How to understand your child: the psychology of babies

Have you ever noticed how fast children develop? Every day they acquire new knowledge and skills, gradually turning from amusing babies into mature, well-formed individuals. And sometimes they surprise us with their interesting life position, adult view of things, and sincere emotions.

Children go through developmental stages, which are studied by child psychology. Its main task is to identify and explain the peculiarities of a child's behavior that are typical for each age period. Child psychology is a complex and important science.

The discovered patterns allow parents to better understand what is happening in the child's soul, because the term "psychology" in Greek sounds like "psyche" – soul, "logos" – doctrine.

Relations with the outside world

Interaction with the outside world begins before birth and continues throughout life. Psychological processes are especially intense in childhood. During this period, models of behavior and relationships with parents, other children, and grandparents are formed.

"Mother-child" relationship

This relationship is formed during pregnancy. In the womb, it is important for a child to hear his or her mother's calm voice, feel her touch and strokes.

After birth, the psychological bond between mother and child is strengthened. Mom becomes not only a person who cares for, feeds, and protects, but also gradually turns into a role model for a girl and the main source of positive emotions for a boy.

Psychologists recommend mothers:

• Do not concentrate communication with your child around household chores. It should be interesting to talk about any topic and spend time with you at any age.
• Do not lose vigilance, but do not allow hypervigilance.
• Do not transfer your negative life experiences to children.

"Dad–child"

Both parents influence the formation of a child's personality equally, but in different ways. A father's task is to become a role model for a boy and a protector for a girl, to instill moral principles, and to provide a sense of stability, integrity, and value to the family.

In the first years of life, a child believes that dad is someone cheerful and reckless who can throw a ball to the ceiling or make a funny face. The role of a "holiday man" at this time is convenient and enjoyable for both the parent and the child.

In the process of growing up, the role of the father changes. For a boy, he becomes a kind of "guide" to the world of men, and for a girl, he becomes the first spiritually close person of the other sex.

It is important for a father to build close communication with his child, but not to forget about his educational role. He should maintain a balance of severity and affection, control and trust, restrictions and rewards.

"Relatives are a child"

Grandparents, aunts and uncles help children develop behavioral models in society. Thanks to communication with adult relatives, a child's horizons expand, he or she learns to build relationships with other people, and realizes his or her role and place in the family.

It is important that relatives who are in frequent contact with the child understand their responsibility in shaping his or her personality and that their rules of upbringing do not contradict those of the parents.

"The child - other children"

Communication with other children helps a child learn to

• build friendships in a team;
• share their own life experience and perceive the experience of others;
• resolve conflict situations, resist aggression, and protect other children;
• respect different life positions and opinions.

Children aged 1-3 years do not divide other children by age. They are equally happy to play with the same age as their peers and with older children. Having grown up a bit (4-5 years old), they begin to actively interact with their peers, strive to get hold of the same toy, fight for leadership in the company, and the attention of adults. A social structure appears in their games, which gradually becomes more complex. By the age of 5-6, children prefer collective games to individual ones.

Young children are constantly making new friends, and the period of friendship between them is short. With age, these ties become more permanent. Social connections play an important role in a child's psychology.

Parents should help to form a child's social circle. Hobbies, sports, and extracurricular activities can be unifying factors.

Speech development

Conscious speech is formed by the age of two. At first, it has an extremely simplified structure. The child uses 2-3 words to describe his or her desires and needs.

By the age of five, the structure of spoken language is almost completely the same as that of adults. Children imitate their parents' intonations and often use their expressions. Therefore, it is important for parents to pay attention to the purity of their own speech, to avoid slang, dialectisms, and profanity. The more beautifully you speak, the more beautifully your child will speak.

