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As a child matures, parents eagerly await important milestones such as learning how to roll over and crawl. Each of these represents a part of physical development. The maturation process happens in an orderly manner; that is, certain skills and abilities generally occur before other milestones are reached. For example, most infants learn to crawl before they learn to walk. However, it is also important to realize that the rate at which these milestones are reached can vary. Some children learn to walk earlier than their same-age peers, while others may take a bit longer.

Motor Skill Development

As a child grows, his or her nervous system becomes more mature. As this happens, the child becomes more and more capable of performing increasingly complex actions. The rate at which these motor skills emerge is sometimes a worry for parents. Caregivers frequently fret about whether or not their children are developing these skills at a normal rate. As mentioned above, rates may vary somewhat. However, nearly all children begin to exhibit these motor skills at a fairly consistent rate unless some type of disability is present.

There are two types of motor skills:

Gross (or large) motor skills involve the larger muscles including the arms and legs. Actions requiring gross motor skills include walking, running, balance and coordination. When evaluating gross motor skills, the factors that experts look at include strength, muscle tone, movement quality and the range of movement.

Fine (or small) motor skills involve the smaller muscles in the fingers, toes, eyes and other areas. The actions that require fine motor skills tend to be more intricate, such as drawing, writing, grasping objects, throwing, waving and catching.

Physical Growth

Physical development in children follows a directional pattern:

Large muscles develop before small muscles. Muscles in the body's core, legs and arms develop before those in the fingers and hands. Children learn how to perform gross (or large) motor skills such as walking before they learn to perform fine (or small) motor skills such as drawing.

The center of the body develops before the outer regions. Muscles located at the core of the body become stronger and develop sooner than those in the feet and hands.

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Development goes from the top down, from the head to the toes. This is why babies learn to hold their heads up before they learn how to crawl.

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Social-Emotional Development DomainCalifornia Infant/Toddler Learning & Development Foundations.

Foundations

Interactions with Adults Relationships with Adults Interactions with Peers Relationships with Peers Identity of Self in Relation to Others Recognition of Ability Expression of Emotion Empathy Emotion Regulation Impulse Control Social Understanding

References

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Social-emotional development includes the child’s experience, expression, and management of emotions and the ability to establish positive and rewarding relationships with others (Cohen and others 2005). It encompasses both intra- and interpersonal processes.

The core features of emotional development include the ability to identify and understand one’s own feelings, to accurately read and comprehend emotional states in others, to manage strong emotions and their expression in a constructive manner, to regulate one’s own behavior, to develop empathy for others, and to establish and maintain relationships. (National Scientific Council on the Developing Child 2004, 2)

Infants experience, express, and perceive emotions before they fully understand them. In learning to recognize, label, manage, and communicate their emotions and to perceive and attempt to understand the emotions of others, children build skills that connect them with family,

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peers, teachers, and the community. These growing capacities help young children to become competent in negotiating increasingly complex social interactions, to participate effectively in relationships and group activities, and to reap the benefits of social support crucial to healthy human development and functioning.

Healthy social-emotional development for infants and toddlers unfolds in an interpersonal context, namely that of positive ongoing relationships with familiar, nurturing adults. Young children are particularly attuned to social and emotional stimulation. Even newborns appear to attend more to stimuli that resemble faces (Johnson and others 1991). They also prefer their mothers’ voices to the voices of other women (DeCasper and Fifer 1980). Through nurturance, adults support the infants’ earliest experiences of emotion regulation (Bronson 2000a; Thompson and Goodvin 2005).

Responsive caregiving supports infants in beginning to regulate their emotions and to develop a sense of predictability, safety, and responsiveness in their social environments. Early relationships are so important to developing infants that research experts have broadly concluded that, in the early years, “nurturing, stable and consistent relationships are the key to healthy growth, development and learning” (National Research Council and Institute of Medicine 2000, 412). In other words, high-quality relationships increase the likelihood of positive outcomes for young children (Shonkoff 2004). Experiences with family members and teachers provide an opportunity for young children to learn about social relationships and emotions through exploration and predictable interactions. Professionals working in child care settings can support the social-emotional development of infants and toddlers in various ways, including interacting directly with young children, communicating with families, arranging the physical space in the care environment, and planning and implementing curriculum.

Brain research indicates that emotion and cognition are profoundly interrelated processes. Specifically, “recent cognitive neuroscience findings suggest that the neural mechanisms underlying emotion regulation may be the same as those underlying cognitive processes” (Bell and Wolfe 2004, 366). Emotion and cognition work together, jointly informing the child’s impressions of situations and influencing behavior. Most learning in the early years occurs in the context of emotional supports (National Research Council and Institute of Medicine 2000). “The rich interpenetrations of emotions and cognitions establish the major psychic scripts for each child’s life” (Panksepp 2001). Together, emotion and cognition contribute to attentional processes, decision making, and learning (Cacioppo and Berntson 1999). Furthermore, cognitive processes, such as decision making, are affected by emotion (Barrett and others 2007). Brain structures involved in the neural circuitry of cognition influence emotion and vice versa (Barrett and others 2007). Emotions and social behaviors affect the young child’s ability to persist in goal-oriented activity, to seek help when it is needed, and to participate in and benefit from relationships.

Young children who exhibit healthy social, emotional, and behavioral adjustment are more likely to have good academic performance in elementary school (Cohen and others 2005; Zero to Three 2004). The sharp distinction between cognition and emotion that has historically been made may be more of an artifact of scholarship than it is representative of the way these processes occur in the brain (Barrett and others 2007). This recent research strengthens the view that early

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childhood programs support later positive learning outcomes in all domains by maintaining a focus on the promotion of healthy social emotional development (National Scientific Council on the Developing Child 2004; Raver 2002; Shonkoff 2004).

