Jeremy Fox
PSY-1100-019
The first few years after being raped were difficult for Hania. It took a long time
for her to get over the fear and anxiety. Even after Aamina was born she had problems
keeping the memories and feelings out of her head. She often worried that this would
hamper her being a good mother despite her own mother’s assurances that she was
doing wonderfully and Aamina as well. She had found a job serving tables at a nearby
restaurant and was able to earn enough to put Aamina thru school when the time came.
It was true that Aamina was doing well. She was healthy, energetic and happy.
Language came easily for her and she was able to communicate quite well by the time
she was two years old; though not always in complete sentences. She spoke quickly
and didn’t fumble much over her words and by the time she was three years old she
would often reply quickly to questions. (Ch. 5, page 166-167. Myelination: the process
by which axons become coated with myelin, a fatty substance that speeds the
transmission of nerve impulses from neuron to neuron. Aamina’s ability to speak so
well was due to an increase in myelin somewhat faster than average.)
Hania was very proud of her daughters development and would often discreetly
brag about her to her friends and others. It was possibly because of this pride that she
was so surprised at Aamina’s reaction one day when she was three years old and she
saw a picture of her grandma when she was a younger woman.
“Look! This is a picture of grandma when she was younger!” Hania said while
holding up a black and white picture.
Aamina gave her a confused look, glanced at grandma, who was sitting at the
table reading the newspaper, her glasses resting on her wrinkled nose and cheeks,
magnifying her droopy eyes.
“That not grandma!” she stated, pointing a little finger at the old photo.
“It is!” said Hania, “She was just younger, that’s all.”
The confused look was stuck on Aamina’s face when she replied “Mom, that not
grandma. That is grandma!” she punctuated her last word by pointing toward the
kitchen. “Grandma is old!” (Ch. 5: page 171. Static Reasoning. A characteristic
whereby a young child thinks that nothing changes. Whatever is now has always been
and always will be. i.e. how Aamina can’t believe that the woman in the old picture is
her grandma.)
Aamina was a stubborn girl and would always want to do things on her own. It
got worse as she got older and would often cause some problems and big headaches.
Her shoe laces would end up in knots or just wrapped together, she would splash juice
and milk over the edge of her cup when pouring, her shirts would be buttoned up all
crookedly. However she would finally consent to help from her mother’s or
grandmother’s help to do these and other things. They would show her little tricks and
tips and teach her the correct way. (Ch 5, page 174. Zone of Proximal Development
[ZPD]. Vygotsky’s term for the skills - cognitive as well as physical - that a person can
exercise only with assistance, not yet independently.)
Sadly, our cute little children change with time and start to develop bad habits.
Aamina started developing a bad habit of insulting people and acting coldly toward
them. She would glare at other kids and sometimes insult them or not play with them or
tell them to leave because no one wanted to play with them. Hania started to notice this
when Aamina was late in her second year, though it continued well into her fourth at
which point it finally seemed to die away. Hania would always tell her daughter that it
was wrong, but she would still act out, often times quite randomly and unprovoked. (Ch.
6, page 215. Relational Aggression: Nonphysical acts, such as insults or social
rejection, aimed at harming the social connection between the victim and other people.
Aamina didn’t ever physically hurt but used verbal acts.)
Hania was talking with her mother one day about this and how it was being
handled. Her mother mentioned that she thought she might try a different approach to
chastising Aamina. She suggested that talking with her didn’t seem to be doing any
good so perhaps she should try talking about it less and be more strict in what she
expected from her and in how she punished her when she misbehaved. “You’re boss
and that’s final! You shouldn’t discuss it with her, just take charge.” She said. (Ch6,
page 210. Authoritarian Parenting: An approach to parenting that is characterized by
high behavioral standards, strict punishment of misconduct, and little communication.)
Hania didn’t much like this idea and continued to do things her way, trying to talk
things out and help Aamina understand. As she did this she started to notice, as her
daughter got older, that Aamina would shy away from talking about things that she did
with her friends or sometimes by herself. Hania noticed that as her daughter got a little
older she would not want to talk about how soccer went with the neighbors or how some
game went.
