Chapterer 8 Child Development
Sleep problems part 1-
"Children can experience a number of sleep problems (Caldwell & Redeker, 2015; El-Sheikh, Hinnant, & Philbrook, 2017; Palermo, 2014). One estimate indicates that more than 40 percent of children experience a sleep problem at some point in their development (Boyle & Cropley, 2004). The following research studies indicate links between children's sleep and their developmental outcomes:
"Preventing Childhood Injuries
"Contexts of Young Children's Health Among the contexts affecting young children's health are poverty and ethnicity, home and child care, environmental tobacco smoke, and exposure to lead. In addition to discussing these issues, we will discuss the state of illness and health in the world's children.Poverty and Ethnicity Low income is linked with poor healthPage 238 in young children (Hughes & others, 2017; Lin & Seo, 2017). Many health problems of young children in poverty begin before birth when their mothers receive little or no health care, which can produce a low birth weight child and other complications that may continue to affect the child years later (Sadovsky & others, 2016). Children living in poverty may experience unsanitary conditions, live in crowded housing, and be inadequately supervised (Doob, 2013; Pelissari & Diaz-Quijano, 2017). Children in poverty are more likely to be exposed to lead poisoning than children growing up in higher socioeconomic conditions (Morrissey-Ross, 2000). The families of many children in poverty do not have adequate medical insurance, and thus the children often receive less adequate medical care than do children living in higher socioeconomic conditions (Black & others, 2017).Ethnicity is also linked to children's health (Black & others, 2017). For example, one study found that even when socioeconomic status was controlled, Latino, African American, and Asian American children were less likely to have had a usual health-care source, health professional, doctor visit, and dental visit in the past year (Shi & Stevens, 2005). Another study revealed that children whose parents had limited English proficiency were three times more likely to have fair or poor health status than their English-proficient counterparts (Flores, Abreu, & Tomany-Korman, 2005).Safety at Home and in Child Care Caregivers—whether they are parents at home or teachers and supervisors in child care—play an important role in protecting the health of young children (Sorte, Daeschel, & Amador, 2017). For example, by controlling the speed of the vehicles they drive, by decreasing or eliminating their drinking—especially before driving—and by not smoking around children, caregivers enhance the likelihood that children will be healthy (Tinsley, 2003).Young children may lack the intellectual skills—including reading ability—to discriminate between safe and unsafe household substances. And they may lack the impulse control to keep from running out into a busy street while chasing a ball. In these and many other situations, competent adult supervision and monitoring of young children are important to prevent injuries. In communicating with young children, caregivers need to make sure that the information they give to children is cognitively simple. And an important strategy is that parents guide children in learning how to control and regulate their own health behavior.Parents also should invest effort in finding a competent health-care provider for their children. This "includes consulting sources of information and asking questions likely to provide useful information about practice characteristics that may affect the parent-doctor relationship. Parents, for example, might seek information concerning a physician's willingness to answer questions and involve parents in decision making or at least to outline options. Parents might also inquire about the physician's style of practice and philosophies about treatment, behavior management, nutrition, and other general health maintenance practices" (Hickson & Clayton, 2002, p. 456). To read about Barbara Deloian, a pediatric nurse who promotes positive parent-child experiences and helps create positive links between families and the health-care system, see the Connecting with Careers profile that follows."
Energy needs-
"Energy Needs Feeding and eating habits are important aspects of development during early childhood (Blake, 2017; Sorte, Daeschel, & Amador, 2017; Wardlaw, Smith, & Collene, 2018). What children eat affects their skeletal growth, body shape, and susceptibility to disease. The preschool child requires up to 1,800 calories per day. Figure 9 shows the increasing energy needs of children as they move from infancy through the childhood years. Energy needs of individual children of the same age, sex, and size vary. However, an increasing number of children have an energy intake that exceeds what they need (Blake, 2017). A recommendation by the World Health Organization is that on average for children 7 years of age and younger, boys should have an 18 percent, and girls a 20 percent, reduction in energy intake (Butte, 2006)."