Interactions with Adults

Interactions with adults are a frequent and regular part of infants’ daily lives. Infants as young as three months of age have been shown to be able to discriminate between the faces of unfamiliar adults (Barrera and Maurer 1981). The foundations that describe Interactions with Adults and Relationships with Adults are interrelated. They jointly give a picture of healthy social-emotional development that is based in a supportive social environment established by adults. Children develop the ability to both respond to adults and engage with them first through predictable interactions in close relationships with parents or other caring adults at home and outside the home. Children use and build upon the skills learned through close relationships to interact with less familiar adults in their lives. In interacting with adults, children engage in a wide variety of social exchanges such as establishing contact with a relative or engaging in storytelling with an infant care teacher.  

Quality in early childhood programs is, in large part, a function of the interactions that take place between the adults and children in those programs. These interactions form the basis for the relationships that are established between teachers and children in the classroom or home and are related to children’s developmental status. How teachers interact with children is at the very heart of early childhood education (Kontos and Wilcox-Herzog 1997, 11).

Foundation: Interactions with Adults

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Relationships with Adults

Close relationships with adults who provide consistent nurturance strengthen children’s capacity to learn and develop. Moreover, relationships with parents, other family members, caregivers, and teachers provide the key context for infants’ social-emotional development. These special relationships influence the infant’s emerging sense of self and understanding of others. Infants use relationships with adults in many ways: for reassurance that they are safe, for assistance in alleviating distress, for help with emotion regulation, and for social approval or encouragement. Establishing close relationships with adults is related to children’s emotional security, sense of self, and evolving understanding of the world around them. Concepts from the literature on attachment may be applied to early childhood settings, in considering the infant care teacher’s role in separations and reunions during the day in care, facilitating the child’s exploration, providing comfort, meeting physical needs, modeling positive relationships, and providing support during stressful times (Raikes 1996).

Foundation: Relationships with Adults

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Interactions with Peers

In early infancy children interact with each other using simple behaviors such as looking at or touching another child. Infants’ social interactions with peers increase in complexity from engaging in repetitive or routine back-and-forth interactions with peers (for example, rolling a ball back and forth) to engaging in cooperative activities such as building a tower of blocks together or acting out different roles during pretend play. Through interactions with peers, infants explore their interest in others and learn about social behavior/social interaction. Interactions with peers provide the context for social learning and problem solving, including the experience of social exchanges, cooperation, turn-taking, and the demonstration of the beginning of empathy. Social interactions with peers also allow older infants to experiment with different roles in small groups and in different situations such as relating to familiar versus unfamiliar children. As noted, the foundations called Interactions with Adults, Relationships with Adults, Interactions with Peers, and Relationships with Peers are interrelated. Interactions are stepping-stones to relationships. Burk (1996, 285) writes:

We, as teachers, need to facilitate the development of a psychologically safe environment that promotes positive social interaction. As children interact openly with their peers, they learn more about each other as individuals, and they begin building a history of interactions.

Foundation: Interaction with Peers

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Relationships with Peers

Infants develop close relationships with children they know over a period of time, such as other children in the family child care setting or neighborhood. Relationships with peers provide young children with the opportunity to develop strong social connections. Infants often show a preference for playing and being with friends, as compared with peers with whom they do not have a relationship. Howes’ (1983) research suggests that there are distinctive patterns of friendship for the infant, toddler, and preschooler age groups. The three groups vary in the number of friendships, the stability of friendships, and the nature of interaction between friends (for example, the extent to which they involve object exchange or verbal communication).

Foundation: Relationships with Peers

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Identity of Self in Relation to Others

Infants’ social-emotional development includes an emerging awareness of self and others. Infants demonstrate this foundation in a number of ways. For example, they can respond to their names, point to their body parts when asked, or name members of their families. Through an emerging understanding of other people in their social environment, children gain an

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understanding of their roles within their families and communities. They also become aware of their own preferences and characteristics and those of others.

Foundation: Identity of Self in Relation to Others

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Recognition of Ability

Infants’ developing sense of self-efficacy includes an emerging understanding that they can make things happen and that they have particular abilities. Self-efficacy is related to a sense of competency, which has been identified as a basic human need (Connell 1990). The development of children’s sense of self-efficacy may be seen in play or exploratory behaviors when they act on an object to produce a result. For example, they pat a musical toy to make sounds come out. Older infants may demonstrate recognition of ability through “I” statements, such as “I did it” or “I’m good at drawing.”

Foundation: Recognition of Ability

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Expression of Emotion

Even early in infancy, children express their emotions through facial expressions, vocalizations, and body language. The later ability to use words to express emotions gives young children a valuable tool in gaining the assistance or social support of others (Saarni and others 2006). Temperament may play a role in children’s expression of emotion. Tronick (1989, 112) described how expression of emotion is related to emotion regulation and communication between the mother and infant: “the emotional expressions of the infant and the caretaker function to allow them to mutually regulate their interactions . . . the infant and the adult are participants in an affective communication system.”

Both the understanding and expression of emotion are influenced by culture. Cultural factors affect children’s growing understanding of the meaning of emotions, the developing knowledge of which situations lead to which emotional outcomes, and their learning about which emotions are appropriate to display in which situations (Thompson and Goodvin 2005). Some cultural groups appear to express certain emotions more often than other cultural groups (Tsai, Levenson, and McCoy 2006). In addition, cultural groups vary by which particular emotions or emotional states they value (Tsai, Knutson, and Fung 2006). One study suggests that cultural differences in exposure to particular emotions through storybooks may contribute to young children’s preferences for particular emotional states (for example, excited or calm) (Tsai and others 2007).