Finally she was able to get Aamina to talk a bit about some of these things and
realized that she was feeling embarrassed because she couldn’t do them well and she
felt ashamed. (Ch 6, page 198 Initiative versus Guilt: Erikson’s third psychosocial crisis,
in which children undertake new skills and activities and feel guilty when they do not
succeed at them.) Hania didn’t really know how to help with this and she didn’t feel
comfortable asking her mom, so she just decided that she would encourage and
support her daughters feelings and help her handle difficult situations.
Over the next few years Aamina changed in many ways. She started to talk
nonstop about everything and anything. She overcame her relational aggression and
started to become very popular at school. One day Aamina came home and told her
mom about one of her new friends at school.
“She is different from everyone else ‘cause she has a sickness in her brain.” She
said with a sullen voice. “But she is still really fun and I like her.”
Hania heard a lot about this girl over the next few months. She decided to invite
her and her family over for dinner one night so she could meet one of her daughter’s
best friends. It was a lovely meal and they all had a great time. During the meal Hania
got up the courage to ask about the other parent’s little girl.
“It’s all right,” said the father, trying to lessen Hania’s obvious nerves. “what she
has is ADHD and dyslexia.”
“Are those related somehow?” asked Hania.
“No.” answered the mother. “Sometimes they just end up with two different
ones.” (Ch 7 page 263, comorbidity: The presence of two or more unrelated disease
conditions at the same time in the same person. Common combinations with ADHD are
conduct disorder, depression and anxiety.) “Despite these difficulties she is very
resilient and actually does really well in school and socially. We are very proud of her,
and very happy your daughter is her friend.” (Ch 8 page 276, Resilience: The capacity
to adapt well despite significant adversity and to overcome serious stress. This girl
showed resilience by finding success in school and with friends despite her disability).
The two girls remained friends for man years as did the parents. Both helped the
other through many things to come as well.
Later that year Aamina came home from school and told her mom about a test
they had taken
“It’s called an IQ test. It says how smart we are.” Said Aamina excitedly. “I did
really well, I got 120!”
“Hey! That’s cool! Good job sweetie!” replied her mom. “I think you’re smarter
than I am!”
“Maybe you should take it too, mom!”
“Sure. I’ll come pick you up tomorrow and get the test as well! How does that
sound?”
“Sounds great!”
She did just that. When she picked it up the teacher told her a bit about it. She
explained that it was a test made by an American named David Wechsler and that it
had a “western feel” to it. “It still works well enough” the teacher said. (Ch. 7 page 259
Criticisms of Testing: Explains that one big problem that is apparent in all major IQ tests
is that they are culturally bias; they reflect the culture of those that write them.)
While she was there Hania decided to talk with the teacher a bit about how the
class was going. As she talked about it the teacher mentioned how they were using
talking, listening and reading to develop reading skills rather than memorization of rules,
sounds, etc. (Ch 7 page 254. Whole-language approach: Uses all language skills
[talking, listening, reading and writing] to teach and develop reading. Contrary to the
Phonics approach which focuses on sounds of letters and letter combinations and using
that as a base.)
Years passed and Aamina continued to do well in school and socially as well.
She continued to be someone popular at her school and was known to be a good kid
that still knew how to have fun. As her eighth birthday approached she started talking to
her mom about the kind of party she wanted. The party was planned and some kids
were invited from school. It wasn’t anything big but it was fun.
During the party a girl from school walked by Aamina and bumped into her on
purpose because she had always been jealous of Aamina’s popularity. Aamina just
assumed it was an accident and thought nothing of it. Some of the girls that saw it
however got a little anxious for a little while and a few pulled away from the party a bit
for a little while, but came back quickly because of some sweets. (Ch. 8 page 273, 293.
Effortful Control/Social Cognition: Social cognition is the ability to understand social
interactions including causes and consequences. It tends to develop hand in hand with
Effortful Control which is the ability to regulate one’s emotions through effort, not just
inclination. The two develop kids to have fewer emotional problems. This leads wellliked children to “shrug off” social slights and attribute them to mere accident, thus
avoiding, anger fear, etc.)
Later at school her friends told Aamina about what had really happened. She
decided to no longer be friends with the girl who had bumped her. When Hania heard
this she asked her why she was going to do that.
“I have to, it’s just what happens, mom!” She replied. “Everyone else would do
the same thing.” (Ch 8 page 300, Conventional moral reasoning: Kohlberg’s second
level of reasoning, emphasizing social rules. Though possibly silly to us the rules for
kids social life exist as well. They follow them just like we do ours.