Early childhood education and development

2010

2010-05-21-WP-Stein-child-care-problems-last

Study finds that effects of low-quality child care last into adolescence
By Rob Stein
Washington Post, 2010-05-21

[1]
Low-quality care in the first few years of life
can have a small but long-lasting impact
on a child’s learning and behavior,
according to new results from the largest, most authoritative assessment
of child rearing in the United States.

[2]
The federally funded study,
which has been tracking more than 1,300 children since 1991,
found that
obedience and academic problems
among those who received low-quality care in their first 4 1/2 years of life
persisted through their 15th birthdays,
suggesting the potential for lifelong difficulties.

[3]
The differences between teens who received low- and high-quality care
when they were very young were relatively small,
and the endurance of these disparities startled researchers.

[4]
“The fact that you have this persistent association is pretty remarkable,”
[Just why is it remarkable, Doctor?
Anyone with half an ounce of sense
remembers the old saying
“As the tree is bent, so it grows.”]
said James A. Griffin of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development,
which is funding the research being reported Friday
in the May-June issue of the journal Child Development.

[5]
Several experts praised the findings,
saying they underscore the urgent need
for local, state and federal governments, employers and others
to improve access to high-quality child care.

[Uh, there is another interpretation.
This only underscores
the problems that working mothers inflict on their defenseless children,
about which such a large part of the female/journalist/academic community
has been in denial.
And yes, Jay Belsky was one of the investigators.]

[6]

“I think it is shocking that
we don’t have a much higher proportion of our children . . .
in excellent, quality child care,”

said Sharon Landesman Ramey,
director of the Georgetown University Center on Health and Education.

[7]
For the study, which began in 1991 amid growing concerns
about the effects of parents’ increasing reliance on outside child care,
researchers in Arkansas, California, Kansas, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin
followed 1,364 infants
of various ethnicities, races and socioeconomic backgrounds.

[8]
The researchers collected detailed information
about the type and quality of care the children were receiving
through age 4 1/2 ,
including whether their custodians were
parents, other relatives, nannies, babysitters
or day-care centers in or outside a home,
as well as the number of hours of which kind of care each child received.
The subjects underwent tests assessing their academic and cognitive skills,
and parents and teachers answered questionnaires about each child’s behavior.
The quality was assessed based on observations of a host of factors,
including the caregivers’ warmth, sensitivity, emotional support
and how much cognitive stimulation they provided.

[9]
The researchers previously reported that
toddlers who received higher-quality care
had fewer behavior problems than those receiving lower-quality care.
The type of care, whether it was inside or outside the home,
did not seem to matter,
although day-care centers appeared to be related to
more acting out among first- and third-graders.
Kids who received high-quality care scored better
on tests measuring math, reading and other cognitive skills
throughout elementary school.

[10]
Researchers had speculated that
the negative effects of lower-quality care would disappear
as the influence of other factors, such as peers, teachers and maturation,
overcame the early childhood experience.

[You know, it’s fascinating that
it is quite acceptable in “elite” circles
to speculate that, maybe, hopefully,
feminism will have no ill effects on our children and our society,
and to condition and predicate all social policies on that assumption,
but that those who suggest just the opposite,
that feminism will and has had
dreadful effects on the areas just mentioned
are challenged and required,
by the same people who accept speculation on pro-feminist theories,
to provide iron-clad, unimpeachable proof for any anti-feminist assertions.]

But in the latest analysis of the data,
they discovered that teenagers who had received higher-quality child care
were less likely to report engaging in problem behaviors
such as arguing, being mean to others and getting into fights.
Those who spent more hours in child care of any kind
were more likely to engage in impulsive and risky behaviors.
And those who received moderately high- or high-quality care
scored higher on tests gauging cognitive and academic achievement.

[11]
“What was the surprise for us was that the effects at age 15
were the same size as we had seen in elementary school
and just prior to school entry,”
said Deborah Lowe Vandell of the University of California at Irvine,
who led the analysis.
The researchers stressed that the benefits of higher-quality care were modest --
a difference of just a few points on standardized tests
measuring reading, math, memory and other cognitive abilities,
and self-reports of behavioral problems.
Other factors, such as the influence of parents and family members,
were clearly more important.
However, the findings held true even after the researchers
took those and other factors into account.

[12]
The researchers plan to continue following the children.

[13]
“The likelihood is these can affect children throughout their lives,
and not just low-income children,”
said Ellen Galinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute,
a nonprofit research center.