Infancy and early childhood development

Early Childhood Development A child’s development starts taking place at a very early age and the way child development takes place during early agehas a major impact on their behavior and emotions during later stages in life. During the early stages of life a child needs the support of his family members as well as other caregivers in order to develop social, physical and emotional competence. It is the responsibility of the caretakers to ensure that the child obtain abundant amount of care, consideration, warmth and involvement from the caregivers end in order to develop. Parents are the most important individuals who play a major role in the child’s development and they way a parent treats his/her children shape the development of a child.
Diana Baumrind identified four different forms of parenting styles that are exercised by most of the parents and different parenting styles impact a child’s development in a different manner. One of these parenting styles can be regarded as authoritarian parenting style and parents following this parenting style the parents expect their children to strictly abide by the rules and regulations that have been created for them. If the child does not follow those rules then he/she ends up experiences sanctions which are aimed at disciplining the child. These parents even do not respond very well to the needs of their children. The second form of parenting style is the authoritative parenting style and in this style parents tend to have created certain rules and regulations but these parents are highly involved in their child’s development and are quite responsive. Children belonging to such parents are not sanctioned with punishments if they fail to meet guidelines and parents are even ready to provide explanations for the rules that they have established.
The third parenting style is permissive and parents following this style tend to be responsive to the needs of the children. They do not set rules and allow the child to explore the world on their own and do not try to discipline the child if the child makes mistake and allows the child to differentiate between right and wrong. But they are highly responsive to the concerns of their children and are ready to help them at all times. The last parenting style is uninvolved parenting style but it is not the least. Parents who follow this style tend to alienate themselves from the concerns of their children and only provide for their basic necessities.
The most appropriate form of parenting style seems to be the authoritative parenting style as compared to the other three. This is because authoritative parents tend to provide direction to the children who help children in learning the difference between things that are harmful to them and things that are beneficial for them. Such parents even provide reasons for their guidelines which provide children with the meaning behind different activities. These parents are lenient towards children which allows the children to continue to experience the world around them as parents who are not lenient tend to scare the child and the child does not try to do anything other than what has been dictated to them.