ECE133: Growth & Development of Children

Topic 9: Theories and Concepts on Emotional Development

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What is Emotion?

• Emotion is a consciousness feeling such as joy, sorrow, fear, hate or the like that is experienced by a person.
• There are two types of emotions: basic emotion and complex emotions: Basic Emotions are experienced by people worldwide and each emotion consists of three elements:
• It is a subjective feeling (subjective because it varies with individuals)
• It is usually accompanied by certain physiological changes such as increased heartbeat or breathing, and
• Often manifested overtly as a behaviour such as crying or shaking.

Complex Emotions

• Complex Emotions are feelings of success (because a child’s expectations are met) and feelings of failure (when a child’s expectations are not met).
• Examples of complex emotions are pride, guilt and embarrassment.

What is Emotional Development?

• Emotional development is the process of developing feelings and learning to handle them appropriately. It includes children's growing ability to:
• Understand their own and others' feelings
• Manage their emotions
• Develop empathy
• Build good relationships
• From birth, children quickly express basic emotions—sadness, fear, anger, and happiness—but need parents and caregivers to help them cope and manage these feelings.
• Complex emotions emerge around 1½ to 2 years, when children develop some sense of self. These include guilt, embarrassment, shyness, shame, pride, surprise, and empathy.

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What is Emotional Development?

• Emotional development begins in infancy and continues into adulthood.
• As children grow, what triggers their emotions changes, and so do their strategies for managing them.
• Primary school children are still learning to identify emotions, understand why they happen, and manage them appropriately.
• Meeting children's emotional needs is one of the most important tasks for parents and caregivers.�

What is Emotional Development?

• Very young children’s emotions are mainly made up of physical reactions (e.g. heart racing, butterflies in stomach) and behaviours. As they grow, children develop the ability to recognise feelings.
• Their emotions are also increasingly influenced by their thinking.
• They become more aware of their own feelings and better able to recognise and understand other people’s.
• Thus, an emotional reaction of a 10-year-old is likely to be far more complex than that of a three-year-old.
• The experience of emotion includes several components:
• Physical responses (e.g. heart rate, breathing, hormone levels)
• Feelings that children recognise and learn to name
• Thoughts and judgements associated with feelings
• Action signals (e.g. a desire to approach, escape or fight)

What is Emotional Development?

• Many things influence the ways that children express emotions, both through words and behaviour.
• These influences include:
• Values and beliefs about appropriate and inappropriate ways of expressing emotions that children learn from parents, carers and school staff
• How effectively children’s emotional needs are usually met
• Children’s temperaments
• Emotional behaviours that children have learned through observation or experience
• The extent to which families and children are under various kinds of stress

Why Do Emotions Matter?

• Children’s responses to the different feelings and emotions they experience every day have a major impact or influence on:
• 1. their thinking such decisions, judgement & choices
• 2. their behaviour
• 3. how well they cope and enjoy life.

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• Emotional development involves:
• learning what feelings and emotions are,
• understanding how and why they happen,
• recognising one’s own feelings
• recognising the feeling of others, and
• developing effective ways of managing their emotions.

Function of Emotions

• Emotions are essential for human survival and adaptation.
• Life without emotions—like a computer—would mean no pleasure from a good meal, sex, or holding a baby.
• Emotions help continue the human species and adapt to the environment.

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• Example: Fear
• Walking home late through a dimly lit neighborhood, you feel fear.
• Fear is useful: it makes you more alert to sounds, more aware of your surroundings, and motivates you to walk quickly to safety.
• So fear is adaptive—it organizes behavior around avoiding danger.

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Function of Emotions

• Other examples of emotions that are adaptive include happiness, disgust and so forth.
• If a person is happy, it may result in better interpersonal relationships. When people are happy with others, they tend to smile and this often causes other people to feel happy too.
• Just like words of the song which says ‘Smile and the whole world smiles with you’. Similarly, ‘disgust‘ is also an emotion that is adaptive.
• For example, when you put spoilt food in your mouth, your immediately spit it out.
• Thus, emotions enable humans to adapt to the different situations they encounter throughout their life (Kail, 2008).

