Emotional development and types of aggression in early childhood

Child Psychology

The author of this brief report has been asked to answer a number of questions relating to child psychology and the development thereof as a child ages and grows. The primary source of answers that shall be used for the answers shall be the tenth chapter of the Berger book. However, the text itself offers other sources and there is a wealth of information on the topics to be discussed in the scholarly sphere. While every child is different and thus develops in their own way, there are tried and true patterns and standards that most children are held to based on the development and progress of millions of prior children.

Emotional development is indeed something that is very strong and in motion when it comes to the early childhood time. As a young child grows, this is when their emotional regulation comes into focus and this in turn brings on a child's self-concept and self-esteem. Lack of this process in motion is commonly and widely accepted to be a sign of psychopathology in a young child. Examples of good or normal development in motion are a child that has an imaginary friend. However, these imaginary friends should be limited to ages three through seven years old. There needs to be monitoring of these imaginary friends as they are sometimes emblematic of a child that is lonely, thus the need to create friends. Further, if a child is having problems with their development of emotional regulation, they will have issues with externalizing and internalizing of emotions and so forth. Self-esteem is something that should start to emerge in young childhood. For example, a child being very proud of artwork that they created would be an example of this. Self-concept emerges around the same time as Erik's concept of guilt (Berger, 2012).

Question Two

Something else that clearly emerges during childhood is aggression. What types of aggression emerge and when depends on the child and what they are exposed to as they grow and learn. The four types of aggression that tend to emerge are instrumental aggression, reactive aggression, relational aggression and bullying aggression. Instrumental aggression is very common with children and is typified by a child not having something that they want, they see that thing they want with another child and they thus try to take that item from that other child, or at least think about doing the same. Reactive aggression is also extremely common and is typified by a child retaliating for an action, intentional or accidental, from another child. For example, if a child is flailing their arms around and accidentally strikes a child, the latter child will tend to react and strike back, or at least try to. The other two types of aggression can come up but they are much more "destructive" and otherwise problematic. Relational aggression is typified by things such as gossip or social exclusion while bullying is exactly what it sounds like. These are described on pages 294 and 295 of the Berger text. As far as what violent programs tend to do, children are drawn to them because of the colors and images and violence in particular is shown as leading to aggression. This is not to say that children can never be exposed to violence and such. Rather, it is just something that should be strongly avoided during the childhood development process as they are not able to synthesize and learn about such things like an older child or adult can do (Berger, 2012).

Question Four

As far as parents and their role in their children mastering emotions, this obviously depends on the age of the child in question. For example, Berger and others will quickly tell others that children that are two years old will not be all that able to control and regulate their motions. This will change as a child gets older and older. The key is for parents or other people watching the child to be on standby and intervene when things get nasty or uncomfortable for the child. If there is an instance where things get nasty, it is important for the parents to stop things before they get too advanced or hostile and thus the parents can explain, as best as the child is able to perceive it depending on their age, so that the child learn. As the child experiences both good things and bad things as they progress through the early childhood years, they will tend to get better and better at the concept and they will also tend to need less intervention and control from the parents provided that development moves at a good and solid clip (Berger, 2012).

Question Five

Finally, we come to a question about gender awareness and how this enters the fray as a child develops and moves through the formative years. As described by Berger, the early propensity is that boys and girls will fall into the normal activities of their biological gender, although there are obviously exceptions. Regardless, the self-identified genders of the boys and girls will take root and both groups will generally tend to believe that their gender is better. When dolls are handled and played with, there will be a question of or the choosing of the gender of that doll even if the gender is not obvious. Berger mentions that opposite sex parent beliefs and roleplaying will peak as a child reaches about age six. Obviously, there can be children and situations that break from that pattern. However, that is the norm and for a number of reasons. Anyhow, five of the stages or issues that can arise when it comes to children and sex include the Phallic stage, the Oedipus complex (boys), the superego, the Electra complex (girls) and identification (Berger, 2012; Mcleod, 2016).

Conclusion

As stated throughout this report, there are variations and differences when it comes to the raising and development of children. Even so, there are common and accepted responses to all of the manifestations described above and there are tried and true ways to response to these issues as they arise. Even in situations where something out of the norm happens to come up, there are responses that could and should take place so as to keep a child from going too far off of what is normal or common for that child. The key is to identify that issue before it becomes too large and react accordingly.