Intellectual development

The process of developing a child's intelligence was described by the Swiss scientist J. Piaget. He identified four successive stages:

• Sensorimotor. It coincides with the period of infancy. The child learns to coordinate the information received from various senses, follows objects, tries to reach and grab them, i.e. the volume of voluntary motor skills increases.
• Preoperational thinking. Accumulation of knowledge about the world around. The child does not yet express his/her needs in words, but tries to do so with behavioral reactions.
• Specific operations. Speech, problem-solving abilities, and logic are developing rapidly. The child acquires knowledge of space and time, quantitative indicators. This stage begins around the age of six and lasts for 3-4 years.
• Formal operations. The child is able to understand cause and effect relationships and formulate his or her own hypotheses.

The duration of the stages of intellectual development is individual. Therefore, parents, on the one hand, need to monitor the timeliness of the child's acquisition of intellectual skills. And on the other hand, they should not panic if they are behind.

Development of feelings

Experts distinguish 2 types of feelings:

• Basic - manifested immediately after birth. With their help, the baby reacts to changes in the environment, expresses attitudes towards loved ones.
• Acquired feelings are more complex feelings: friendship, love, gratitude, fear, and resentment. They are formed under the influence of the behavior and values instilled by parents, as well as on the basis of information from the world around us.

The development of feelings forms the concept of a child's emotional intelligence. Is he able to recognize the emotions of other people and empathize with them? The combination of positive and negative feelings forms the concept of morality.

Parents should explain to their children the emotions they feel but do not yet realize. And also teach them how to manage them – to control them, express them appropriately, and choose the form of manifestation.

10 tips on how to understand a child

1. A newborn informs parents about their desires and feelings by crying. After a couple of weeks, you can learn to distinguish between "hungry" crying and crying when you are overstimulated. A schedule of meals, walks, and sleep will help. Is the baby crying? Look at the clock and you will understand why.
2. A child's whims are not always the result of disobedience. At a tender age, children are just learning how to behave in society and do not always react correctly to external stimuli. Is the child crying loudly in the store? Do not rush to scold him. He may be tired, scared, or hot. Your first reaction should be to try to understand the cause of the problem, and only then to start fixing it.
3. Respect the child's wishes from the first years of his life. Instead of scolding a fidgety child, accept his or her active thirst for learning about the world around them and make these journeys safe.
4. Teach your child to express their thoughts as accurately as possible. Instead of "I'm bored," say "let's go for a walk," instead of "I don't like school," say "I don't like math." If you get accurate information from your child, you will be able to respond to it properly.
5. Use art therapy. The technique will help diagnose the child's psycho-emotional background, teach them to express feelings, and correct problems. An ordinary drawing of a child will tell you about his or her psychological state. A specialist practicing art therapy will help with the interpretation.
6. Listening is not the same as hearing. Parents sometimes listen to their children half-heartedly, and this is a mistake. His stories about games, friends, and events at school, in addition to the obvious meaning, can reveal the nuances of behavior, hidden emotions.
7. Keep your finger on the pulse. Be interested not only in the child's personality but also in his or her social roles. Communicate with the parents of his friends, and monitor the situation at school. This way, you can find out about problems before the child tells you about them.
8. Build trusting relationships. The better you do this, the easier it will be for you and your child to get through the difficult period of adolescence.
9. Develop your child's emotional intelligence. A person who is able to sensitively recognize the emotions and motives of other people usually has no problems expressing their own feelings.
10. If you want to understand your child, understand yourself. Ross Campbell, an American professor of clinical pediatrics, writes in his book How to Understand a Child: "It is extremely important for both parents to be able to take an honest look at themselves and evaluate themselves, to have a correct picture of themselves. Parents need to respect themselves so that their children can develop the same attitude toward themselves. They have to love themselves, only then can they love their children with the unconditional love that is so necessary for their development."

Parents' knowledge of child psychology will help them to cope with the difficulties of parenting more easily. Learning to understand your child is not an easy process, but it is within the power of each of us. Maximum attention, trusting relationships, consistency of actions, and moderation in reactions are the main principles of achieving mutual understanding between parents and children. May you succeed!