Early Influences Shaping The Individual

332 Pages·1989·7.851 MB·English

by  Spyros Doxiadis (auth.), Spyros Doxiadis, Susie Stewart (eds.)

Early Influences
Shaping The
Individual
NATO ASI Series
Advanced Science Institutes Series
A series presenting the results of activities sponsored by the NATO Science Committee,
which aims at the dissemination of advanced scientific and technological knowledge,
with a view to strengthening links between scientific communities.
The series is published by an international board of publishers in conjunction with the
NATO Scientific Affairs Division
A Life Sciences Plenum Publishing Corporation
B Physics New York and London
C Mathematical Kluwer Academic Publishers
and Physical Sciences Dordrecht, Boston, and London
o Behavioral and Social Sciences
E Applied Sciences
F Computer and Systems Sciences Springer-Verlag
G Ecological Sciences Berlin, Heidelberg, New York, London,
H Cell Biology Paris, and Tokyo
Recent Volumes in this Series
Volume 157-Plasma Membrane Oxidoreductases in Control of
Animal and Plant Growth
edited by Frederick L. Crane, D. James Morra, and Hans Low
Volume 158-Biocompatibility of Co-Cr-Ni Alloys
edited by Hartmut F. Hildebrand and Maxime Champy
Volume 159-Biologically Based Methods for Cancer Risk Assessment
edited by Curtis C. Travis
Volume 160-Early Influences Shaping the Individual
edited by Spyros Doxiadis
Volume 161-Research in Congenital Hypothyroidism
edited by F. Delange, D. A. Fisher, and D. Glinoer
Volume 162-Nematode Identification and Expert System Technology
edited by Renaud Fortuner
Volume 163-Leishmaniasis: The Current Status and New Strategies for Control
edited by D. T. Hart
Series A: Life Sciences
Early Influences
Shaping The
Individual
Edited by
Spyros Doxiadis
Foundation for Research in Childhood
Athens, Greece
Technical Editor
Susie Stewart
Plenum Press
New York and London
Published in cooperation with NATO Scientific Affairs Division
Proceedings of alllATO Advanced Re'search Workshop on
Early Influences Shaping the Individual,
held January 20-24, 1988,
in Athens Greece
l
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
NATO Advanced Research Workshop on Early Influences Shaping the Individual
(1988: Athens, Greece)
Early influences shaping the individual I edited by Spyros Doxiadis; technical
editor, Susie Stewart.
p. cm.-(NATO ASI series. Series A, Life sciences; vol. 160)
Proceedings of a NATO Advanced Research Workshop on Early Influences
Shaping the Individual, held January 20-24,1988, in Athens, Greece.
Includes biblioQraphical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-4684-5636-3 e-ISBN-13: 978-1-4684-5634-9
001: 10.1007/978-1-4684-5634-9
1. Child development-Congres!>es.. 2. Prenatal influences-Congresses. I.
Doxiadis, Spyros. II. Title. III. Series: NATO ASI series. Series A, Life sciences;
v.160.
RJ131.N324 89·3563
155.4-dc19 CIP
© 1989 Plenum Press, New York
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1s t edition 1 989
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233 Spring Street, New York, N.Y. 10013
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted
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EARLY INFLUENCES SHAPING THE INDIVIDUAL
Your children are not your. children.
They are the sons an4 daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but. not from you,
And though they are with yo'u yet. they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
(From The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran)
v
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
On behalf of the Foundation for Research in Childhood I would like to
thank NATO Science Council for its generous support and Bebelac Hellas, S
and E and A Metaxa, and Ioniki Insurance Company for assistance with the
social programme. Thanks are also due to Christos Bartsocas, Thalia
Dragona, and Dimitra Makrynioti who, as members of the Planning Committee,
helped with the organization of the Advanced Research Workshop, to Anny
Zahopoulou and Anna Frantzi for their administrative and secretarial
help, to Andrew Kamoudis who recorded the contributions, and to Anne
Etheridge and Melanie Lang of Craigie Hall Business Centre in Glasgow who
produced the final manuscript. Without the experience and hard work of
our Technical Editor, Susie Stewart, the book would not have been
published and we are all greatly indebted to her. Finally sincere thanks
to all participants, some of them from far-off countries, for their
willingness to present papers and contribute their knowledge and expertise
to this project.