Expressions of Emotions

• Look at Figure 9.2 of the three pictures of children. Who is sad? Who is angry? Who is happy?

Expressions of Emotions

• According to Fox, Kimmerly & Schafer (1991), when infants and adults smile, they are happy which is accompanied by a physiological change.
• The left frontal cortex of the brain tends to have more electrical activity than the right frontal cortex.
• Children all over the word express basic emotions in the same way.
• Regardless of region or culture, all children have the same facial expression of anger, sadness and happiness as shown in the three picture in Figure 9.2.
• Collectively, facial expressions reflect young children‘s underlying emotional state.

Lewis (2000) and Mascola, Fischer & Li (2003) trace the development of emotions as follows

• Newborns experience two general emotions: pleasure and distress.
• When they are about 2 to 3 months of age, social smiles appear; i.e. they smile when they see another human face. At times this is accompanied by ‘cooing‘ (the early form of vocalisation). They are also able to express sadness; they look sad when their mother stops playing with them.
• When they are about 4 to 6 months of age, anger emerges. For example, they show anger when a favourite toy is taken away.
• Around 6 to 9 months of age, fear begins to emerge. For example, when a stranger approaches the child shows signs of stranger wariness; i.e. the child cries and looks frightened especially when the stranger approaches suddenly without warming up to the child.
• By the time they are 8 to 9 months of age, they are able to express all the basic emotions (anger, happiness, sadness, fear, etc).
• Complex emotions emerge around 1½ to 2 years of age when children have an understanding of their self.

Developing Emotional Skills

• There are a number of reasons why children vary in the way they express and manage their emotions.
• These variations may be due to events that impact on children and families at times, such as severe or chronic illness, trauma, or difficult social circumstances.
• Variations in children’s emotional expression may also be influenced by specific family or cultural values and by differences in children’s temperaments.

Developing Emotional Skills

Developing Emotional Skills

• Children learn how to express emotions based on what their family and culture consider normal.
• Some families encourage a wide range of emotions; others discourage certain emotions like anger or pride.
• These differences also shape how children learn to regulate emotions.
• Regulating emotions is harder for some children because of temperament.
• Some feel emotions intensely and are more reactive, get angry easily, act impulsively, and struggle to calm down.
• Others have anxious temperaments, get anxious quickly, find it hard to manage fears, and often avoid situations that worry them.

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Learning to Manage Emotions

• Children learn to recognize others’ emotions and adjust their behavior accordingly.
• Babies as young as 4 months, and definitely by 6 months, can distinguish facial expressions: when mothers smile and speak pleasantly, babies feel happy; when mothers are angry or sad, infants become distressed (Montague & Walker-Andrews, 2001).
• Between ages 2 and 5, children gradually learn to manage feelings.
• Toddlers may throw tantrums when frustrated, but as they mature emotionally, they learn other ways to express anger.
• They also begin developing moral emotions like shame and guilt.

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Learning to Manage Emotions

• Young children often get frustrated because of the gap between what they want to do and what they can actually do—leading to temper tantrums.
• When feelings are poorly managed, thinking can be impaired, and children may act on feelings without thinking.
• By school age, children are more aware of their own and others’ feelings.
• They can link thoughts and feelings, use words to describe emotions, and better change or shape how they feel.
• This helps them tolerate frustration, delay gratification, and calm themselves down.

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• Acknowledging and exploring his feelings helps Josh feel understood.
• This makes it easier for him, with his mother’s help, to think carefully about what he can do to improve the situation and feel better.
• Josh’s mother could support this next step by asking him what he thinks would make things better for him. She might also suggest some options for him to consider.
• Approaching Josh’s difficulty this way shows him that difficult emotions are linked to problems that can be thought through and resolved.

Learning to Manage Emotions

• As children grow, their emotional range expands to include feelings like regret and relief, and complex emotions such as shame and guilt become more evident—for example, a 7-year-old may feel guilt in situations that would not have bothered them earlier.
• Fears also change: preschoolers may fear the dark or imaginary creatures, but these usually fade in primary school as they learn to distinguish appearance from reality.