Young children’s expression of positive and negative emotions may play a significant role in their development of social relationships. Positive emotions appeal to social partners and seem to enable relationships to form, while problematic management or expression of negative emotions leads to difficulty in social relationships (Denham and Weissberg 2004). The use of emotion-

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related words appears to be associated with how likable preschoolers are considered by their peers. Children who use emotion-related words were found to be better-liked by their classmates (Fabes and others 2001). Infants respond more positively to adult vocalizations that have a positive affective tone (Fernald 1993). Social smiling is a developmental process in which neurophysiology and cognitive, social, and emotional factors play a part, seen as a “reflection and constituent of an interactive relationship” (Messinger and Fogel 2007, 329). It appears likely that the experience of positive emotions is a particularly important contributor to emotional well-being and psychological health (Fredrickson 2000, 2003; Panksepp 2001).

Foundation: Expression of Emotion

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Empathy

During the first three years of life, children begin to develop the capacity to experience the emotional or psychological state of another person (Zahn-Waxler and Radke-Yarrow 1990). The following definitions of empathy are found in the research literature: “knowing what another person is feeling,” “feeling what another person is feeling,” and “responding compassionately to another’s distress” (Levenson and Ruef 1992, 234). The concept of empathy reflects the social nature of emotion, as it links the feelings of two or more people (Levenson and Ruef 1992). Since human life is relationship-based, one vitally important function of empathy over the life span is to strengthen social bonds (Anderson and Keltner 2002). Research has shown a correlation between empathy and prosocial behavior (Eisenberg 2000). In particular, prosocial behaviors, such as helping, sharing, and comforting or showing concern for others, illustrate the development of empathy (Zahn-Waxler and others 1992) and how the experience of empathy is thought to be related to the development of moral behavior (Eisenberg 2000). Adults model prosocial/empathic behaviors for infants in various ways. For example, those behaviors are modeled through caring interactions with others or through providing nurturance to the infant. Quann and Wien (2006, 28) suggest that one way to support the development of empathy in young children is to create a culture of caring in the early childhood environment: “Helping children understand the feelings of others is an integral aspect of the curriculum of living together. The relationships among teachers, between children and teachers, and among children are fostered with warm and caring interactions.”

Foundation: Empathy

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Emotion Regulation

The developing ability to regulate emotions has received increasing attention in the research literature (Eisenberg, Champion, and Ma 2004). Researchers have generated various definitions of emotion regulation, and debate continues as to the most useful and appropriate way to define this concept (Eisenberg and Spinrad 2004). As a construct, emotion regulation reflects the interrelationship of emotions, cognitions, and behaviors (Bell and Wolfe 2004). Young

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children’s increasing understanding and skill in the use of language is of vital importance in their emotional development, opening new avenues for communicating about and regulating emotions (Campos, Frankel, and Camras 2004) and helping children to negotiate acceptable outcomes to emotionally charged situations in more effective ways. Emotion regulation is influenced by culture and the historical era in which a person lives: cultural variability in regulation processes is significant (Mesquita and Frijda 1992). “Cultures vary in terms of what one is expected to feel, and when, where, and with whom one may express different feelings” (Cheah and Rubin 2003, 3). Adults can provide positive role models of emotion regulation through their behavior and through the verbal and emotional support they offer children in managing their emotions. Responsiveness to infants’ signals contributes to the development of emotion regulation. Adults support infants’ development of emotion regulation by minimizing exposure to excessive stress, chaotic environments, or over- or understimulation.

Emotion regulation skills are important in part because they play a role in how well children are liked by peers and teachers and how socially competent they are perceived to be (National Scientific Council on the Developing Child 2004). Children’s ability to regulate their emotions appropriately can contribute to perceptions of their overall social skills as well as to the extent to which they are liked by peers (Eisenberg and others 1993). Poor emotion regulation can impair children’s thinking, thereby compromising their judgment and decision making (National Scientific Council on the Developing Child 2004). At kindergarten entry, children demonstrate broad variability in their ability to self-regulate (National Research Council and Institute of Medicine 2000).

Foundation: Emotion Regulation

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Impulse Control

Children’s developing capacity to control impulses helps them adapt to social situations and follow rules. As infants grow, they become increasingly able to exercise voluntary control over behavior such as waiting for needs to be met, inhibiting potentially hurtful behavior, and acting according to social expectations, including safety rules. Group care settings provide many opportunities for children to practice their impulse-control skills. Peer interactions often offer natural opportunities for young children to practice impulse control, as they make progress in learning about cooperative play and sharing. Young children’s understanding or lack of understanding of requests made of them may be one factor contributing to their responses (Kaler and Kopp 1990).

Foundation: Impulse Control

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Social Understanding

During the infant/toddler years, children begin to develop an understanding of the responses, communication, emotional expression, and actions of other people. This development includes infants’ understanding of what to expect from others, how to engage in back-and-forth social interactions, and which social scripts are to be used for which social situations. “At each age, social cognitive understanding contributes to social competence, interpersonal sensitivity, and an awareness of how the self relates to other individuals and groups in a complex social world” (Thompson 2006, 26). Social understanding is particularly important because of the social nature of humans and human life, even in early infancy (Wellman and Lagattuta 2000). Recent research suggests that infants’ and toddlers’ social understanding is related to how often they experience adult communication about the thoughts and emotions of others (Taumoepeau and Ruffman 2008)

Theories of Cognitive and Moral DevelopmentContact: Dr. Jan Garrett

This page revised August 22, 2003Contents

Cognitive Development

1. Fact-Opinion Dualism2. Student Relativism3. Cognitive Maturity

Moral Development

1. Kohlberg's Six-Stage Theory2. Gilligan's Challenge to Kohlberg's Theory

A Theory of Cognitive Development in Three Stages

The main outlines of this section are taken from Anne Colby et al., Educating Citizens (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003), chapter 4. The evaluation of the first and second stages and some details in the description of the third stage are my own formulations, although they are based on distinctions and insights common among philosophers and other educators. (I have tried to avoid unnecessary technicalities.)

