Mental deprivation
As a psychic deprivation (of Latin deprivare = rob) refers to the mental state of the organism, caused by insufficient satisfaction of basic psychological needs. This state of affairs can arise when it is not possible to establish a close relationship with others that is characterized by intense feelings ( attachment theory ). The term psychological deprivation goes back to Zdeněk Matějček .
Definition of terms
The term refers exclusively to a mental deficiency which can primarily affect the developing child. In addition, deprivation is differentiated as a lack of nutrition due to insufficient nutrition (physical deprivation), lack of sensory stimuli ( sensory deprivation ), lack of linguistic stimulation ( linguistic deprivation ), social isolation (social deprivation), etc. More narrowly defined deprivation terms are used for the lack of emotional ties between mother and child ( maternal deprivation ; Mary Ainsworth ) and between father and child ( paternal deprivation ) as well as for the consequences of a longer stay in hospital or at home ( hospitalism ), etc. A broader term is used for lack of education (pedagogical deficit). Matějček deliberately avoids the term "deprivation syndrome" because it could mislead people into understanding a group of pathological features that are precisely defined in terms of content and that can be diagnosed in the same way as other somatic or mental illnesses.
Mental deprivation can also be understood in a multilayered manner, in which the conditions of the deficiency for an effective interaction of the child with the environment are differentiated:
- Lack of overall stimulation (amount, intensity and type of stimuli)
- Lack of opportunities for effective learning or understanding of cognitive structure
- Lack of prerequisites for building a specific relationship or emotional dependency that helps to achieve inner security
- Lack of prerequisites for acquiring personal-social roles (no social independence, lack of identity).
Mental Deprivation Theory
There is (yet) no unified theory of psychological deprivation. Matějček distinguishes four basic psychological needs (two of which are always polar) as the basic human tendency towards active contact with the surrounding world. Alfred Adler spoke of the “social nature” of humans.
- The need for variability, which includes variability of stimuli (amount, modality, intensity) and new progressive stimulation.
- The need for stability in order to find a permanent structure, order and regularity in the alternation of events and thus establish a continuity of the past, the present and the future.
- The need for dependence (love, bond, relationship), as a bond with specific people in particular and with the outside world in general, which becomes the foundation of life security.
- The need for independence, with personal separation from the environment in order to achieve autonomy, conscious identity or social role in the world's social network.
Only when the child gets to know the uniqueness and durability of the environmental objects and their personal meaning and value can they form specific relationships with them. If a child is to develop normally, all of its basic needs must be satisfied harmoniously - adapted to the respective development phase. If these needs are not or only unilaterally satisfied over a long period of time and to a considerable extent, the child's psychological development is adversely affected. In the child's environment there are certain conditions that allow the satisfaction of basic psychological needs. All cultures and the educational systems that exist in them expect a certain regulation (offer of stimulation, introduction to the order of things and actions, type of contact with the child, time of independence) in this direction.
History of Deprivation Research
In the history of mankind, claims have been made several times that a ruler carried out experiments with small children in whom they were not spoken to (e.g. by a mute carer) or that they were Sometimes they were even consciously neglected emotionally in order to preserve the original language of humanity - i.e. H. without the language model of caregivers - out: The ancient Greek historian Herodotus - claimed the formerly living on the 200 years (about 485,425 BC..) Pharaoh Psammetichus I (664-610 BC..), Salimbene of Parma on the Roman-German Emperor Friedrich II. von Hohenstaufen (1194-1250), whom he viewed extremely negatively, and later authors about Jacob IV. of Scotland (1473-1513) and the Indian mogul Akbar (1542-1605); at least the experimental children of Frederick II are said to have died of neglect. However, the truth of such allegations is more than uncertain: Critical authors reject the allegations of experimental child abuse, especially by Psammetich I and Jacob IV, but presumably also the allegedly fatal attempts by Frederick II as very unlikely; Akbar's experiment alone probably took place, but there the children were only raised by mute wet nurses, without any report of emotional neglect. Since the 20th century, the alleged experiment of Frederick II has been haunted by some psychological or educational publications, as supposed evidence of the (vital) importance of emotional affection for small children.
A Spanish bishop wrote in his diary from 1760: In the foundling house a child becomes sad and many perish from their sadness.
The Austrian pediatrician Meinhard von Pfaundler made a significant contribution to this topic . He was able to prove that hospital damage in infants and children in clinics can be linked to the separation of the mother (hence the term hospitalism , sometimes also called hospital marasmus). Not only is this an issue for institutions that house children, but there is also hospitalism in families ( child neglect ).
Further systematic scientific work comes from the Vienna School Charlotte Bühler from the 1930s . The extensive psychoanalytically oriented studies of René A. Spitz , which he presented in his book From Infant to Toddler, proceed from this basis . Harry Harlow was able to show in animal experiments that mental disorders also occurred in primates if no adequate mother-child relationship could be established. John Bowlby summarized the international results of previous research for the WHO in 1952 in Maternal care and mental health and in 1962 together with Ainsworth in Deprivation of Maternal Care . The vast majority of modern work on child development relies on the attachment theory of John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth .
Causes of Deprivation
The causes of psychological deprivation are very diverse (for example depression in the mother). In general, life situations such as isolation or separation (separation) can be in which the subject (children, adults, primates ) is not given the opportunity to satisfy his or her basic psychological needs to a sufficient extent and for a long enough time.
Isolation and its aftermath
In 1961, Ainsworth recommended that isolation should only be used in those situations in which a specific relationship with the first person (mother, father, etc.) had not yet developed. Examples of the most severe isolation are the so-called wolf children or the Kaspar Hauser case . The total isolation from human community is the most severe deprivation situation. As a result, the child is severely retarded in mental and physical development, language is not developed, and useful social habits are not developed. The speed and extent of the ability to recover depend on the severity of the deprivation. Even when intellectual development improves, severe personality disorders usually remain.
