ABSTRACT
INTERACTION OF BOTH of the healthy child underpins their ability to function in their social group. Genetic inheritance ‘sets the scene’ and physiological maturation determines the healthy child’s ability to use the environmental to hone their inbuilt ‘experience processing’ skills. We infer this process by observing their behaviour and psychologists have documented this activity to suggest developmental ‘norms’. They have shown that the brain is more than the electrical impulses that can be measured; consciousness encompasses perception of senses, voluntary initiation and control of movement, and capabilities associated with higher mental processing such as perception, memory, learning and emotional response. Marieb and Hoehn (2007) describes clinical consciousness on a continuum that grades behaviour in response to stimulus as alert, drowsy, stupor and coma, but a wider definition of consciousness, such as that which allows the child to appreciate beauty and experience love, must involve a more holistic and totally interconnected function of brain parts.
