ABSTRACT
Particular importance has been attached by Freudian-oriented psychologists and anthropologists to the infant's feelings of emotional security, the warmth of mother-child relationships, to the earliness or abruptness of weaning, severity of toilet-training, and to such practices as binding, in children's psychological development. While Whiting and Child have had some success in relating rearing practices to the beliefs and values of different ethnic groups, any generalisations as to their effects on personality or intellectual development are dubious. As Whiting points out elsewhere (1961), a far greater variety of conditions may be found in non-western groups than in our own culture, and it is difficult for the psychologist from outside to tell what are the most significant parameters in child-rearing.
