"Childhood Plays Crucial Role in the Journey to Adulthood"
Any intelligent human being may perhaps be sure to ask themselves at one point in their life how they became who they are today? Or rather, what journeys did one go through to get to the location they now reside in metaphorically speaking? One theory of what shapes a person into being can be found in Psychology: Core Concepts. The definition given for the nature-nurture theory states, “Simply put, nature-nurture interaction means that we are all born with certain predispositions (nature) that, if exposed to the proper experiences in our environment (nurture), can reach their full potential” (pg 231).
The importance of having a strong, healthy foundation and upbringing in the environment at an early age is very crucial to an individual’s life. Children who do not have a good relationship with their parents or guardians are more likely entitled to a number of disadvantages in their future, due to trauma in their earlier days. These disadvantages and trauma can be caused under certain circumstances things such as a lingering sense of inability to prevent such an event, an unexpected event in which one was not prepared, a repeated event which causes a child to lack confidence and the sense of love for themselves, or if a child’s parents never taught the child their roles in society. One of the most impactful traumas can be most detrimental if it occurred in childhood.
Childhood Plays Crucial Role in the Journey to Adulthood
First, trauma during childhood, involving the parents or other legal guardian, along with surroundings and environment, can lead to future implicated problems. A child is vastly vulnerable and susceptible to permanent damage which can stay with them throughout their childhood, adolescence, and finally adulthood. Children more than often are unable to control or prevent tribulations and burdens that can be laid on them at an early age. A major misdemeanor and confusion which can erupt within the realm of parenting can be the way in which a parent or guardian would instigate the discipline and correction of a child’s misbehaviors. For example, if a child was told not to do something, yet they prolong to do it, a parent should intercept that manner of performance. It is not merely the importance of disciplining the child, but the way in which it is done. For example, if a parent gets out of control and begins to scream and yell irrationally and emotionally at said child, then the child will walk away with nothing but the lingering of confusion in how to feel at that precise moment. The child will not have benefitted from that experience. Instead, they will have simply learned how to deal with the next person who acts against their wishes; screaming and yelling irrationally and emotionally to get their way. They do this because that is what they have learned from their parents.
Often times a parent can confuse “discipline” with “totalitarianism”. Webster’s English Dictionary gives the definition of “discipline” as, “training; subjection to control; punishment.” While on the contrary, it also gives the definition of “totalitarianism” as, “political doctrine under which one group rules a state under a highly centralized government, allowing no recognition or representation to other parties.” In this same way, parents often times feel like they are correct and do not consider whether or not a child might not have been wrong. There is a very serious and high danger of mistreating a child with irrationality and a sense of totalitarianism. These dangers can lead to a separation between the connection of a child and their parent. In some instances, a parent will not act on a caring and loving level with the correct disciplinary actions; there needs to be a balance between disciplining a child too much, and not enough. In one theory, in order for a child to learn to act just and rightly there needs to be a firm distinction between right and wrong with nothing passive in between. There also needs to be a good remodel for them to follow after; to see then act on what they see. Another theory is that child need to experience wrong, in order to specify what is right. For example, one does not learn to ride a bike from simply just watching someone ride, but getting on that bike and figuring it out themselves how to operate the machine, the same thing goes with learning. It is frequently noted in human behavior that learning is best done by experiencing something, whether it is experiencing from a distance, or from personal experience.
Second, in the early stages of a child’s life an unhealthy fear can be born into their mind when the occurrence of an unexpected event, in which one was not prepared, ensues. This sort of unexpected event can be anything from the witnessing of mistreatment between spouses resulting in a divorce which includes verbal or physical fighting, or something along the lines of privileges being taken away due to a passive discipline towards the child. When a child witnesses endlessly the verbal abuse between their parents, they will begin to consider that the “normal” way to treat people. Some children will take this method in treating others with anger and apply it to their own relationships in their future; it is sometimes all they will ever learn from their parents on how to treat other people, which can cause a negative sense of selfishness. This is evident in most cases of adults who have difficulty in relating and caring for other people other than themselves. The reason they find the need to mostly care about their own being is because they more than often grew up feeling like their parents did not care for them, and in order to survive, they cared for themselves so that at least someone in their life would. If one is never cared for in a healthy, loving manner by the people who raise them, the results are more than predictable: difficulty with future relationships. Not only is this the result of witnessing the verbal fights and unnecessary arguments between one’s parents and the unpromising, false “need” to care for only them, but it is also a result from the repetition of a negative event.
