Middle childhood is a time of discovery, consolidation, and strengthening of key competencies. During this period of development, ranging between ages 6 and 12 years, physical skills mature, personality traits solidify, and social interactions become more sophisticated. Parents remain at the center of children’s social world, but peers become increasingly important. Although biology provides a timetable for development, cultural and contextual factors can slow, nurture, or hinder growth. Thus, developmental shifts during childhood are best understood within a broad social context that includes individual factors as well as family, peers, neighborhoods, and culture.
Status of Children
In his 2002 State of the Union address, George W. Bush adopted the Children’s Defense Fund policy to “Leave No Child Behind.” Unfortunately, 2 years later, very little has improved in the lives of American children. Every 11 seconds, an American child is reportedly abused or neglected, and every 2 hours...
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Suggested Reading
Children’s Defense Fund. (2003, July). Broken promises: How the Bush administration is failing. America’s Poorest Children. Retrieved from http://www.childrensdefense.org/pdf/broken_promises.pdf
Erwin, P. (1993). Friendship and peer relations in children. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Gilligan, C. (1982). In a different voice: Psychological theory and women’s development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Miller, P. A. (1993). Theories of developmental psychology. New York: W.H. Freeman.
Singer, D. G., & Revenson, T. A. (1997). A Piaget primer: How a child thinks. Madison, WI: International Universities Press.
Sroufe, L. A. (1996). Emotional development: The organization of emotional life in the early years. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Suggested Resources
Children’s Defense Fund: http://www.childrensdefense.org/pdf/broken_promises.pdf
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© 2004 Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers
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Donenberg, G.R. (2004). Youth. In: Encyclopedia of Women’s Health. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-306-48113-0_470
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-306-48113-0_470
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
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