Childhood

Question 1

Cultural differences in childhood

Answer 1

Benedict: childhood different in non industrial societies with one of the maj. differences being children taking responsibility at an earlier age

Holmes: studied childhood in Samoa and found children were never seen as “too young”

Question 2

Bolivia Case Study

Answer 2

-Punch: studied childhood in Bolivia and found children as young as 5 expected to take responsibility
- further research found children worked for as low as $14 a day as they needed to provide for their families

Question 3

Conventional approach

Answer 3

• Highlights importance of parents to childhood
• critical of the effects modern world has on childhood (postman: tv and media negatively affects children)
• Brooks: parents have become over obsessed with safety (coddling)
• Palmer: toxic childhood - innocence of children polluted by media

Question 4

Social Action Theory

Answer 4

Criticises conventional approaches and argues children aren’t blank slates and have just as much impact on parents too (reciprocal determinism: )

Question 5

childhood is not a social construction

Answer 5

Pilcher: separateness —> there is a physical and pscychological difference between adults and kids (for instance placing a young child by themesleves on a busy street they wouldnt know what to do)

James and Prout: dominant framework - adults more mature —> children are largely amoral and require socialisation

laws giving children rights give a concrete definition of stages of maturity signalling boundaries between childhood and adolesence (age of consent 16 and age of adult 18)

Question 6

childhood is a social construction

Answer 6

Aries - “childhood” was not so much of a thing in medieval times as children were “little adults” and “economic assets” —> modern society gives rise to child centred society whereby the social construction of childhood is given more weight (consumerism etc)

Bolivia case study - Punch
children work from a young age to provide economic security