ABSTRACT

The parent's ordinary concern with the problems of rearing his own children is matched by the psychologist's interest in whether different child-rearing practices have demonstrable long-term effects, whether the child is indeed father to the man. Although the idea of character may seem premature for the period of early childhood, psychoanalytic writers have suggested that later character is influenced by infant experiences of feeding, toilet and sex. An important aspect of the psychosexual relationships is the process of identification, whereby the young child comes to accept particular persons as models for his own behaviour. The educational implications of the psychology of early childhood include the importance of helping more mothers to understand how young children are shaped by individual affection, tolerance, and variety of stimulus and experience. The nominal concern of psychology is with fact rather than value, and with persons rather than institutions.