Developmental psychology/Chapter 4/Who Should Care For Babies?


 * >> Previous page: Theories of Infant Psychosocial Development
 * >> Next page: Chapter 5

Many caregivers could be present for a baby - it just depends on the culture and family. Since 1980 in the Western world, infant care from non-relatives have been increasing. In the US in 2015, 58% of mothers of <1 year olds were in the workforce - allocare is needed! In our country, the rich and the poor are able to get infant day-care for their child. The middle-class usually take the infants into their care at home.

Overall, these conclusions have been made by developmentalists regarding infant care:


 * 1) Familiar caregivers are needed
 * 2) Constant change of care leads to aggressive behaviours in the future
 * 3) Need strong relationship with parent

Small Excerpt Regarding Daycares: Should the Government Prioritize High-Quality and Affordable Daycares?
The importance of child care for a child is quite self-explanatory. Without proper care, the child can be impacted for as long as they live - including neurological and physical ailments as a result of mis-care. With this being mentioned, what are the 5 requirements for high-quality childcare to ensure your child receives the best for their development?

My personal view is that high-quality daycares SHOULD be a priority for the government. This is simply because our children are going to be the next generation, including the next police officers, news reporters, leaders, politicians and even having our next president! It would be harder to answer, "Why SHOULDN'T we prioritize healthy daycares?". Our children are impacted by these daycares and it is our duty to ensure that they're receiving proper and professional treatment that will be the best for their development. With this being said, I also agree with expanding public education to ensure that elementary schools contain high-quality daycare for working families: school is the place of major development for a child, so it is best that we're able to see proper and sufficient care for a place which is frequented by children so often. These programs that may arise also should require that the caregivers are permanent and long-lasting, as developmentalists agree that a caregiver should not be new/someone that changes often as this affects the children's attachment stage.
 * 1) There should be attention given to all infants (a maximum of 5) by two permanent caregivers who are experienced in this field.
 * 2) Infants need to be constantly testing their sensorimotor skills and language skills. The caregivers must be engaged linguistically with their kids and toys that test the movement of their fingers should be readily available.
 * 3) The environment must be cleaned and they must be encouraged to wash their hands
 * 4) Caregivers must be professionals in their field and know what they're doing
 * 5) Caregivers have to be engaged with their children and not focus on other things
 * 6) Other small points are that the number of infants should be limited to <8 to ensure attention (attachment and synchrony), regular naps, ratio of adults to infants be 1:4 and the parents must be supportive