According to Darwin, it is a survival of the fittest. According to Marx, our battle is a class struggle, the survivors against the losers of the capitalist economy. According to Freud, the sexual impulse, which leads to the aggressive impulse, is the fall of civilization. According to Hobbes, the state of nature requires the imposition of social contract upon the underdog. According to Rousseau, the midget quarrell for goon and crack, while the giant stride across the universe. According to Jesus, love thy neighbor. To help or not to help? It is only those in power, the fittest, the elite who have to make policy to eradicate the problem at the root. It might be too extreme to change economic policy, however it is not asking too much to provide high quality, high quantity and the right type of early child care for the children of those stuck in the lower socioeconomic classes.
We are in the twenty first century and are considered an advanced civilization, however we have gone wrong somewhere, when there is crime and violence on the streets of a rich western liberal state. Whether it be aggravated burglaries, armed robberies, murder or rape, society is unsettled with millions locked up in correction facilities and millions more under psychiatric care. There are millions homeless and unemployed, if not homicidal, suicidal with drug and alcohol addictions to add to broken families. To compete in this free market requires competencies and behaviors that have not been acquired by a large portion of society. Remedy for our dilemma requires conditioning of the mind which begins in early infancy. As such, similar minds who concur have made the start on the research that will establish policy to eradicate our society of such a sickness.
Belsky found that children who experienced higher quality early child care displayed somewhat better cognitive and academic outcomes in fifth grade than did children who experienced poorer quality care. Paradoxically, children with more experience in center settings continued to manifest somewhat more problem behaviors through sixth grade. The most important factor on achievement and social functioning, Belsky confirms, is parenting quality.
Sims found that higher quality center care showed a greater decline in cortisol (a biological measure of stress levels). Sims reiterated the fact that the fate of the poors’ children in the western capitalistic states will attend child care centers with poor educators and hence a bleak outlook for their children in terms of knowledge gained and problem behaviors. Sims also claims that the relationship between the caregiver and child is of critical importance.
There have been several studies over the years on the effects of early child care. Some have highlighted potentially beneficial consequences of early child care, especially of high-quality care, on social functioning (e.g., Howes, 1998; Peisner-Feinberg & Burchinal, 1997; Vandell, Henderson, & Wilson, 1988), as well as on cognitive-linguistic development or academic achievement (e.g., Broberg, Wessels, Lamb, & Hwang, 1997; Burchinal et al., 2000; Peisner-Feinberg et al., 2001), particularly in the case of economically disadvantaged children attending high-quality early-intervention programs (e.g., Campbell et al., 2001; Reynolds, 2000; Schweinhart, Weikart, & Larner, 1986). On the negative side, adverse consequences on socioemotional functioning, including behaviour problems have been found (Bates et al., 1994., Belsky, 1990, 2001; Haskins, 1985; Vandell & Corasaniti, 1990). With all the results that have been brought to the table for policy makers, it is not clear how long the effects of early child care have on the future of the children, some claiming that effects do not endure beyond the preschool or early elementary school years (e.g., Blau, 1999; Colwell, Pettit, Meece, Bates, & Dodge, 2001; Deater-Deckard, Pinkerton, & Scarr, 1996; Egeland & Hiester, 1995), while others claim effects are more long lasting (e.g., Belsky, 1988; Vandell et al., 1988; Vandell & Corasaniti, 1990) and others claim effects endure for some time (Campbell et al., 2001; Lazar & Darlington, 1982; Schweinhart et al., 1986).
Although I am bias against the use of cortisol as measure of the effects of child care, there have been many studies using cortisol as a measure. To begin, children's cortisol levels tended to increase throughout the day in child care (Tout et al. 1998) whereas children in the home setting demonstrated decreases in cortisol (Dettling et al. 1999; Watamura et al. 2003). Several factors influence this variance : Children who were more socially fearful (Crockenberg 2003), younger children and those with less well-developed social skills (Watamura et al. 2003), emotionally negative children and those with less self-control (Dettling et al. 2000) and boys (Crockenberg 2003), high quality child care demonstrated less sharp increases or actual decreases in cortisol levels (Dettling et al. 2000; Gunnar et al. 1992; Gunnar & White 2001), attachment to carer has proven to have impact (Gunnar et al. 1992; Lamb 1998), individual needs need to be met (Greenspan 2003), separation anxiety (Jarvis & Creasey 1991), sensitive mothers and those with social support (Harrison & Ungerer 2002) and finally parents enduring financial stress result in children with lower cognitive and language skill and higher rates of antisocial behaviour (Kim-Cohen et al. 2004). In addition, boys appear more vulnerable to adverse early childhood environments (Wilkins et al. 2004)
As I am bias against biological markers, I have to present the limitations of cortisol as a measure for child development studies; abnormal variances in cortisol levels are recorded for various conditions ranging from memory problems (Abercrombie et al. 2003; Takahashi et al. 2004), health problems [fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, severe rheumatoid arthritis (Adam 2003), responsiveness to vaccines and the immune system (Padgett & Glaser 2003), hypertension (Kunz-Ebrecht et al. 2004)], socio-emotional problems [adults with insecure attachment, less effective marital functioning (Adam 2003), children who have been abused or who do not have secure attachments (Luecken & Lemery 2004), major depression and posttraumatic stress disorder (Young & Breslau 2004), adults who experienced the death of a parent in childhood (Nicolson 2004)], behaviour problems (Adam 2003) and stress associated with low socioeconomic status (Kristensen et al. 2004). It is not yet clear how high levels of cortisol need to be, and for how long elevations need to be maintained, for children to experience a significant increase in risk for negative outcomes (Watamura et al. 2003)
Children not only participate in families and child care arrangements, they participate in peer groups, community settings, schools and a range of other environments, all of which influence their outcomes. It is difficult to claim that early child care is an indicator of future delinquency. There are several studies to refer to, however the researchers explicitly state that there are variables not accounted for, the measuring tape not sufficient and comparative studies show ambiguity. The reality is that presidents are groomed, corporate leaders and great scientists are always derived from good stock who know how to ‘make’ men. Those stuck in the penitentiary and psychiatric institutions are bred from inferior stock who do not know better. In the jungle, the offspring of the survivors will survive. These are the facts. To remedy the social problems of capitalist societies, we need either change economic policy or provide higher quality, higher quantity and better types of early child care for those stuck in the lower socioeconomic classes.
No comments:
Post a Comment