I. Fact / Opinion "Dualism"

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A view often found among beginning college students could be called "Fact / Opinion Dualism." This view appears to amount to the following beliefs:

FOD1. All statements are either statements of fact or opinion.

FOD2. Statements of fact are proven, certain. We can rely on them.

FOD3. Statements of opinion are merely opinion, what someone believes. We cannot rely upon them.

FOD4. "The facts, ma'am, nothing but the facts."

In a philosophy course, a Fact/Opinion Dualist may want to know "what is the professor's opinion?" If the professor has presented the arguments for and against, say, the permissibility of assisted suicide, the Fact / Opinion Dualist wants to know which of the two views the professor prefers. Indeed, it may be a fact that the professor does think one of the two views is superior, but what he or she is trying to convey is how the advocates of the two views make their case.

What's right about Fact/Opinion Dualism?

There is an important distinction between truth and falsehood, and there is also an important distinction between what we know (or have strongly justified opinions about) and what we only believe without much evidence. The fact/opinion distinction reflects a confused awareness that these distinctions are important.

What's wrong with Fact/Opinion Dualism?

* You cannot handle two real distinctions with just one mental distinction. We need (at least) two distinctions.

* The sharp split between fact and opinion is misleading. Some opinions are true, and some of these true opinions are justified. If, as seems plausible, knowledge is justified true opinion, then what we know is part of what we have opinions about. And what we really know (however much or little) are "facts." So opinion and fact overlap; they are not mutually exclusive. We can say that some opinions correspond to facts.

* Fact/Opinion Dualists are also mistaken if they treat all opinions as "mere" opinions, as unjustified. But Fact/Opinion Dualists also seem to assume that

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opinions cannot be justified. On this approach, knowledge as justified true opinion would be impossible.

II. Student Relativism

A second view, often found among college students after they have been exposed in humanities courses to the fact that plausible reasons can often be given for opposing viewpoints, has been labeled "Student Relativism."

SR1. All views have advantages and disadvantages; where two or more views conflict, one can argue plausibly for and against each of them.

SR2. Among such competing views, all positions are equally correct.

SR3. We should be tolerant of views that differ from our own.

SR4. It does not really matter what you believe. (An educated person may believe any of them, with equal justification.)

What is correct about Student Relativism?

* It is often true that when there exist conflicting views, there are plausible arguments for and against each of them.

* Tolerance is a value that we should normally uphold.

Why is it a flawed position overall?

* There are limits, for instance, to how much intolerance a tolerant society can afford to tolerate! (The use of police force to stop people from burning religious minorities at the stake seems justified.)

* Among competing views, not all positions are equally defensible; some are, all things considered, more defensible than others.

* It often does matter what you believe. Beliefs affect action, directly or indirectly. Actions have consequences, some helpful, some harmful to beings that matter (especially human beings).

* Relativism is self-refuting. If we consider any of the planks of Student Relativism (SR1, SR2, SR3, or SR4), somebody can be found who holds the view that the claim is false. According to SR2, then, the contrary view is as

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correct as the view it opposes. (Thus, SR2 and "SR2 is false" would both be true!)

III. Cognitive Maturity

A third view, which some might call "cognitive maturity," tends to gain ground among at least some students as they advance in their college career.

CM1. Among competing views, some views are more justifiable (rationally defensible) than others.

CM2. We cannot know which ones are (we cannot have justified confidence in them) prior to a serious investigation, using all the mental tools available.

CM3. It is reasonable

     (a) to commit ourselves to the views that appear, on thorough examination, to be most justifiable.

     (b) to be open to challenges from other points of view, especially if they are well-reasoned. (Toleration of other points of view is therefore valuable.)

     (c) to set aside a time in our lives in which we concentrate on serious investigation of the most important, controversial questions.

     (d) periodically to reexamine our previous conclusions and modify them when they can be improved.

A Theory of Moral Development in Six Stages

Added August 21, 2003

Most of the information contained below is taken from the article by Ernest Alleva and Gareth B. Mathews, "Moral Development," pp. 828-35 in Lawrence and Charlotte Becker, eds., Encyclopedia of Ethics (New York: Garland Publishers, 1992), and Manuel G. Velasquez, Business Ethics: Concepts and Cases (Prentice-Hall, 2002), chapter 1. The information on Kohlberg and Gilligan's views can be found in many sources.

Developmental psychologists Lawrence Kohlberg and Carol Gilligan do not agree about everything, but they do agree about the following important points:

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1) that there are stages or levels of growth in our moral development

2) that these stages include a level focused on the self, a level in which we uncritically accept conventional standards, and a mature level in which we learn to evaluate our previous standards and try to develop or discover more adequate ones.

Lawrence Kohlberg's View of Moral Development

Preconventional Level(1) Externally imposed ("heteronomous") morality. To do "right" is to avoid breaking rules; obedience is valuable for its own sake and for the sake of avoidance of damage to persons and property.

(2) Egoism and exchange. To do "right" is to do what is in one's immediate interest; right is also what's fair, an equal exchange. (Tit for tat.)

Conventional Level(3) Relationships and Interpersonal Conformity. Right is to live up to expectations of family and friends, what people expect of you in your role as son, brother, friend. It means keeping mutual relationships (trust, loyalty, respect, gratitude).

(4) Social system and conscience. Right is fulfilling actual duties to which you have agreed, contributing to society, the group, and institution. Laws are to be upheld except in rare cases when they are inconsistent with such duties.

Postconventional Level(5) Social contract and minimal rights. One recognizes that most values and rules are relative to one's group, but they should be upheld because they are the social contract (arrived at by a fair procedure). A few rules (rights to life and liberty) must be upheld in any society.