This selfishness could also result from a divorce if a child takes on the responsibility of said divorce. An article off of a Harvard Medical School website makes this distinction very clear, “Teens develop a sense of self-identity with input from both parents as well as from the relationship between the parents. When divorce occurs, that identity is disrupted. As a result, the teen’s self-esteem may also be disrupted. During a traumatic divorce, an adolescent may experience hurt from the pain inflicted on either parent. This may lower his or her self-esteem and be an impediment to a future intimate relationship.” It goes on to list three important dynamics, “Parents have a profound effect on a teen’s self-esteem. Research has shown that there are three factors associated with good self-esteem in adolescents: acceptance by parents, limit setting clearly defined by parents, parental respect and allowance for latitude of action within the limits” ("Self-esteem," 2010).
Third, negative reoccurring events in a child’s environment or the neglect of a parent, affect their future greatly, where it is evident that a lack of nurture is formed. Since children are given little or no responsibility for how and where they are raised, the effects show an accurate result in how they are shape in personality and ethics. A CPS group, (Child Protection Services), did a study to see what kinds of children were prone to future depression, which went along the lines of this scenario: “Neglected children reported more shame-proneness and more depressive symptoms than comparison children. Guilt-proneness, in contrast, was unrelated to neglect and depressive symptoms, indicating specificity for shame-proneness. The potential role of shame as a process variable that can help explain how some neglected children exhibit depressive symptoms is discussed” (Bennett, D). Having the shortcoming of being raised in an underprivileged and negative setting could include circumstances such as repeated events which cause a child to lack confidence. Contrary to the “selfishness” theory, a child could go another way and develop the lack of love or respect for self. This is mostly developed in females, but there are many males who suffer as well from this situation. A child who feels they are not loved has a better chance of developing one or more of the following including depression, anxiety, and post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), persistent misbehavior, social problems, suicidal behavior, or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.
There are different conditions and levels of neglect. The well-known type of neglect is not taking care of something. Another form of neglect can be a mental abandonment. If a child is not able to connect on a mental level with their parent, then loneliness sets in. In some forms of loneliness, children will learn to turn to any form of stimuli they can grasp, no matter how artificial or fleeting it may be. If the sense of loneliness and abandonment linger as they grow older, they will more than likely turn to drugs, promiscuity, and violence for stimulation or to fill empty gaps in their lives. An article on teen drug abuse states this importance, “During adolescence the brain is still developing. Drugs interfere with natural development.” It is highly dangerous to allow a child to stray into the need to use drugs as stimulation or escape route from reality. The article goes on to say, “The prefrontal cortex is the part of the brain that, when fully developed, will be used to make decisions that require judgment and consideration of long-term consequences.” It is crucial to not permit or overlook a child’s internal feelings, because in the long run, can affect their entire life. For example, in females a main source of escaping problems, such as that of a damaging relationship with their father figure, can often times lead to poor decision making in a future relationship.
Faces of the Adolescent Girl read that, “the beginnings of loving relationships occur in infancy and early childhood when the daughter has, ideally, experienced unconditional love from her parents” (Kovar, 1968). Females are often times led in a type of quest with the hopes of finding the loving father figure, or in some case a loving nurturing figure, which is crucial to learning how to have healthy relationships with people. In most cases this leads promiscuity because their sense of what “love” is has been perverted and twisted into a false image of what kind of love they are in desperate need for. Females are also more likely to be attracted to older men who are attracted back. If a female who has had a painful past with her father growing up, sees an older male taking interest in her, she is more than likely going to express her attraction back, since she never had her father showing an interest in her. It is more of an unconscious psychological motive which spur s the attraction, rather than the attraction in and of itself. Kovar goes on to say in her book, Faces of the Adolescent Girl, that a female with a bad relationship in her own home, “comes to learn that relationships since they involve another, are always problematic, and never completely unconditional.” This is what an adolescent girl would believe if she never experienced that unconditional, healthy love from the people who raised her.
