Predictable and consistent parenting - why is this important for brain development?

We all know that experiences in our early lives play a role in shaping how our brains mature and how we act in adulthood. But, as Tallie Baram (writing for The Conversation) points out, scientists are struggling to find out why this happens.

In a study, recently published, Tallie’s team found that unpredictable or inconsistent parental behaviour can disrupt the development of a child’s emotional brain circuits. This can lead to an increased risk of mental illness and substance abuse later on in the child’s life.

Predictability and consistency

To work out what experiences or ‘signals’ affect how the brain’s emotional systems develop, the researchers took cues from how the brain’s sensory systems, like vision and hearing, develop. Environmental signals are important to sensory development. For example, if an infant is unable to see adequately because of a severe lazy eye, they may develop lifelong vision deficits. Similarly, an infant who is unable to make out the patterns and sequences of everyday sound due to frequent ear infections may develop lifelong hearing problems.

Because parents are often the primary source of the information an infant and young children receives from their environment, they thought it would be reasonable to assume that parental signals would be crucial to brain development. Previous research over the decades have found that a caretaker’s behaviours and how responsive they were to their child’s needs were important to the child’s emotional growth. An absence of responses, such as from neglect, was associated with increased risk for emotional problems later in life.

While many studies have focused on the effects of “positive” or “negative” parental behaviours on child brain development, researchers have paid little attention to patterns of behaviour, or a parent’s predictability and consistency. A parent who is predictable and consistent is one who reacts to new situations, such as when their child has a mild fall or asks for a new toy, in the same way. In the long term, predictability also means that a child knows who will pick them up from school and when they can expect lunch, dinner or bedtime.

Attachment theory posits that a strong bond with a primary caregiver early in life is critical to child development.

Across all studies, which included animals and humans, the results showed that predictable parental behaviour patterns led to better emotional and cognitive functioning in their children later in life. While our studies have focused primarily on mothers, it is very likely that the same principles apply to fathers as well.

The findings suggest it’s not just “positive” or “negative” parenting that affects a child’s development. It’s just as important for a child’s emotional brain development that their parents nurture them in predictable and consistent ways.

There are many adversities beyond a parent’s control that can impact their developing a child, such as poverty, traumatic events and war. However, being aware of the role that predictable and consistent behaviour plays in brain development can help parents create an optimal environment for their child as they grow emotionally.

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Martin Doherty, writing for The Conversation, says that at the age of about four, children reach important milestones in brain development.

One of these is a huge improvement in understanding others’ thoughts and feelings. This is the start of empathy. Another is in spatial thinking—understanding how objects are positioned and related. This is the beginning of the ability to read maps.

Martin and his colleague, Catherine Sayer, conducted a study with 175 two to five-year-olds to explore how children are able to use scale models to figure out where something is in the real world. At about four, children are able to use a scale model of a room to work out where something is. We thought that this might result from children’s understanding of how one thing can represent something else. But we actually found that four-year-olds’ ability to use scale models came from their spatial abilities.

At the same age, children start to understand that someone’s behaviour is due to what that person believes, not necessarily what is really the case. This has interesting consequences.

If you’ve played hide-and-seek with young children, you may have noticed that they aren’t always very good at it. They love the ritual of looking in all the wrong places first, but beforehand they may tell you where they are going to hide, hide in the same place every time, or not be especially hidden.

After their fourth birthday, they get much better at hide and seek. They understand that the seeker looks in the wrong places because they don’t know where the hider is.

At about three to four children also start to tell lies. They realize they can make someone believe something that isn’t true.

Understanding symbols

Martin’s earlier research with fellow psychologist Josef Perner suggests that four-year-olds don’t just start to understand how others’ minds work. Figuring this out is part of the development of an understanding of “representation”—that symbols, like thoughts, words, or pictures, can be used to stand for something else.

Children start to think about how words relate to objects. This means, for instance, knowing that “animal” can refer to something you already have a name for, such as “rabbit”. This might help children learn the new word.

Their ability to use a understand the components of pictures also improves around this age. Very young children use a lot of trial and error to complete a jigsaw, picking up random pieces to see if they fit. By the time they are about four years old, they start to use the picture as a guide, trying to connect lines and match bits of colour, while checking the guide picture on the box lid.

Developmental experiments

Another ability children develop at around four is using scale models. A classic set of developmental experiments involved a model of a regular household room. The real room had typical furniture—sofa, table, cupboard and so on—and the model had miniature versions laid out in the same way.

Children were shown where something was hidden in the model and told to find an object hidden in “the same place” in the room. Children of around four can find the object using the identical layouts. If shown a sticker under a particular chair in the model room, for example, they can go straight to the “same” chair in the other room. This is the fundamental understanding required to read maps.

Adults see scale models and maps as representations. Maps represent a town or a country. A scale model of, say, the Eiffel Tower represents the real thing. At first, Martin suspected children’s ability to use scale models is more evidence of understanding representation at this age.

He was wrong. Instead, the researchers found that this ability is based on a development in children’s spatial abilities that also occurs at about four. This is the ability to think about spaces and where objects are within them. Spatial abilities help with maths skills, and good spatial ability is linked to an interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Their experiment was simple. They compared the model room task with a test of understanding how representation works. The two abilities develop around the same age, but they found they were not related. Children who could do one task couldn’t necessarily do the other.

They also had a test of purely spatial ability. Children who passed the model room task also passed the spatial task. So it looks like the model room task relied on children‘s spatial thinking.

They don’t yet know why two important but apparently unrelated abilities arise at the same time. Perhaps it’s related to changes in the growing brain at this interesting age.

Provided by The Conversation.

Image supplied by Freepik.