(6) Universal ethical principles. Right is the recognition of universal ethical principles, principles that a thoroughly reflective person thinker will arrive at and choose. (Key among them are recognition of the equality of human rights and respect for the dignity of human beings as individual persons.)

Carol Gilligan.Gilligan was a student of Kohlberg and later became critical of some of his generalizations. She is well known for having argued that girls and women

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tend to develop along a somewhat different path, although similarities between her account of female moral development and male moral development are not hard to discover.

More recent scholarship tends to the view that the "care" path described by Gilligan exists but it is not limited to females, nor are females limited to it. Gilligan may be right that the "care" path is found more often among females than among males.

Preconventional. One learns to care for oneself.

Conventional. One internalizes norms about caring for others and tends to neglect oneself.

Postconventional. One becomes critical of the conventions one adopted in the conventional stage and learns to balance caring for self with caring for others.

Understanding Society

Innovative thinking about social agency and structure in a global world

A better social ontology

I believe that the social sciences need to be framed out of consideration of a better understanding of the nature of the social—a better social ontology. The social world is not a system of law-governed processes; it is instead a mix of different sorts of institutions, forms of human behavior, natural and

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environmental constraints, and contingent events. The entities that make up the social world at a given time and place have no particular ontological stability; they do not fall into “natural kinds”; and there is no reason to expect deep similarity across a number of ostensibly similar institutions – states, for example, or labor unions. (W. V. O. Quine’s metaphor of the bushes shaped to look like elephants comes to mind here; Word and Object .)

So the rule for the social world is – heterogeneity, contingency, and plasticity. And the metaphysics associated with classical thinking about the natural world – laws of nature, common, unchanging structures, and predictable processes of change – do not provide appropriate metaphors for our understandings and expectations of the social world. Nor do they suggest the right kinds of social science theories and constructs.

Instead of naturalism, I suggest an approach to social science theorizing that emphasizes agency, contingency, and plasticity in the makeup of social facts. It recognizes that there is a degree of pattern in social life – but emphasizes that these patterns fall far short of the regularities associated with laws of nature. It emphasizes contingency of social processes and outcomes. It insists upon the importance and legitimacy of eclectic use of social theories: the processes are heterogeneous, and therefore it is appropriate to appeal to different types of social theories as we explain social processes. It emphasizes the importance of path-dependence in social outcomes. It suggests that the most valid scientific statements in the social sciences have to do with the discovery of concrete social-causal mechanisms, through which some types of social outcomes come about.

And finally, this approach highlights what I call “methodological localism”: the view that the foundation of social action and outcome is the local, socially-located and socially constructed individual person. The individual is socially constructed, in that her modes of behavior, thought, and reasoning are created through a specific set of prior social interactions. And her actions are socially situated, in the sense that they are responsive to the institutional setting in which she chooses to act. Purposive individuals, embodied with powers and constraints, pursue their goals in specific institutional settings; and regularities of social outcome often result.

How does this perspective fit with current work in the social sciences? There are several current fields of social research that are particularly well suited to this approach. One is the field of comparative historical sociology, in its use of fairly detailed studies of similar cases in order to identify common causal mechanisms. Kathleen Thelen’s astute studies of different institutions of skill formation in Germany, UK, US, and Japan are an excellent case in point; she asks the twin questions, what causal processes give stability to a set of institutions? And what causal processes lead to a process of transformation in those institutions? The research methods of comparative historical sociology, then, are particularly well suited to the ontology of contingency, plasticity, and causal mechanisms (How Institutions Evolve: The Political Economy of Skills in Germany, Britain, the United States, and Japan).

Ethnography gives us a different angle on this same ontology. Ethnographers can give us insight into culturally specific mentalities—the “socially constructed individuals”. And they can give concrete

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analysis of the institutions that both shape individuals and are in turn shaped by them. More generally, qualitative research methods can offer a basis for discovery of some of the features of agency, mentality, and culture within the context of which important social processes take place. A good current example is Leslie Salzinger's Genders in Production: Making Workers in Mexico's Global Factories , a study of the social construction of femininity in the factories of the maquiladoras. C. K. Lee's sociology of Chinese factory protests is also a model of a study that combines qualitative and quantitative methods; Against the Law: Labor Protests in China's Rustbelt and Sunbelt .

The new institutionalism is a third theoretical perspective on social analysis and explanation. This approach postulates the causal reality of institutions; it highlights the point that differences across institutions lead to substantial differences in behavior; and it provides a basis for explanations of various social outcomes. The rules of liability governing the predations of cattle in East Africa or Shasta County, California, create very different patterns of behavior in cattle owners and other land owners in the various settings. (Mary Brinton and Victor Nee, The New Institutionalism in Sociology ; Jean Ensminger, Making a Market: The Institutional Transformation of an African Society .) It is characteristic of the new institutionalism that researchers in this tradition generally avoid reifying large social institutions and look instead at the more proximate and variable institutions within which people live and act.

What kind of social science research and theory corresponds to these assumptions about social ontology? Here are some chief features--

They make use of eclectic multiple theories and don't expect a unified social theory that explains everything

They are modest in their expectations about social generalizations They look for causal mechanisms as a basis for social explanation They anticipate heterogeneity and plasticity of social entities They are prepared to use eclectic methodologies -- quantitative, comparative, case-study,

ethnographic -- to discover the mechanisms and mentalities that underlie social change

We need a better sociology for the twenty-first century. If social scientists continue to be captivated by the scientific prestige of positivism and quantitative social science to the exclusion of other perspectives, they will be led to social science research that looks quite different from what would result from a view that emphasizes contingency and causal mechanisms. And if there are strong, engaging, and empirically rigorous examples of other ways of conducting social research that can come into broad exposure in the social sciences—then there is a greater probability of emergence of a genuinely innovative and imaginative approach to the problem of social knowledge.

LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT

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Language Development in Early Childhood

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Research has shown that the way parents speak to their children plays an important role in language development.

Image courtesy Paolo Milanes

There is perhaps nothing more remarkable than the emergence of language in children. Have you ever marveled at how a child can go from saying just a few words to suddenly producing full sentences in just a short matter of time? Researchers have found that language development begins before a child is even born, as a fetus is able to identify the speech and sound patterns of the mother's voice. By the age of four months, infants are able to discriminate sounds and even read lips.

Researchers have actually found that infants are able to distinguish between speech sounds from all languages, not just the native language spoken in their homes. However, this ability disappears around the age of 10 months and children begin to only recognize the speech sounds of their native language. By the time a child reaches age three, he or she will have a vocabulary of approximately 3,000 words.

Theories of Language Development

So how exactly does language development happen? Researchers have proposed several different theories to explain how and why language development occurs. For example, the behaviorist theory of B.F. Skinner suggests that the emergence of language is the result of imitation and reinforcement. The nativist theory of Noam Chomsky suggests that language in an

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inherent human quality and that children are born with a language acquisition device that allows them to produce language once they have learned the necessary vocabulary.

How Parents Facilitate Language Development

Researchers have found that in all languages, parents utilize a style of speech with infants known as infant-directed speech, or motherese (aka "baby talk"). If you've every heard someone speak to a baby, you'll probably immediately recognize this style of speech. It is characterized by a higher-pitched intonation, shortened or simplified vocabulary, shortened sentences and exaggerated vocalizations or expressions. Instead of saying "Let's go home," a parent might instead say "Go bye-bye."

Infant-directed speech has been shown to be more effective in getting an infant's attention as well as aiding in language development. Researchers believe that the use of motherese helps babies learn words faster and easier. As children continue to grow, parents naturally adapt their speaking patterns to suit their child's growing linguistic skills.

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What is Culture?The word culture has many different meanings.  For some it refers to an appreciation of good literature, music, art, and food.  For a biologist, it is likely to be a colony of bacteria or other microorganisms growing in a nutrient medium in a laboratory Petri dish.  However, for anthropologists and other behavioral scientists, culture is the full range of learned human behavior patterns.  The term was first used in this way by the pioneer English Anthropologist Edward B. Tylor in his book, Primitive Culture, published in 1871.  Tylor said that culture is "that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society."  Of course, it is not limited to men.  Women possess and create it as well.  Since Tylor's time, the concept of culture has become the central focus of anthropology.

Culture is a powerful human tool for survival, but it is a fragile phenomenon.  It is constantly changing and easily lost because it exists only in our minds.  Our written languages, governments, buildings, and other man-made things are merely the products of culture.  They are not culture in themselves.  For this reason, archaeologists can not dig up culture directly in their excavations.  The broken pots and other artifacts of ancient people that they uncover are only material remains that reflect cultural patterns--they are things that were made and used through cultural knowledge and skills.

Layers of CultureThere are very likely three layers or levels of culture that are part of your learned behavior patterns and perceptions.  Most obviously is the body of cultural traditions that distinguish your specific society.  When people speak of Italian, Samoan, or Japanese culture, they are referring to the shared language, traditions, and beliefs that set each of these peoples apart from others.  In most cases, those who share your culture do so because they acquired it as they were raised by parents and other family members who have it.

 

  Edward B. Tylor  (1832-1917)

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The second layer of culture that may be part of your identity is a subculture .  In complex, diverse societies in which people have come from many different parts of the world, they often retain much of their original cultural traditions.  As a result, they are likely to be part of an identifiable subculture in their new society.  The shared cultural traits of subcultures set them apart from the rest of their society.  Examples of easily identifiable subcultures in the United States include ethnic groups such as Vietnamese Americans, African Americans, and Mexican Americans.  Members of each of these subcultures share a common identity, food tradition, dialect or language, and other cultural traits that come from their common ancestral background and experience.  As the cultural differences between members of a subculture and the dominant national culture blur and eventually disappear, the subculture ceases to exist except as a group of people who claim a common ancestry.  That is generally the case with German Americans and Irish Americans in the United States today.  Most of them identify themselves as Americans first.  They also see themselves as being part of the cultural mainstream of the nation.

 

These Cuban Americanwomen in Miami, Floridahave a shared subcultureidentity that is reinforcedthrough their language,food, and other traditions

The third layer of culture consists of cultural universals.  These are learned behavior patterns that are shared by all of humanity collectively.  No matter where people live in the world, they share these universal traits.  Examples of such "human cultural" traits include:

 1.  

communicating with a verbal language consisting of a limited set of sounds and grammatical rules for constructing sentences

 2. using age and gender to classify people (e.g., teenager, senior citizen, woman, man)

 3. classifying people based on marriage and descent relationships and having kinship terms to refer tothem (e.g., wife, mother, uncle, cousin)

 4. raising children in some sort of family setting 5. having a sexual division of labor (e.g., men's work versus

women's work) 6. having a concept of privacy

 

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 7. having rules to regulate sexual behavior 8. distinguishing between good and bad behavior 9. having some sort of body ornamentation10. making jokes and playing games11. having art12. having some sort of leadership roles for the implementation of

community decisions

While all cultures have these and possibly many other universal traits, different cultures have developed their own specific ways of carrying out or expressing them.  For instance, people in deaf subcultures frequently use their hands to communicate with sign language instead of verbal language.  However, sign languages have grammatical rules just as verbal ones do.

Culture and Society

Culture and society are not the same thing.  While cultures are complexes of learned behavior patterns and perceptions, societies are groups of interacting organisms.  People are not the only animals that have societies.  Schools of fish, flocks of birds, and hives of bees are societies.  In the case of humans, however, societies are groups of people who directly or indirectly interact with each other.  People in human societies also generally perceive that their society is distinct from other societies in terms of shared traditions and expectations.