Figure description-
"Following young children's scribbles (Figure 8a) is the placement stage, Kellogg's term for 2- to 3-year-olds' drawings, drawn on a page in placement patterns. One example of these patterns is the spaced border pattern shown in Figure 8b. "" shape stage is Kellogg's term for 3-year-olds' drawings consisting of diagrams in different shapes (see Figure 8c). Young children draw six basic shapes: circles, squares or rectangles, triangles, crosses, Xs, and forms""The pictorial stage is Kellogg's term for 4- to 5-year-olds' drawings that consist of objects that adults can recognize (see Figure 8e)."
Myelination-
"Some of the brain's increase in size also is due to the increase in myelination, in which nerve cells are covered and insulated with a layer of fat cells (see Figure 3). This has the effect of increasing the speed and efficiency of information traveling through the nervous system. Myelination is important in the development of a number of abilities in children and adolescents (Cercignani & others, 2017). For example, myelination in the areas of the brain related to hand-eye coordination is not complete until about 4 years of age. One fMRI study of children (mean age: 4 years) found that children with developmental delays of motor and cognitive milestones had significantly reduced levels of myelination (Pujol & others, 2004). Myelination in the areas of the brain related to focusing attention is not complete until the end of middle childhood or later."
"Diet, Eating Behavior, and Parental Feeding Styles
A national study found that from the late 1970s through the late 1990s, several dietary shifts took place in U.S. children: greater away-from-home consumption; large increases in total energy from salty snacks, soft drinks, and pizza; and large decreases in energy from low- and medium-fat milk and medium- and high-fat beef and pork (Nielsen, Siega-Riz, & Popkin, 2002). These dietary changes occurred for children as young as 2 years of age through the adult years.A national study revealed that 45 percent of children's meals exceed recommendations for saturated and trans fat, which can raise cholesterol levels and increase the risk of heart disease (Center for Science in the Public Interest, 2008). In addition, this study found that one-third of children's daily caloric intake comes from restaurants, twice the percentage consumed away from home in the 1980s. Nearly all of the available children's meals at KFC, Taco Bell, Sonic, Jack in the Box, and Chick-fil-A were too high in calories. A recent study of 2- and 3-year-olds found that French fries and other fried potatoes were the vegetable they were most likely to consume (Fox & others, 2010).
"Fat and Sugar Consumption
Although some health-conscious parents may be providing too little fat in their infants' and children's diets, other parents are raising their children on diets in which the percentage of fat is far too high (Blake, 2017). Too many young children already have developed a pattern of not eating enough fruits and vegetables, a pattern that can have negative consequences later in development. For example, a recent study revealed that 2½-year-old children's liking for fruits and vegetables was related to their eating more fruits and vegetables at 7 years of age (Fletcher & others, 2017)."
"Fine Motor Skills
At 3 years of age, children show a more mature ability to place and handle things than they did when they were infants. Although for some time they have had the ability to pick up the tiniest objects between their thumb and forefinger, they are still somewhat clumsy at it. Three-year-olds can build surprisingly high block towers, each block placed with intense concentration but often not in a completely straight line. When 3-year-olds play with a simple jigsaw puzzle, they are rather rough in placing the pieces. Even when they recognize the location a piece fits into, they are not very precise in positioning the piece. They often try to force the piece in the location or pat it vigorously."
"Child Art in Context
Claire Golomb (2002, 2008, 2011, 2016) has studied and conducted research on children's art for a number of decades. Golomb especially criticizes views of young children's art that describe it as primitive and a reflection of conceptual immaturity. She argues that children, like all novices, tend to use forms economically, and their comments indicate that their simplified version works. Rather than seeing children's art as reflections of their conceptual immaturity, Golomb (2011, 2016) focuses on the inventive problem solving that goes into creating these drawings."
"Environmental Tobacco Smoke
Estimates indicate that approximately 22 percent of children and adolescents in the United States are exposed to tobacco smoke in the home. An increasing number of studies reach the conclusion that children are at risk for health problems when they live in homes in which a parent smokes (Miyahara & others, 2017; Pugmire, Sweeting, & Moore, 2017). In one study, if the mother smoked, her children were twice as likely to develop respiratory problems (Etzel, 1988). In another study, young children whose fathers smoked at home were more likely to have upper respiratory tract infections than those whose fathers did not smoke at home (Shiva & others, 2004). Children exposed to tobacco smoke in the home are more likely to develop wheezing symptoms and asthma than children in nonsmoking homes (Merianos, Dixon, & Mahabee-Gittens, 2017; Vo & others, 2017). Also, a recent study revealed that maternal cigarette smoking and alcohol consumption when children were 5 years of age were linked to children subsequently engaging in early onset of smoking in adolescence (Hayatbakhsh & others, 2013). And a recent study found that young children who were exposed to environmental tobacco smoke were more likely to engage in antisocial behavior when they were 12 years old (Pagani & others, 2017)."