Learning to Manage Emotions

• Children differ in how they express and manage emotions because of life events (illness, trauma, difficult social circumstances), family and cultural values, and individual temperament.
• Families and cultures shape which emotions are encouraged or discouraged, which affects how children learn to regulate emotions.
• Some children are more emotionally reactive, intense, impulsive, and slow to calm down; others have anxious temperaments, worry easily, struggle to manage fears, and tend to avoid upsetting situations.

Attachment Theory

A) WHAT IS ATTACHMENT?

• The most important property of humankind is the capacity to form and maintain relationships.
• These relationships are absolutely necessary for any of us to survive, learn, work, love, and procreate.
• Human relationships take many forms but the most intense, most pleasurable and most painful are those relationships with family, friends and loved ones.
• Within this inner circle of intimate relationships, we are bonded to each other with "emotional glue" — bonded with love (Perry, 2011).

Attachment Theory

• People differ in their ability to form and maintain close relationships—the “emotional glue.” Some naturally form many intimate, caring bonds and enjoy them; others feel little pull toward intimacy, have few friends, and remain emotionally distant even from family. In extreme cases, a person may have no intact emotional bond with anyone.
• Human infants cannot survive without a caregiver for food and protection, and they also need other support to thrive.
• They have few inborn behaviors—such as crying, rooting, and sucking—but many behavioral systems are activated through interaction with another person. In the first year, babies’ brains double in volume, and early experiences become hardwired as a foundation for later life.
• The deep bond children form with their primary caregiver is called attachment—an emotional bond to another person. Attachment exists to some degree in all mammals, especially nonhuman primates.

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B) GROWTH OF ATTACHMENT

• Psychologist John Bowlby was the first attachment theorist, describing attachment as a "lasting psychological connectedness between human beings" (Bowlby, 1969, p. 194).
• Bowlby believed that the earliest bonds formed by children with their caregivers have a tremendous impact that continues throughout life.
• According to Bowlby, attachment also serves to keep the infant close to the mother, thus improving the child's chances of survival. The attachment bond has the following key elements:
• 1. an attachment bond is an enduring emotional relationship with a specific person;
• 2. the relationship brings safety, comfort, and pleasure;
• 3. loss or threat of loss of the person evokes intense distress.

According to Bowlby, there are FOUR PHASES IN THE GROWTH OF ATTACHMENT

With his identification of the four stages of attachment, John Bowlby (1969) was instrumental in illuminating the changes in the development of attachment between mother and child.

• During the PREATTACHMENT PHASE or indiscriminate sociability phase, infants interact with most people with their cries, coos and smiles from birth to two months in order to receive attention.

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• Between two and eight months (ATTACHMENT MAKING PHASE), the infants begin to develop a preference for the responses of familiar adults such as the mother.

With his identification of the four stages of attachment, John Bowlby (1969) was instrumental in illuminating the changes in the development of attachment between mother and child.

• With the TRUE ATTACHMENT PHASE (eight to 24 months), the infants possess a strong attachment to their caregivers and suffer from separation and stranger anxiety.
• Their strong relationships with their caregivers are formed in tandem with the development of their motor ability to move towards their caregivers for safety and verbal skills that enable them to socialize with their caregivers on a more complex level than before.

With his identification of the four stages of attachment, John Bowlby (1969) was instrumental in illuminating the changes in the development of attachment between mother and child.

• During the RECIPROCAL RELATIONSHIPS phase that starts typically from age two years, young children have acquired representational and memory skills that allow them to relate to their environment in an active way.
• Thus, they do not require the constant attention of their parents.
• They also begin to adjust their perspectives of various situations and understand the points of view of their parents.
• At the same time, they are able to cope with short periods of separation from their parents.

TYPES OF ATTACHMENT RELATIONSHIPS

• Mary Ainsworth (1978, 1993), an early researcher on attachment developed a methodology, called Strange Situation. in which an infant is kept in a room with its mother.

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• Suddenly, the mother leaves the rooms for about 3 minutes, and then the mother comes back to the room; and Ainsworth observed the reaction of the child.

Mary Ainsworth (1913-1999)

TYPES OF ATTACHMENT RELATIONSHIPS

TYPES OF ATTACHMENT RELATIONSHIPS

What do these types of attachment relationships suggest?

