Okay, it’s official. Science has done it. They have the tools and they can build one. The future of tomorrow is here today. They have finally deciphered the arcane impulses that govern our children and unveiled the alchemical process that will unerringly result in the rearing of a perfect child. If that whiffs of nonsense, … Continued
Brain Development
“Men are from Earth, women are from Earth. Deal with it.” George Carlin
Why is it that authority in one area so often confers authority in another? It’s a well-studied phenomenon. One of the most famous examples of this can be seen in the social psychology experiment conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Miligram in the 1960s in which he measured the willingness of study participants to obey … Continued
Domestic violence and the hidden victims
Medical experts in Australia have concluded, following the result of a royal commission into domestic violence in the state of Victoria (the first of its kind in the country), that children are affected by it even before birth. Statistics show that the number of cases of domestic violence in the country has increased by 136 … Continued
There is only one happiness in this life, to love and be loved. George Sand
Professor Richard Layard and his colleagues at the Wellbeing research programme at the London’s School of Economics’ centre for Economic performance, have reached a perhaps obvious but nonetheless important conclusion that…. having an emotionally healthy childhood is the key to happiness in later life. And furthermore, that being a happy child begets a happy satisfied … Continued
Are we failing our children?
We hear an awful lot about the problems with young people today. The headlines tend to favour the negative stories such as the ASBOs, underage pregnancies, the increasing frequency of teenage on adult violence and so on, but I have some real sympathy for what children face today. Consider what we now know about the … Continued
Matter over Mind ?
As knowledge of science and the human animal move forward it becomes ever more apparent of the interrelational nature of things. Our species has a propensity to compartmentalise the world and to some degree this makes sense. To deal with everything in its entirety is overwhelming, impractical and impossible. However, there are circumstances in which … Continued
Personality goes a long way
Borderline Personality Disorder: What a parent can learn from a therapist’s experience. I was lucky enough to attend a really fascinating workshop on this personality disorder recently and I realised that as a therapist the insights gained were incredibly useful in themselves but I also realised that there was a lot of learning for mothers … Continued
Silence is not Golden
There has been a serious issue highlighted recently by Tristram Hunt, the shadow education secretary, regarding children of primary school age with profound language deficits. Typically a child of four or five will have a vocabulary of approximately 1500 to 2000 words. Some children are arriving at their first school with as little as 30-50 … Continued
I dream of Genie
The last blog entry regarding the effects of maltreatment on brain development reminded me of a documentary I’d watched as a teen. It was ostensibly about a wild or feral child (i.e. those recognised as living with little or no human contact) and the impact that this had upon language acquisition. The term wild … Continued
The Effects of Maltreatment on Brain Development
I read an article recently on the effects of maltreatment on brain development in children. It was such a concise and informative overview of recent developments in this area that I decide to reproduce the article (with the kind permission of the Child Welfare Information Gateway) in its entirety and make it available below. Click to … Continued