Day Care
Early Socialisation
Task
• Taking into account your own views and what
you have learned about attachment, list the
pros and cons of day care.
The Nature of Day Care
• Today’s society means women go back to work more quickly
than before.
• Up to 52 weeks maternity leave. The first 26 weeks is known as
‘Ordinary Maternity Leave’, the last 26 weeks as ‘Additional
Maternity Leave’.
•The earliest leave can be taken is 11 weeks before the expected
week of childbirth. Employees must take at least 2 weeks after
the birth (or 4 weeks if they’re a factory worker).
• Statutory Maternity Pay (SMP) is paid for up to 39 weeks. You
get:
•90% of your average weekly earnings (before tax) for the first 6
weeks
•£136.78 or 90% of your average weekly earnings (whichever is
lower) for the next 33 weeks
Types of Day Care
• Nurseries – state or private
•Childminders
•Informal arrangements.
Features of Quality Day Care
Phillips and Howes (1987) identified 3 important features:
Structural Features: The National Day Care Study (Roupp,
Travers, Glantz and Coelen, 1979) . Group size, staff:child
ratio,training, space, equipment.
Dynamic Features: Experiences and interactions.
Contextual Features: Staff stability and turnover.
Cognitive Development
+ves
Bruchinel, 1989 – those who were in day care had a higher IQ than those who
did not.
Broberg et al., 1997
.3 groups of 8 year-old children, who had received different types of care in
infancy - day nurseries, childminders or remained at home. Those children who
had experienced care in day nurseries had better verbal and mathematical
abilities than the others. There was even a positive correlation between length of
time spent in day nurseries and cognitive ability
-Ve
Bryant et al, 1983
Middle class Oxford childminders – 75% were detached, 25% had poor speech.
(Baydar and Brooks-Gunn, 1991
the cognitive ability of those children who started day care earlier was lower than
that of the later starters
Kagen et al , 1980
No difference
Emotional Development
+ves
Lazar and Darlington, 1982
Headstart children were more likely to have attended
college and less likely to be trouble with the law and
claiming welfare.
-ves
World Health Organisation
“Day care can cause permanent damage to a child”
Social Development
+ves
Shea 1981
Those who attended 5 x wk more sociable than those who
attended twice.
Clarke-Stewart et al, 1994
cope better with the new social interactions when they start
attending school .
-ves
Pennebaker et al, 1981
If children are already shy day care will have a negative effect.
Cole and Cole, 1996.
Other studies suggest that children in day care centres tend to be
more aggressive .
Conclusions
What are your thoughts?
What problems are there with these studies? Can we compare
them like for like?
Do you think the positives outweigh the negatives?
If you had a child would you put them into day care?
If so, which type?