• In general, these types of attachment suggest the quality of the relationship a child feels toward a particular person (parent, grandparent, caregiver, etc.).
• They represent children’s felt sense of security and comfort level with the person‘s responsiveness to their needs.
• They are important because children often show different outcomes in their well-being based on attachment style.

Some of the important aspects of a child’s growth affected by attachment quality include the following:

• Children who are secure in their attachments more freely explore their environment and are able to learn with confidence, while children who are insecure are more likely to struggle in being confident and learning about their surroundings.
• Children who are secure tend to be more popular with peers and exhibit more positive social interaction with other kids, while children who are insecure seem more at risk for hostile, anti-social or difficult relationships with other children.
• Children who are secure tend to be more emotionally stable and able to express and manage their feelings well, while children who are insecure are more likely to be emotionally unstable and have difficulty in expressing and managing feelings.
• Children who are secure demonstrate greater ability to handle stress and help others handle stress, while children who are insecure are more likely to struggle when stressed, act out in unhealthy ways and be insensitive to others who are stressed.

How do such attachments develop?

• Several key factors can affect the quality of a child’s attachment.
• These can include the child’s temperament (more active and outgoing, etc.), the context of the situation (stranger present, familiar room, etc.), early history (traumatic experience, etc.) and other things.
• But the way in which a parent responds to and interacts with a young child is the key factor in how an attachment develops.
• A child’s attachment style generally develops based on the child‘s perception or understanding of the caregiver‘s reliability in providing comfort, support and security.

Behaviours that promote attachment and provide the opportunity for meaningful interaction include

• Smiling
• Looking at each other
• Vocalising to each other
• Following
• Clinging

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• Physical touch and hugging
• Exploring the surroundings
• Feeding interactions
• Crying
• Playing

Supporting Emotional Development of Children

• Children have really ‘big emotions’. Children are constantly providing signals to adults how they are feeling – whether positive or negative.
• Children tell adults in various ways whether they are happy or sad.
• CHILDREN NEED SUPPORT LEARNING HOW TO FEEL AND EXPRESS THEIR EMOTIONS.

Adults

• Adults have many opportunities to foster the emotional development of children. However, according to Murray (2017), it is hard for adults to understand and respond to children’s intense emotions:
• First, children tend to react to their emotions, and the younger and less emotionally mature they are, the more immediate and intense their emotional reactions are likely to be (see Figure 9.3).
• As a teacher or parent, it is hard to help children think through their response to powerful emotions because they may only have a few seconds to respond before there is an eruption of loud, intense screams or acting out behaviours, like hitting or throwing something.
• So, often teachers and parents are left to clean up after the situation has already spun a bit out of control, which is stressful and frustrating.

Adults

• Second, children’s behavioural responses to their emotions may not make sense when viewed through an adult lens. Consider a child who feels lonely and sad about being left out. An adult who is lonely would look out for others for support. Children seldom look out to others for support and instead may isolate themselves, scream or yell at others children because they do not want to spend time with them.

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• Third, adults often forget to view children’s emotion through a developmental lens. Children at different ages have a limited ability to manage or regulate their emotions. Adults may conclude that a child ‘overacting’ or that the child is a naturally difficult child or label the child as spoilt. That is why, it is important for adults to learn about child development and how children process emotions and understand the different types of emotions children expression at different age levels. Without this knowledge, adults may place unrealistic expectations on children’s ability to manage their emotions.

At home

• Tune into children’s feelings and emotions. Some emotions are easily identified, while others are less obvious. Tuning into children’s emotions involves looking at their body language, listening to what they are saying and how they are saying it, and observing their behaviour. This allows you to respond more effectively to children’s needs and to offer more specific guidance to help children manage their emotions.

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• Help children recognise and understand emotions. Taking opportunities to talk with children and teach them about emotions helps children to become more aware of their own emotions as well as those of others. Encouraging children to feel comfortable with their emotions and providing them with practice in talking about their feelings helps children to further develop ways to manage their emotions.

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• Set limits on inappropriate expression of emotions. It is very important for children to understand that it is okay to have a range of emotions and feelings, but that there are limits to the ways these should be expressed. While acknowledging children’s emotions, it is therefore very important to set limits on aggressive, unsafe or inappropriate behaviours.