While human societies and cultures are not the same thing, they are inextricably connected because culture is created and transmitted to others in a society.  Cultures are not the product of lone individuals.  They are the continuously evolving products of people interacting with each other.  Cultural patterns such as language and politics make no sense except in terms of the interaction of people.  If you were the only human on earth, there would be no need for language or government.

Is Culture Limited to Humans?There is a difference of opinion in the behavioral sciences about whether or not we are the only animal that creates and uses culture.  The answer to this question depends on how narrow culture is defined.  If it is used broadly to refer to a complex of learned behavior patterns, then it is clear that we are not alone in creating and using culture.  Many other

   

Non-human culture? This orangutan mother isusing a specially preparedstick to "fish out" food froma crevice.  She learned thisskill and is now teaching itto her child who is hangingon her shoulder and intentlywatching.

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animal species teach their young what they themselves learned in order to survive.  This is especially true of the chimpanzees and other relatively intelligent apes and monkeys.  Wild chimpanzee mothers typically teach their children about several hundred food and medicinal plants.  Their children also have to learn about the dominance hierarchy and the social rules within their communities.  As males become teenagers, they acquire hunting skills from adults.  Females have to learn how to nurse and care for their babies.  Chimpanzees even have to learn such basic skills as how to perform sexual intercourse.  This knowledge is not hardwired into their brains at birth.  They are all learned patterns of behavior just as they are for humans.

CROSS CULTURAL DEVELOPMENT

Cross-culturalFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cross-cultural may refer to

cross-cultural studies , a comparative tendency in various fields of cultural analysis cross-cultural communication , a field of study that looks at how people from differing cultural

backgrounds communicate any of various forms of interactivity between members of disparate cultural groups (see also

cross-cultural communication, interculturalism, intercultural relations, hybridity, cosmopolitanism, transculturation)

the discourse concerning cultural interactivity, sometimes referred to as cross-culturalism (See also multiculturalism, cosmopolitanism, transculturation, cultural diversity)

Contents

1 Cross-cultural studies in the social sciences 2 Cross-cultural communication 3 Cross-cultural pedagogies 4 Cross-cultural studies

o 4.1 Cross-cultural writers (autobiography, fiction, poetry) o 4.2 Cross-cultural films o 4.3 Cross-cultural theatre

4.3.1 Plays/theatre pieces 4.3.2 Companies

o 4.4 Characteristics of cross-cultural narratives o 4.5 Cross-cultural visual artists o 4.6 Cross-cultural music

5 See also 6 References 7 External links

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Cross-cultural studies in the social sciencesMain article: cross-cultural studies

The term "cross-cultural" emerged in the social sciences in the 1930s, largely as a result of the Cross-Cultural Survey undertaken by George Peter Murdock, a Yale anthropologist. Initially referring to comparative studies based on statistical compilations of cultural data, the term gradually acquired a secondary sense of cultural interactivity. The comparative sense is implied in phrases such as "a cross-cultural perspective," "cross-cultural differences," "a cross-cultural study of..." and so forth, while the interactive signification may be found in works like Attitudes and Adjustment in Cross-Cultural Contact: Recent Studies of Foreign Students, a 1956 issue of The Journal of Social Issues. Usage of "cross-cultural" was for many decades restricted mainly to the social sciences. Among the more prominent examples are the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology (IACCP) established in 1972 "to further the study of the role of cultural factors in shaping human behavior," and its associated Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, which aims to provide an interdisciplinary discussion of the effects of cultural differences.

Cross-cultural communicationMain article: cross-cultural communication

By the 1970s, the field of cross-cultural communication (also known as intercultural communication) developed as a prominent application of the cross-cultural paradigm, in response to the pressures of globalization which produced a demand for cross-cultural awareness training in various commercial sectors.

Cultural communication differences can be identified by 8 different criteria: 1) when to talk; (2) what to say; (3) pacing and pausing; (4) the art of listening; (5) intonation; (6) what is conventional and what is not in a language; (7) degree of indirectness; and (8) cohesion and coherence.[1]

Cross-cultural pedagogies

The appearance of the term "cross-cultural" in the titles of a number of college readers and writing textbooks beginning in the late 1980s can be attributed to a convergence of academic multiculturalism and the pedagogical movement known as Writing Across the Curriculum, which gave educators in the social sciences greater influence in composition pedagogy. Popular examples included Ourselves Among Others: Cross-Cultural Readings for Writers (1988), edited by Carol J. Verburg, and Guidelines: A Cross Cultural Reading Writing Text (1990), ed. Ruth Spack.

Cross-cultural studies

Cross-cultural studies is an adaptation of the term cross-cultural to describe a branch of literary and cultural studies dealing with works or writers associated with more than one culture. Practitioners of cross-cultural cultural studies often use the term cross-culturalism to describe

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discourses involving cultural interactivity, or to promote (or disparage) various forms of cultural interactivity.

Cross-culturalism is nearly synonymous with transculturation, a term coined by Cuban writer Fernando Ortiz in the 1940s to describe processes of cultural hybridity in Latin America. However, there are certain differences of emphasis reflecting the social science derivation of cross-culturalism.

The term "cross-culturalism" became prevalent in cultural studies in the late 1980s and 1990s.[2] An early proponent of the term was the Guyanese writer Wilson Harris, who wrote in The Womb of Space (1983), that "cultural heterogeneity or cross-cultural capacity" gives an "evolutionary thrust" to the imagination.[3][4]

Anthropology exerted a strong influence on the development of cross-culturalism in literary and cultural studies. French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss was a key figure in the development of structuralism and its successor, post-structuralism. Cross-influences between anthropology and literary/cultural studies in the 1980s were evident in works like James Clifford and George Marcus's collection, Writing Culture: the Poetics and Politics of Ethnography (1986). Harvard anthropologist Clifford Geertz was cited as an influence on literary critics like Stephen Greenblatt, while other literary/cultural scholars turned to works by Victor Turner and Mary Douglas.

