no is just an assertion of will. Parents must ignore temper tantrums, never give in to manipulative behavior. Parents must not attribute meaning to behavior or take things personally. Habits such as thumb sucking, masturbation and biting can occur here. This should not concern parents.

Question 8

Pre-school. a.) What is the age? b.) What is the major / primary psychological task for the infant? What is the factor that allows for developmental tasks to occur? c.) Describe developmental periods that occur during infancy. What are parental tasks?

Answer 8

• a.) 3-5 years old - b.) initiative vs guilt - c.) Pleasure vs pride, guilt, conscience and sex role identities are developing in this period. Parents should encourage talking about feelings and thoughts when expressed. They should respect the child’s needs, listen and take child’s perspective seriously, help child distinguish and sort things out and foster curiosity and exploration and verbal sharing of experience. By age 3

Question 9

Describe changes to thoughts around gender for ages 2-6?

Answer 9

• Age 2 to 5: beginning preference for same-sex play - Age 3: know male and female differences are for life - Age 4: certain toys and roles are seen as more appropriate for one sex than the other - Pre-school: still confusion of sex and gender - Age 6: know which sex is better (their own) and which sex is stupid (the opposite)

Question 10

Describe relationship between temperament and attachment.

Answer 10

• Temperament refers to constitutionally based individual differences in emotional, motor and attentional reactivity and self-regulation. - A difficult child is more affected by a mother’s responsiveness than a positive child is. - A difficult temperament plus ineffective parenting leads to future difficulties, ie. someone who is destructive and antisocial.