At home

• Listen and validate the child’s emotional experience. Listen to what children say and acknowledge their feelings. This helps children to identify emotions and understand how they work. Being supported in this way helps children work out how to manage their emotions. You might say, “You look worried. Is something on your mind?” or “It sounds like you’re really angry. Let’s talk about it.”

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• Encourage problem-solving to manage emotions. Help children develop their skills for managing emotions by helping them think of different ways they could respond. You might say, “What would help you feel brave?” or “How else could you look at this?” • Be a role model - Children learn about emotions and how to express them. Appropriately by watching others – especially parents, carers and school staff. Showing children the ways you understand and manage emotions helps children learn from your example. This includes examples of saying: “Sorry, I lost my temper” (because no parent is perfect!) and then showing how you might make amends.

At home

• Keep the emotional climate of the home calm, warm and predictable.
• Accept and acknowledge your child’s emotions.
• Read stories to children and talk about the different feelings characters in the book may be feeling. Talking about emotions helps children to better understand their feelings.
• Help your child to put feelings into words – ―it seems like you are feeling disappointed at the moment.

• Encourage children to talk about situations that make them feel excited, happy, angry or worried.
• Praise children for not losing control and staying calm.
• Help children to understand the difference between their own and other people‘s feelings - I know you are feeling frustrated right now but what you are doing is making your sister feel sad.
• Children learn to manage their emotions by watching how other family member express and manage their emotions. Parents play a critical role in modelling how to respond to strong feelings. Children need help and practice in managing their emotions.

In the School

• View emotions as an opportunity for connecting and teaching. Children’s emotional reactions provide ‘teachable moments’ for helping them understand emotions and learn effective ways to manage them. You might say, “I can see you’re really frustrated about having to wait for what you want. Why don’t we read a story while we’re waiting?”
• Teachers can show support for children’s emotional development by displaying books and posters that show different emotions.
• Teachers can be proactive in teaching children relationship skills and emotional management strategies, such as through lessons on practicing kindness and managing anger appropriately.

• Teachers can make the most of “teaching moments” that arise when conflicts between children arise, so that they can help guide the children to work toward a solution that honours each child’s emotions and needs.
• Help children to separate feelings from behaviour – I know you are feeling angry but it is not OK to hit.
• Children’s emotional development is greatly influenced by the quality of the relationship that is developed between themselves and their teachers. The way teachers interact with children has a lot to do with the way children will develop emotionally.

Things to Avoid

• When dealing with the emotional development of children, adults should AVOID the following:
• Dismissing Children’s Emotions - Telling children not to feel the way they do (eg, by saying, “Don’t be scared/sad/angry”), can lead children to believe that their emotions are wrong and they are bad for having them. Remember that all feelings are okay and for children to learn how to manage them they first need to be acknowledged and understood.
• Lying to Children about Situations to Avoid Emotional Reactions - Telling children things like, “It won’t hurt a bit” (when you know it will), can actually increase the emotional reaction. It teaches them not trust the person who has lied. It is important to communicate with children about difficult situations that affect them in ways they can understand. Providing information to children at their level, with reassurance, helps them be prepared and work out ways to manage their emotional responses.
• Shaming Children for their Emotions - Sometimes adults tease children about their emotional responses or try to talk them out of feeling a certain way, which can lead feelings of shame. Saying things like, “Why are you crying like a baby?” or “You’re such a scaredy cat!” undermines children’s confidence. Instead of helping them to feel brave it may lead them to feel guilty for experiencing that emotion.
• Ignoring Children’s Emotional Responses - Sometimes adults may think that the child will just grow out of their emotional responses and ignore them. This can communicate to children that their

Every Child is Different

• Children differ in how they express and manage emotions because of life events (such as illness, trauma, or social hardship), family and cultural values, and individual temperament.
• Families and cultures teach children which emotions are acceptable to show, shaping how they learn to regulate emotions.
• Regulation is harder for some children due to temperament: highly reactive children may feel emotions intensely, struggle to calm down, act impulsively when frustrated, or become anxious easily and avoid feared situations.