Spyros Doxiadis
Athens
July 1988
~i
CONTENTS
Prologue 1
1. Concepts of Children and their Development in
Greek History ..... . 5
S. Doxiadis
2. Trying to Understand Development . . . . . • . . . . • . . . 15
R.S. Illingworth
3. Advances in Genetic Prediction and Diagnosis . • . . . • . . 23
M. Pembrey
4. Genetics and the Development of Behavior . . . . . . . . . . 37
P. McGuffin
5. Interaction between Technical and Social Developments
in Human Genetics 55
H. Galjaard
6. Developmental Behavioral Genetic Research on Infant
Information Processing: Detection of Contuinuity
and Change .........•..•..•... 67
Lee A. Thompson
7. On Change of Children and Childhood 85
J. Qvortrup
8. Social Theorizing and the Child: Constraints and
Possibilities •.. . . • • . . • . . 93
C. Jenks
9. Divided Denmark: A Convoy in Disintegration 103
J. Blum
10. Illegitimate Births: Do They Suffer in the Long Term? . .• III
J. Golding
11. Intrauterine Growth Retardation in Developing and
Developed Countried 123
C.A. Canosa and F.M. Sopena
12. Intrauterine Influences Related to the 2-5 Postnatal
Years' Growth Period . . . . . . . . • 155
F. Falkner
ix
13. Care of High-Risk Newborns Today: Advanced Medical
Technology and Quality of Life • • • • 163
U. de Vonderweid and S. Nordio
14. Maternal Stress During Pregnancy and the Behavior
of the Offspring • . • • • 175
M.O. Huttunen
15. Maternal Depression and its Impact on Early Child
Development • • . • • • • 183
16. Development of Infants "At Risk" and Psychosocial
Conditions: Results of a Prospective Study 193
G. Neuhauser
17. Development of Self-Regulatory Behavior in Children:
Towards Understanding the Origins of Behavioral
Misadventures •••••••• • • • 207
L.P. Lipsitt
18. Parental Attitudes in Childhood and Development of
Psychological Problems in Adolescence 217
A. Eksi
19. Psychosocial Risk Trajectories and Beneficial
Turning Points • • • •• •••••• 229
M. Rutter
20. Influence of Care and Development in Infancy on Health
and Educational Progress in Later Life •••• 241
M.E.J. Wadsworth
21. Prediction of Child Competence from Maternal Beliefs
and Behaviors During Infancy • • • • . • • • • 257
E.S. Schaefer
22. Genetic and Environmental Influences on Temperamental
Development: Longitudinal Study of Twins From
Infancy to Adolescence ••••••.••.•• 269
A.M. Torgersen
23. Constitutional Aspects of Personality Beginning in
Childhood: Schizoid Personality Disorder
(Asperger's Syndrome) •.••••••••. 283
S. Wolf
24. Early Interventions and Pediatric Practice . • • 299
J.C. Gomes Pedro, M. Benedita Monteiro,
A. Carvalho, Madelena Patricio, F. Torgal
Garcia, I. Fiadeiro, and M. Lourdes Levy
Epilogue 319
List of Participants 321
Index 329
x
PROLOGUE
Spyros Doxiadis
Many wonders there are,
and yet none is more wonderful than man.
(From Antigone by Sophocles)
Among the questions most frequently addressed by parents to a
pediatrician are the following. Why is my child not developing physically
or mentally as other children? Why, although intelligent, is he not doing
well at school? Why is he on the go all the time? Why can he not
concentrate? Why does he seem so aggressive? For adolescents the
questions tend to centre on drug-taking, alcohol abuse and smoking habits.
