Child Care,Developmental Delay and Institutional Practice

Abstract

Child care, developmental delay and institutional practice This research draws on Valsiner's (1987) individual socio- ecological approach to development, and Miller and Goodnow's (1995) concept of a cultural practice. It shows how institutions for children act as cultural settings that contain child-care practices that advance or retard children's development through the forms of social exchange and activities they promote. Formal assessments of a group of institutionalised children indicated significant delay in five developmental domains. Child-care workers were observed interacting with these children in a range of activity settings within the institutional routine. Staff behaviour towards the children was found to be highly regulatory and characterised by block treatment. Interactions allowed little opportunity for the scaffolding of psychological capacities beyond those that were functional within the ideological, personnel, and material constraints of the institution. We argue that regulative styles of care-giving explain, at least in part, the developmental delays shown by the institutionalised children, and that these styles do little to address developmental problems associated with inadequate care prior to institutionalisation. It is argued that institutional culture promotes regulative care through the establishment of routines that facilitate multiple care-giving under conditions of scarce personnel resources.