"Neuronal Changes
In "Prenatal Development" and "Physical Development in Infancy," we discussed the brain's development during the prenatal and infancy periods. Changes in neurons in early childhood involve connections between neurons and myelination, just as in infancy (Juraska & Willing, 2017). Communication in the brain is characterized by the transmission of information between neurons, or nerve cells. Some of the brain's increase in size during early childhood is due to the increase in the number and size of nerve endings and receptors, which allows more effective communication to occur."
"Malnutrition in Young Children from Low-Income Families
Malnutrition continues to be a major threat to millions during the childhood years (Black & others, 2013, 2017; Blake, 2017). Malnutrition and starvation are a daily fact of life for children in many developing countries that have high rates of poverty (UNICEF, 2017). One study revealed that two food-assisted maternal and child health programs (both of which emphasized food provision, communication about behavior change, and preventive health services) helped to reduce the impact of economic hardship on stunting of children's growth in Haiti (Donnegan & others, 2010).A common nutritional problem in early childhood is iron deficiency anemia, which results in chronic fatigue (Lundblad & others, 2017). This problem results from the failure to eat adequate amounts of quality meats and dark green vegetables. Young children from low-income families are most likely to develop iron deficiency anemia (Petry & others, 2017).Some researchers argue that malnutrition is directly linked to cognitive deficits because of negative effects on brain development (Nyaradi & others, 2013). However, an increasing number of researchers conclude that the links between child undernutrition, physical growth, and cognitive development are more complex. For example, nutritional influences can be viewed in the context of socioemotional factors that often coincide with undernutrition. Thus, children who vary considerably from the norm in physical growth also differ on other biological and socioemotional factors that might influence cognitive development. For example, children who are underfed often are also less supervised, less stimulated, and less educated than children who are well nourished. As we discussed earlier, poverty is an especially strong risk factor that interacts with children's nutritional status to affect physical and cognitive development (Black & others, 2013, 2017).Malnutrition may be linked to other aspects of development in addition to cognitive deficits. One longitudinal study found that U.S. children who were malnourished at 3 years of age showed more aggressive and hyperactive behavior at age 8, had more externalizing problems at age 11, and evidenced more excessive motor behavior at age 17 (Liu & others, 2004)."
""Fussy Eaters," Sweets, and Snacks
Many young children get labeled as "fussy" or "difficult eaters" when they are only trying to exercise the same rights to personal taste and appetite that adults take for granted (Dovey & others, 2008). Caregivers should allow for the child's developing tastes in food. However, when young children eat too many sweets—candy bars, cola, and sweetened cereals, for example—they can spoil their appetite and then not want to eat more nutritious foods at mealtime. Thus, caregivers need to be firm in limiting the amount of sweets young children eat."
"Developmental Changes and Stages
The development of fine motor skills in the preschool years allows children to become budding artists. There are dramatic changes in how children depict what they see. Art provides unique insights into children's perceptual worlds—what they are attending to, how space and distance are viewed, how they experience patterns and forms (Bullard, 2014). Rhoda Kellogg is a creative teacher of preschool children who has observed and guided young children's artistic efforts for many decades. She has assembled an impressive array of tens of thousands of drawings produced by more than 2,000 preschool children. Adults who are unfamiliar with young children's art often view the productions of this age group as meaningless scribbles. However, Kellogg (1970) documented that young children's artistic productions are orderly, meaningful, and structured."
"Gross Motor Skills
The preschool child no longer has to make an effort simply to stay upright and to move around. As children move their legs with more confidence and carry themselves more purposefully, moving around in the environment becomes more automatic.