The pediatrician in the hours of inner searching and contemplation
repeats the same questions to himself. He tries to find answers in the
literature. Sometimes he is satisfied, more often not. And if he is
philosophically minded his questions go deeper. He wonders who determines
the fate of an individual? Is it blind chance? Is it some other power?
Is it purely his family, his microcosm or his social group, his macrocosm?
How far are heredity or the intrauterine environment or the mother's
mental condition during pregnancy and infancy responsible? And with the
questions on lifestyle, can the pediatrician as a doctor do something
about it? Or what right has he to interfere in a child's development as a
moral agent or as a concerned citizen?
All these questions have been turning over in my mind for a long time.
In my younger years the strictly clinical were more prominent: how to
answer the parents' questions and how to help a particular child. And
with advancing years and less pressure to find immediate answers, with
more involvement in wider issues, with more responsibility in policy
planning, the more theoretical questions came to the foreground - why the
differences between individuals, why some face life in a courageous way,
why happiness for some and misery for others living under the same
conditions? And perhaps all these enquiries and doubts can be summarized
in general thus - why are we what we are? what makes us the sort of
people we are? what can we do to make children, adolescents, adults
happier?
To some of these questions there are partial answers but so many
remain unanswered that I felt it was worth the effort to gather in Athens
experts in the field of human development from many countries and from
many disciplines to take part in an Advanced Research Workshop on "Early
Influences Shaping the Individual".
I asked the main contributors to present their views on this subject,
based partly on published reports in their field but mainly on their own
work. Furthermore I hoped that the discussions among representatives of
five main disciplines involved in the study of children would produce some
motivation for new studies. Sixty experts in the fields of genetics,
pediatrics, child psychology, child psychiatry, and sociology were
invited. Twenty-four papers were given at this multidisciplinary
gathering and an extensive discussion followed. This book contains as
separate chapters all lectures given and, with some inevitable editing,
the discussions.
As an introduction I attempted to find and describe in the writings of
ancient Greeks their knowledge but mainly their conceptions and ideas on
the physical and mental development of children in utero and in the early
years of life, and their beliefs as to the factors influencing this
development.
Illingworth follows and, on the basis of his extensive work on
development, expresses his views on the value of psychological and
developmental tests, on the meaning of abnormalities, on the importance of
understanding and respecting differences in the rate of development.
The next four chapters deal with genetic aspects of development.
Pembrey describes recent advances in molecular genetics which have
revolutionized the study of genetic influences in various hereditary
diseases. These advances have made possible carrier detection in many
affected families and prenatal diagnosis during the first trimester of
pregnancy. Galjaard gives a picture of our present understanding of the
molecular basis of genetics and its relationship to rare abnormalities.
He expresses the hope that future advances may enable us to understand
better the genetic elements of intelligence and behavior. McGuffin then
writes on the difficult distinction between the effects of inheritance and
of common family environment and hopes that the "new genetics" will
advance our knowledge on the inheritance of abnormal traits. Lee Thompson
approaches the problems of continuity/discontinuity of development with
the use of behavioral genetic methodology to conclude that continuity of
individual differences is at least partly genetically determined.
The three chapters which follow are based on a sociological approach
to childhood and development. Qvortrup rejects the prevailing view that
children are only marginally members of the adult society into which they
are growing. He proposes that childhood is a permanent and not a
transient popUlation group and it is therefore already integrated into
society. Jenks examines the concept of "development" and suggests that
many and varying forms of discourse, one of them the sociological,
contribute to bring the "child" into being. Blum looks at the current
social framework in Danish society and suggests that changes and the
collapse of norms have had decisive consequences for the conditions of
childhood.
Next Golding presents the results of the British Births Survey on the
influence of illegitimacy on the child and concludes that there is no
indication that this social factor has a long-term adverse effect on
health or development.
The next group of three chapters deal with the effect on the
developing child of intrauterine and neonatal factors. Canosa and Sopena,
with personal experience from both developing and developed countries,
examine the incidence of low birthweight and intrauterine growth
retardation in relation to place of residence and social class. They
2