How Knowing Your Child's Temperament Should Guide Discipline Decisions

A child's temperament can give a parent valuable cues on how to react to the child's responses and cues. There are 3 dimensions of temperament including emotionality, activity, and sociability. Combined these dimensions make up how your infant or child react to a vast sea of situations, conflicts, stimulus, and environments.

Young infants and some young children tend to react in predictable ways which makes determine your child's temperament that much more important. Two psychologists, Thomas and Chess coined the term 'goodness of fit' as a description of how well a caretaker or parent responds to the needs and cues of an infant.

Their overall advice drawn from their studies was that parents that are consistent and prompt in their response to cues such as crying, whimpering, and tantrums tend to have a better goodness of fit then parents who ignore the child or delay the response to the child's cues.

Children who are denied consistent and suitable responses (warm, caring, loving) are more likely to be anxious, emotionally unstable, and fearful as they progress through development and though life. Children who have an excellent goodness of fit with their caretaker will grow up to be sociable, confident, emotionally stable, and empathetic.

This research suggests that the one idea suggested of ignoring children to make them tough and self-reliable (suggested famously by Watson) is a horrible mistake and a mark of horrible parenting. This will only produce a person who is bitter, resentful, and unable to interact successfully with others in life. Infants and children need to be nurtured and cared for in order to develop into normal and productive adults.

With all this said a parent needs to adjust their responses to the child's temperament which generally does not change through development. A child who is fussy tends to remain so just as a child who seems unconcerned about everything will remain so. Adjusting your responses and your handling of the situation will help you better discipline and care for your child.