Kovar expands on that thought saying, “A girl’s relations with parents and siblings are soon interspersed with relations to peers.” This statement has proven to be accurate, not only with females, but the opposite as well. One will never know how to love if they cannot perceive that they, themselves, are loved. If they never see what a healthy, loving relationship looks or feels like, then they will never know for themselves. For any child, it is also crucial for parents to make sure their child is not engaging in the emotional of feeling of abandonment. Abandonment from a child or adolescent’s family frequently leads to a negative behavior. The negative behavior is often linked with the need and desperation for attention by their parents. This behavior then leads to one to inevitably search for relations; someone they can relate to; other “abandoned” children or adolescents. When a group of negative-behaving people gather, the outcome does not result in something friendly. It results in just a group of hurting, negative feeling people. To counter-act that kind of behavior and emotions, there needs to be an interception of a positive figure. However, to prevent this from occurring in a child’s life, the right care and procedures need to be acted on. Reality needs to have an apparent distinction if one hopes for their child to attain any achievement in life. If there is no reality and everything is also candy-coated, or if everything is twisted into fantasy, the results are not too promising for a positive outcome. An article which talks about the nature-nurture theory, Lynne Griffin explains this system of reality in an understood and easily comprehended mode, “The danger of painting fictional characters with a jumble of different facial features, eye colors or statures is that many writers end up with caricatures, or two-dimensional models that rely too heavily on stereotypes. Traits, quirky and distinct, along with inner motivations, set characters apart, making them your own.” A child is more prone to having a sense of implanted racism within their mind if they are never exposed to the truth if diversity. However, the child needs to not merely just to know the diversity between people, but diversity within life in general. A child needs to know the reality that in order to attain accomplishment, a good work ethic and a strong sense of motivation is necessary. In order to prevent a child to become stereotypical and discriminative, Griffin goes on to say, “We are, of course, born with genetic traits, like the color of our hair or shape of our eyes. Most of these traits, mapped out by your biology, affect more than your appearance. Biological traits set you up to act in particular ways. They have the power to compel you to do things that are, at times, automatic.” The importance of this statement is needed to understand everyone is different; no one is better than another one just because of outward appearance.
Last, if a child’s parents never teach the child their roles in society, damages in their future are more promising than not. In a book titled, Adolescent Development, the author gives an example of the relationship between child and their parents stating, “The ambiguous status of the adolescent gives rise to such concerns as achieving greater independence, being misunderstood of judged by unfavorable stereotypes, and having more rights and privileges and fewer responsibilities imposed by parents.” It goes on to add the problems child grow into adolescence having to deal with, “Such problems as achieving economic independence, assuming the approved sex role, and preparing for family life present special difficulties. Adolescent problems are intensified if the development tasks of childhood have not yet been thoroughly mastered” (Hurlock, 1973). A child will have major difficulties in understanding their roles if their parents does not raise them to know.
The base and foundation of a person’s inner most being is affected greatly by their surroundings and environment in which they are raised. It is important for a parent to expose their child to responsibilities that they will have to endure in the future, in order to ready them for the outside world. If a child is never taught these things, such as, taking care of themselves and others, being able to work in a public environment to earn a supporting income, and making sure the child does not grow up to be apathetic to society. Parents need to teach their children how to contribute to society and to teach them the “give and take” system of the world if they expect their children to grow up to be the least bit successful. In order to prevent future apathy, the parent should depict motivation to succeed in things and to be able to give just as much as they take from society.
In an article which was performed by Iowa scientists, a research was done to prove nature-nurture has a slight form of inaccuracy. The article reads, “The challenge young children face when they encounter a new word has also been used to bolster nativist claims. When children are told a new word and shown a visual scene that contains unfamiliar objects, there are an infinite number of possible meanings for the word. But children are very good at figuring out which object in the scene the new word refers to. Given this amazing ability, researchers have suggested that kids have an innate ability to consider only some of the possible meanings of the word.” This explains about how children will be able to follow their common sense to figure certain things out for themselves, but they will never be able to figure it all out on their own; there needs to be a sort of teacher or example for them to follow and learn from. Children need to be taught at an early age the way things operate, but also they need to be able to make some discernments of their own. Robert Polmin wrote an article discussing the ability for a child to be taught to teach themselves. In his article he stated, “Heritability does not imply immutability. Nonetheless, the pervasiveness of genetic differences suggests that we must reexamine the role of education. Instead of thinking about it as a way of countering genetic differences among children, education might profit from accepting that children differ genetically in how and how much they learn. Understanding the nature of intelligence is compatible with the current trend toward personalized education.” This explains the belief that the way children learn depends of one’s genetic strength in certain areas. Some children are stronger than other children in certain areas, and visa-versa. To promote a child’s learning ability, it is crucial for them to start their learning experience from the moment they are born, and never be denied of an opportunity to learn something new about the world.
This in my 12 page paper for Psychology 101
More to come,
-R
