"Normal" Development

As we have been talking in class about the different theories of development and what is "normal", I can't but start to think about the different ways I have seen children. According to Scarr, every one of the children I have had contact with in many different settings have fit the notion of normal development i.e. they have learned to communicate, can interact socially, feed themselves etc. The young juveniles I see everyday that are incarcerated certainly have developed, evolutionary wise, in the normal sense. But what about the other aspects of development- developing a sense of morality for example. Piaget argues that between the ages of 4-7yrs, a child's sense of morality is black and white. My question is this: how can a child develop a sense of morality, that conforms at least minimally to social norms, if his/her parents don't instill it at an early age? If a parent does illegal/immoral behavior to feed an addiction (what ever that may be) how does a child develop a sense of what is right or wrong?

As a child matures into a young adult, does he or she eventually start to develop the sense of right or wrong or do we accept the prognosis of some that we have a segment of our society that will always be somewhat deviant in accepting the norms we all try to live by?

Daughters Exposed to DES

In the 1940s through the 1970s woman were given Diethylstilbestrol (DES), a synthetic non-steroidal estrogen to prevent against miscarriages. When DES was first prescribed, tests were run to determine if the drug was preventing miscarriages. According to clinical standards the results tested positive. It was later found that DES exposure in utero led to an increased rate of miscarriage and preterm birth. In 1971, the Food and Drug Administration released a warning about the use of DES.

The daughters who were exposed in utero to DES were believed to reach menopause at an earlier age. In 2006, Boston University also did a study to determine the effects DES has on the age in which women reach menopause. Questionnaires were sent by mail to 4,210 women exposed to DES while in the womb and1,829 women who were not exposed to DES. The questionnaire was followed up by a telephone interview for those who did not respond to the survey. The questions in this survey were about cancer, medical history, reproductive history, and the occurrence of menopause. A follow-up survey was conducted and sent to 6,551 women who were eligible

The results showed that the mean age of women reaching menopause who were exposed to DES had the mean age of 51.5. This is lower compared to unexposed women who had the mean age of 52.2 years old when they reached menopause. Exposed women in this survey also had higher levels of education, were less likely to have ever smoked, had fewer children, and had children at a later age at first birth. DES-exposed women were approximately 50% more likely to have reached natural menopause at each age as seen in figure 1.



http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/164/7/682.full

TO SPANK OR NOT TO SPANK?

I found the following article veryinteresting in the fact that it distinguishes the different types of spanking. The term used for spanking, that is not attractive and very harsh in wording is "corporal punishment". I feel that proponents of using alternatives to spanking use this terminology as a scare tactic and attempt to make parents feel bad about using physical discipline. Corporal punishment reminds me of something an officer gets if he goes a-wall or if an inmate in a prison system fights or goes against the system that is set up within the actual system. It seems to be an extreme terminology.

The following is from the wordnetweb, and is a definition of spanking:
Noun

S: (n) spanking (the act of slapping on the buttocks) "he gave the brat a good spanking"

This is how I view it as well. I, as a parent, have older children now, but did use spanking as a form of discipline in my home. I don't believe in using objects such as belts or switches, but to use my hand, with the child bent on my knee and deliver one quick smack on the bottom. It seems to me by having the child bending over and then talking to him while he/she is bent over waiting for the spanking, is a far better deterrent then the spanking itself. Timeouts worked on two of my three kids. The other one responded by having objects taken away from him for a time. I use to give the child that responded to objects being taken away a lot of time outs, and all it did was frustrate both of us. Spanking, for me needs to be done in extreme situations. So, I created a "quit time" for him. This gave him an opportunity to calm down and not feel like he was a bad kid. Time outs set him over the edge and I would give in so I did not have to hear the screaming and stomping. He constantly felt as if he was doing something wrong and acted out with time outs. He is 17 now, and when he gets frustrated, I recommend a quite time, to reflex on where he is at during a tough time. He still uses them.
All in all, moderate spanking is not harmful in my opinion. I guess one would have to decide where the line is with extremes of actual discipline verses child abuse.

http://www.sptimes.com/2008/02/06/Hillsborough/Parents_waver_over_wi.shtml

http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=spanking