"The Brain and Cognitive Development
The substantial increases in memory and rapid learning that characterize infants and young children are related to cell loss, myelination, and synaptic growth. In a recent study, young children with higher cognitive ability showed increased myelination by 3 years of age (Deoni & others, 2016). Neuroscientists have found that the density of synapses peaks at 4 years of age (Moulson & Nelson, 2008). Some leading cognitive scientists argue that the true episodic memory (memory for the when and where of life's happenings, such as remembering what one had for breakfast this morning) and self-awareness do not develop until about this time (4 years of age) (Craik, 2006). However, recall that some infant development researchers conclude that episodic memory and self-awareness emerge during infancy (Bauer & Leventon, 2015). These aspects of the brain's maturation, combined with opportunities to experience a widening world, contribute to children's emerging cognitive abilities (Bell, Ross, & Patton, 2018). Consider a child who is learning to read and is asked by a teacher to read aloud to the class. Input from the child's eyes is transmitted to the child's brain, then passed through many brain systems, which translate (process) the patterns of black and white into codes for letters, words, and associations. The output occurs in the form of messages to the child's lips and tongue. The child's own gift of speech is possible because brain systems are organized in ways that permit language processing."
"Structural Changes
Until recently, scientists lacked adequate technology to detect sensitive changes and view detailed maps of the developing human brain. However, sophisticated brain-scanning techniques, such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), now allow us to better detect these changes (de Haan & Johnson, 2016). With high-resolution MRI, scientists have evolved spatially complex, four-dimensional growth pattern maps of the developing brain, allowing the brain to be monitored with greater sensitivity than ever before. Using these techniques, scientists have discovered that children's brains undergo dramatic anatomical changes between the ages of 3 and 15 (Thompson & others, 2000). By repeatedly obtaining brain scans of the same children for up to four years, they found that the children's brains experience rapid, distinct spurts of growth. The amount of brain material in some areas can nearly double within as little as a year, followed by a drastic loss of tissue as unneeded cells are purged and the brain continues to reorganize itself. The scientists found that the overall size of the brain did not show dramatic growth in the 3-to-15-year age range. However, what did dramatically change were local patterns within the brain."
"Preventing Childhood Injuries
Young children's active and exploratory nature, coupled with unawareness of danger in many instances, often puts them in situations in which they are at risk for injuries. Most of young children's cuts, bumps, and bruises are minor, but some accidental injuries can produce serious injuries or even death (Taylor & others, 2017).
"Overweight Young Children Being overweight
has become a serious health problem in early childhood (Blake, 2017; Perry & others, 2017; Ward & others, 2017). The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2017) has established categories for obesity, overweight, and at risk for being overweight. These categories are determined by body mass index (BMI), which is computed by a formula that takes into account height and weight. Children and adolescents whose BMI is at or above the 97th percentile are classified as obese; those whose BMI is at or above the 95th percentile are overweight; and those whose BMI is at or above the 85th percentile are at risk of becoming overweight.The percentages of young children who are overweight or at risk of being overweight in the United States have increased dramatically in recent decades, but in the last several years there are indications that fewer preschool children are obese. In 2009-2010, 12.1 percent of U.S. 2- to 5-year-olds were classified as obese, compared with 5 percent in 1976-1980 and 10.4 percent in 2007-2008 (Ogden & others, 2016). However, in 2013-2014, a substantial drop in the obesity rate of 2- to 5-year-old children occurred in comparison with their counterparts in 2003-2004 (Ogden & others, 2016). In 2013-2014, 9.4 percent of 2- to 5-year-olds were obese compared with 14 percent in 2004. It is not clear why this drop occurred, but possible causes include families buying lower-calorie foods and the influence of the Special Supplementation Program for Women, Infants, and Children that subsidizes food for women in low-income families and emphasizes consuming less fruit juice, cheese, and eggs and more whole fruits and vegetables."
" Denver Developmental Screening Test II
is a simple, inexpensive, fast method of diagnosing developmental delays in children from birth through 6 years of age. The test is individually administered and includes separate assessments of gross and fine motor skills, as well as language and personal-social ability (Comuk-Balci & others, 2016; Ribeiro & others, 2017; Rubio-Codina & others, 2016). Among the gross motor skills this test measures are the child's ability to sit, walk, long jump, pedal a tricycle, throw a ball overhand, catch a bounced ball, hop on one foot, and balance on one foot (Yilmaz & others, 2017). Fine motor skills measured by the test include the child's ability to stack cubes, reach for objects, and draw a person."
" Growth hormone deficiency
is the absence or deficiency of growth hormone produced by the pituitary gland to stimulate the body to grow."