Day Care Observation Paper

Adam Bengtson
Paper 1
Psych 301
9/25/14

Schwartz (1983) investigated how length of day-care attendance correlated to attachment behavior in eighteen-month-old infants. Schwartz’s study set out to determine the differences in attachment behavior of eighteen-month-old infants in relation to their length of day-care attendance or lack of attendance. This study specifically focuses on eighteen-month-old infants from middle-class families where all of the infants had been placed into full time day-care before the age of 9 months, part time day-care or if they attended no day-care at all.
In conducting this study Schwartz observed fifty 18-month-old infants and their mothers in order to see the effects of daily separation the between the mothers

and their children. These infants and their mothers were observed twice. Once they were observed in their normal home environment and then once again in the laboratory setting. Based on the recorded results of these sessions they were then separated into one of three categories. These categories were dependent on if the infant attended a full time day-care, part time day-care or if they attended no day-care at all. During these two sessions Schwartz recorded the strength and persistence of behaviors that included contact seeking and maintenance, proximity avoidance, and contact resistance.
In the home environment Schwartz recorded that there were no major differences of behavior between the infants who attended full time day-care, part time day-care, or attended no day-care. However, it is noted that the mothers with infants that attended full time or part time day-care showed a more positive and a more affectionate behavior toward their child in comparison to those mothers that did not have their child in day-care. In the other setting, the laboratory, infants who attended a full time day-care showed an increase in avoidance behavior in comparison to infants that attended part time day-care or no day-care. The attachment behavior between the infants and their mother does appear to be influenced by the separation and amount of time and the infant spends at day-care.
Schuetze, Lewis, and DiMartino (1999) studied the relation between time spent in day-care and exploratory behaviors in 9-month-old infants. For this experiment Scheutze, Lewis, and DiMartino studied 32 healthy full-term nine-month-old infants; five of these infants had previously not been enrolled in a daycare. 18 of subjects were boys and the other 14 girls. These subjects were found through word-of-mouth among three local daycare centers.
Testing for this study was conducted in two areas. For those enrolled in day-care, testing was done in a quite, familiar area. For the infants in home-based care the research was done in a laboratory setting. At all times of the testing a known caregiver was present with the infant. Once the infant had time to familiarize with their testing environment, different measures of exploratory behaviors were then attained. These test included how the infant chose to free play with toys having no contact with the caregiver, other than encouraging statements. Other test also included simple problem-solving measures.
Scheutze, Lewis, and DiMartino found that the amount of time an infant spends in day-care leads to more frequent and varied exploratory behaviors and a higher success of problem-solving abilities. The amount of time spent in day-care lead to the possibility of increasing motivation and development of exploratory strategies among other developments, where as the infants not enrolled in day-care showed a decline in these behaviors. These results were all dependent on the quality of care provided within the day-care.
Belsky, Burchinalm, Clarke-Stewart, McCartney, Owen, and Vandell (2007) are researching if there are any long-term effects of early child-care. For this study Belsky et al. selected 1,364 families with 1-month-old infants to become the participants. Of these participants some withdrew, most had some missing data, and only 293 of the children had complete data recorded for all predictors and outcomes in any analysis. In this study the children’s experiences in child care before entry into school, for school and after-school experiences, and the child’s outcomes for social and cognitive behaviors were described.
Observational assessments were conducted in specific periods throughout the child’s life in order to show the effects of early child-care. Observing the child-care type and quality. The results of this study infer that the stronger and more consistent predictor of the children’s development was parenting. As for quality of care, the higher the quality the more likely the child was to have higher vocabulary scores. The study has also shown that with a higher exposure to central care, the child is likely to have more teacher-reported externalizing problems.
Egeland and Hiester (1995) researched the long-term consequences of infant day-care and mother-infant attachment. In their study, Egeland and Hiester attempted to determine if the effects of day-care over a long period of time changed dependent on the security of attachment in infancy. Another point was if the children’s adaptation to home and day-care could be predicted on the level of attachment the child had received during infancy. This study tried to show the effects of Day-care compared to home-care and the secure of insecure levels of the children. The mothers and children in this study were all considered to be at a high risk of poverty.
The infants and mothers were observed over an extended period of time.

Infants were observed at 12 months old with procedures that consisted of a series of episodes. These episodes included attachment and exploration behaviors in circumstances that became gradually stressful. The infants were also observed based on their behaviors once they were reunited with their mother after separation for a short period of time. At 42 months the mothers respect for autonomy, hostility, and the child’s avoidance of the mother. They were then observed in social withdrawal, self-esteem, self-control, aggression, emotional health, and externalizing upon entering kindergarten.
Results of this study show that the children who were securely attached to their mother had a higher chance to be negatively affected by early out-of-home care where as for the insecurely attached children it proved to be more beneficial. The insecure children that entered day care proved to have a higher level of proactivity in comparison to home-cared. As for the secure children who attended day-care, they came to show more aggression and became more

avoidant.
Field (1991) shows the correlation of quality infant day-care and grade school behavior and performance in two studies.

The first study consisted of 28 children averaging seven years of age. All of these children had full-time infant day-care before the age of 2 with an average of 6.7 months. The children also remained in the same nursery school before starting grade school. Packets were sent to the mothers to rate their own introverted/extroverted behavior and included a number of background questions on the child such as age, participation in gifted programs, and awards the child has received. The children were also sent a questionnaire packet included a self-concept scale and magic markers, with which the children were directed to draw a self-portrait. These portraits were judged by use of colors, placing of body parts, size of drawing, and facial expresions.
Results of this study show that the number of friends the children had was positively related to the time spent in quality day-care. Based off the children’s drawings the study also notes that the more time a child spends in quality day-care leads being less despressed and having a higher self-esteem. The children who spent more time in quality day-care have also shown better socially and emotionally behaviors at the early grade school

periods.
Volling and Feagans (1995) investigated children’s social competence in relation to day-care. In this investigation Volling and Feagans examined the socioeconomic status, family relations, temperament, and quality/quantity of day-care. These were examined as predictors of the child’s social interactions.
36 children were included in this study and attended one of three day-cares. The day-cares differed such as non-profit and two for-profit daycares in different environments. Questionnaires were given to the mothers that evaluated their family environment, social status, day experiences, and temperament. The children were observed on their social behavior in the classrooms when they were around 2 ½ years old. Additional observations were also made, but were not of central importance. In order to measure the children’s social competence, the children were watched in two 10-minute observations of indoor free play on two separate occasions in which an observational system was developed to evaluate the social behavior of the children.
Results of this study concluded that children who attended day-care more hours per week were involved in more social play and had friendlier peer interactions. If the child-to-caregiver ratio became too large, it was noticed that there was more nonsocial play among the children. With a smaller child-to-caregiver ratio the children displayed more positive interactions. Day-care quality shows to play a main part in children’s play and interactions among each other and caregivers.
Field, Masi, Goldstein, Perry, Parl examined the possible ties that day-care facilities have with children’s preschool social behaviors. Field et al. studied seventy-one preschool-aged children. Entering day-care at varying times and receiving varied amounts of care, these children were compared on their behavior when reunited with their parent, the teacher and parent ratings of their behavior, and also the interactions they displayed on during playground play.
The findings from this study further shows that with more hours and months of day-care, children are more likely to oblige in cooperative play, and have more positive interactions among peers. A child receiving continuous care in quality day-care does not appear to negatively affect attachment behavior, but rather aid in the preschool social behavior.
Burchinal, Bryant, Lee, and Ramey examined children put into day care early, infant-mother attachment, and the maternal responsiveness in the infant’s first year.