Support –––
Child
Dr Janine Cooper –––
W
atching a child learn new skills and building on existing knowledge is highly rewarding. It is a fast and rapidly changing process. Many theories of development have been proposed to attempt to explain this complex progression in abilities and social skill acquisition. Support is focusing on the combination of biological influences, such as brain development, with environmental factors. Hence, it’s a ‘nature and nurture’ collaboration rather than a ‘nature or nurture’ debate. Learning through observation As any parent, caregiver or educator will know, children are active, adaptive explorers who aim to control their environment. They do this by watching the actions of others and copying them. Caregivers and parents provide the strongest observable behaviour in the first five years of life. However, as children get older, they choose to watch friends and teachers, as well as other people who they consider
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important. The person being observed is called a ‘model’ and most children will have someone that they imitate. Who do children model? It might be a real person such as a caregiver or an older sibling. It can also be a person in the media, sporting environment or even a fictitious character such as a superhero. Young children carefully watch the model’s behaviour and actively learn from what they observe. Research has shown children are more likely to copy behaviour when the potential models: • provide the child with social praise or affection • are similar gender, age and interests • are visibly dominant peers or adults in a dominant role such as a teacher or coach. Therefore, when a child watches a parent use aggression to discipline, they will
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