Like multiculturalism, cross-culturalism is sometimes construed as ideological, in that it advocates values such as those associated with transculturation, transnationalism, cosmopolitanism, interculturalism, and globalism. Nevertheless, cross-culturalism is a fundamentally neutral term, in that favorable portrayal of other cultures or the processes of cultural mixing are not essential to the categorization of a work or writer as cross-cultural.

Cross-culturalism is distinct from multiculturalism. Whereas multiculturalism deals with cultural diversity within a particular nation or social group, cross-culturalism is concerned with exchange beyond the boundaries of the nation or cultural group.

Cross-culturalism in literary and cultural studies is a useful rubric for works, writers and artists that do not fit within a single cultural tradition. To the extent that cultures are national, the cross-cultural may be considered as overlapping the transnational. The cross-cultural can also be said to incorporate the colonial and the postcolonial, since colonialism is by definition a form of cross-culturalism. Travel literature also makes up a substantial component of cross-cultural literature. Of the various terms, "cross-culturalism" is the most inclusive, since it is free of transnationalism's dependence on the nation-state and colonialism/postcolonialism's restriction to colonized or formerly-colonized regions. This inclusiveness leads to certain definitional ambiguity (albeit one derived from the term culture itself). In practice, "cross-cultural" is usually applied only to situations involving significant cultural divergence. Thus, the term is not usually applied in cases involving crossing between European nations, or between Europe and the United States. However, there is no clear reason why, for example, Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America or even Woody Allen's Annie Hall (in which the protagonist experiences culture

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shock after traveling to Los Angeles from New York City) could not be considered cross-cultural works.

Although disagreement over what constitutes a "significant" cultural divergence creates difficulties of categorization, "cross-cultural" is nevertheless useful in identifying writers, artists, works, etc., who may otherwise tend to fall between the cracks of various national cultures.

Cross-cultural writers (autobiography, fiction, poetry)

Meena Alexander (India, Sudan, England, United States) Elvia Ardalani (Mexico, United States, Iran) Ruth Benedict (United States, Dutch New Guinea, Japan) Aimé Césaire (Martinique, France) Charles Eastman (Sioux, United States) Olaudah Equiano (Igbo, United States, England) Lafcadio Hearn (Greece, Ireland, United States, Japan) Joseph Heco (Japan, United States) Rudyard Kipling (India, England, United States of America) Jhumpa Lahiri (England, United States, India) Anna Leonowens (India, England, Thailand, Nova Scotia) Yone Noguchi (Japan, United States) Marco Polo (Italy, China) Victor Segalen (France, China) Khal Torabully (France, Mauritius).

Cross-cultural films

The African Queen Anna and the King Babel The King and I The Last Samurai The Man Who Would Be King (film) The Namesake (film) Princess Tam Tam Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence Jodhaa Akbar Mammoth Outsourced

Cross-cultural theatre

(note that currently the term "intercultural theatre" is preferred to "cross-cultural theatre" (see also Intercultural theatre)

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Plays/theatre pieces

David Belasco , Madame Butterfly Gilbert and Sullivan , The Mikado Tony Kushner , Homebody/Kabul Tom Stoppard , Indian Ink Miss Saigon Peter Brook, The Mahabharata

Companies

International Centre for Theatre Research The Bridge - Stage of the Arts TheatreWorks (Singapore)

Characteristics of cross-cultural narratives

Cross-cultural narrative forms may be described in terms of common characteristics or tropes shared by cross-cultural writers, artists, etc. Examples include primitivism, exoticism, as well as culturally specific forms such as Orientalism, Japonisme.

Cross-cultural narratives tend to incorporate elements such as:

ethnographic description travel writing culture shock acculturation or resistance to acculturation social obstacles such as discrimination, racism, prejudice, stereotypes, linguistic difficulties,

linguicism overcoming of social obstacles through acculturation, tricksterism, kindness, luck, hard work,

etc. return home (often accompanied by further culture shock)

Cross-cultural visual artists

Leonard Tsuguharu Foujita (Japan, France) Paul Gauguin (France, Tahiti) Isamu Noguchi (United States, Japan, France, India)

Cross-cultural music

Main article: ethnomusicology

Music has long been a central medium for cross-cultural exchange. The cross-cultural study of music is referred to as ethnomusicology.

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See also

Cosmopolitanism Cross-cultural narcissism Cultural Detective Emotions and Culture Globalism Hybridity Interculturalism Interculturality Negotiation Transculturation Transnationalism Third Culture Kid Cross-cultural leadership

References

1. Tannen, Deborah. "Cross-cultural communication". Retrieved 8 February 2013.2. Joseph Trimmer and Tilly Warnock, Understanding Others: Cultural and Cross-Cultural Studies

and the Teaching of Literature Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English, 1992.3. Wilson Harris, The Womb of Space (Westport: Greenwood, 1983): xviii.4. Wilson Harris, The Unfinished Genesis of the Imagination, ed. Andrew Bundy. London/New York:

Routledge, 1999.

External links

Cross-cultural experience narratives compiled by the Glimpse Foundation Cross-Cultural Study: Some Considerations Transtext(e)sTranscultures trilingual (English, Chinese, French) journal of the Institute for

Transtextual and Transcultural Studies, University of Lyon, France. Comparing Nigerians and Canadians: Insights from Social Survey Research, 1990-2005 Modes and models for transcending cultural differences, Journal of Research in International

Education, Van Hook, S.R. 2011