What is Temperament?

• Temperament: individuals have a general emotional style that guides their tendency to respond in certain ways to a variety of events in their environment.

• Individual way of approaching the world, in turn shapes behavior and development

Thomas and Chess

• NY Longitudinal Study , Thomas & Chess studied 133 infants into adulthood

• Asked parents about activity level, excitability, response to novel situations and people, food, bowel, and sleep patterns, mood, sensitivity

• Easy child (40%): a positive mood, quickly establishes routines, and easily adapts.

• Difficult child (10%): irritable, reacts negatively and cries frequently, resists change, and shows irregular behaviors.

• Slow-to-warm-up child (15%): low mood intensity, low activity level, and slow to adapt to new people and situations

• = 65, so 35% did not fit into one of these categories

Is Temperament Stable Over Time?

• Thought to be more “hard-wired”. There is some stability in temperament over time

• Change can also be and is observed; Temperamental characteristics do not, however, typically go from one extreme to another.

• One reason why we see change is that the ethnicity and culture the child is growing up may value and encourage certain child characteristics over others.

Biology and Environment - Development of Shyness and Sociability

• Neurobiological research has focused on inhibited, or shy, children and uninhibited, or sociable, children (introversion and extroversion).

• Neurobiological and physiological correlates of shyness:

  • Individual differences in arousal of the amygdala (fear response), and in brain waves in the frontal lobes of cerebral cortex

  • Heart rate higher in shy children, speeds up further during unfamiliar events

  • Higher cortisol concentration in saliva, rises more when stressed

  • Greater pupil dilation, rise in blood pressure, and lower skin surface temperature when faced with novelty

Genetic and Environmental Influences

• Stability of temperament is low to moderate in infancy and toddlerhood and moderate from the preschool years on.

• Long-term prediction from early temperament is best achieved after age 3.

• Heritability estimates suggest a moderate role for genetic factors in temperament and personality, but environment is also powerful.

  • A child’s initial approach to the world can be intensified or lessened by experience. Thus children can and do adapt

• Differences in early temperament may have genetic roots but also supported by cultural beliefs and practices.

Parenting

• Goodness-of-fit model explains how temperament and environment can together produce favorable outcomes

• The fit between parent and child temperament is also moderated by cultural value, parental mental health, marital happiness, and favorable economic conditions.

• Parents, caregivers and educators play a big role in recognizing and supporting a child’s natural temperament, while recognizing their individual differences

• E.g. an intense, reactive child may need more time to calm down and soothe; a slow to warm child may need more preparedness for new situations and time to adjust to transitions or new routines

• **The goal is not to CHANGE the child, but rather nurture their strengths, help them feel supported, accepted, and confident when faced with new or unfamiliar situations or challenging tasks

• Parents should recognize their own temperament and styles, may be difficult to parent a child who has a temperament different than one’s own. Be aware of their own limitations, influences