Separation and its aftermath
Separation is a situation in which there is an interruption of specific already existing relationships between the child and his or her social environment. Shorter and longer separations are a normal, common life situation and their effects can be very different depending on the individual development and personality conditions.
Home children
Studies that compare the development of home children with family children almost always show a certain intellectual and emotional development delay (retardation) with regard to language development and social behavior, as well as anxiety and aggressiveness. The home environment is particularly detrimental to children up to three or five years of age. Observations at specific time intervals showed that infants raised in families spent 75% of their waking hours in contact with other people and only 25% of that time passively followed the actions of their loved ones. For children in care, it was almost the other way around, depending on the care key.
However, better development conditions can be achieved through effective measures (constant positive personal relationship between educator and child, sensory stimulation, curative educational setting, small groups of children, adaptation to family upbringing, etc.). The developmental differences of the individual children in the home mainly depend on how they interact with the home environment based on their individual psychological basic equipment.
Partial community education
The risk of deprivation depends primarily on the following three factors: First, the extent to which the institutions of community education complement or replace the education of the family. In weekly facilities (one-week day nurseries, one-week kindergartens, boarding schools), from which the children only come home on weekends, the upbringing of the family is almost completely replaced. Secondly, on the age of the children (infants, toddlers, kindergarten teachers, schools with after-school care centers) and thirdly, on the type of care ( care key , small groups, day care , stimulation value , etc.) and the personality of the educator (attachment behavior, experience and education, balance and stability). In the case of a partial community upbringing (day care facilities such as crèche , kindergarten , after-school care , all-day school , etc.), the family and the attitude towards the child play an important role and have a major influence on fruitful educational cooperation and an effective development stimulus. Complicating factors that appear on the parents' side as a reaction to the separation from the child, for example, were exaggerated fear, feelings of guilt, compensation for the separation through unconditional indulgence and an urge to constantly secure the child's love. The partial community upbringing (day nursery) can exert a positive influence where the upbringing in the family is neglected or is emotionally unbalanced.
The most important aspect to consider when comparing different types of care is the age of the child being looked after. From infancy to the age of three, the child is heavily dependent on the person of the adult educator. For Matějček, crèches for toddlers essentially have a “makeshift function”, whereby two problems in particular were found in crèche children: difficulties in adapting and two to three times more susceptibility to illness than family children. While the risk potential for psychological deprivation in long-term care of children under three years of age in homes must be viewed as "dangerous", their situation in day nurseries is at most "stressful". With day nursery children, the emotional bond to mother and father and to home remains, but it is subject to a certain burden; because it is complemented by additional volatile relationships. Under optimal conditions, no significant differences in the somatic and mental development of day care children and family children could be found.
family
Even in today's society, the family is of central importance for psychological development. The partial communal facilities (day nurseries, etc.) can complement the upbringing in the family but not replace it. While the mother is usually the first caregiver at the beginning of life, as the child ages, every family member (father, sibling) plays a role in fulfilling vital needs (physical, emotional, intellectual and moral). Later on, the family's social environment and how it is embedded in the community also become important for the development of the child's personality. If the family is not integrated into the community (emigrant families, celebrity families, etc.) this can have negative effects. The overall atmosphere of the family with its close coexistence of all members has a lasting impact on the child's personality. If one of the most important person in a relationship is missing and cannot be replaced, the child is particularly threatened by deprivation, whereby the time of failure and its cause (illegitimate child, divorce, death, military service, war) contribute differently to deprivation. The greatest danger to the development of a toddler is the lack of a mother if she cannot be adequately replaced. The previous development theory of infants and toddlers, however, has hardly dealt with the role of the father and does not allow any reliable statements in this regard.
The lack of a formally complete family can be compensated by the remaining family members with loving care. That is why children from fatherless or motherless families can grow up healthy. However, there are also grossly neglectful or violent family relationships in which the children blossom when they are admitted to a children's home. Whether the work of the parents or the single parent has an unfavorable effect on development depends, among other things, on whether the job is satisfactory and whether there is enough time to take care of the development of your child and whether there is good substitute care.
A lack of emotional exchange between parents and child can also be the cause of depression, neurosis or psychosis . Children who are in a state of complete emotional isolation due to the atmosphere of emotional coldness often have a one-sided emotional development deficit, because they are only promoted intellectually. Expressed emotional rejection, hostility, or cruelty appear even more severe, leaving the children emotionally and socially isolated and severely traumatized .
Conditions of deprivation inherent in the individual
Psychological deprivation is understood as the individual processing of a lack of emotional stimulation to which the child is exposed in a deprivation situation. The striving for attachment is active from the infant, as its needs are satisfied in the first months of life on the level of emotional perception. In the dyad of mother and child, the mother's continuous emotional interest in the child creates an emotional exchange that becomes the basis for this and other relationships.
The same deprivation conditions can affect children differently depending on their age and stage of development. In the first six months, if there is a lack of various sensory and emotional stimuli, infants react with undifferentiated, global psychosomatic reactions. In this developmental phase the child needs elementary unspecific social stimulation. After around the age of seven months, anaclitic or analogous reactions occur suddenly and with full force in the event of a deficiency. At this point in time, the child is able to distinguish the mother's face or the main caregiver from other (strangers) people and now has the need to develop a specific relationship with her that gives him a feeling of security. In children who have not been able to develop such a relationship, the ability to relate to people is severely and often permanently impaired. The sensitivity to this type of deprivation lasts until around the age of three. Even relatively short separations from the mother or the caregiver can cause disturbances during this time. After the age of three, relationships expand to include the whole family, including siblings and grandparents, and it gives the child the emotional stimuli for a sense of security. In the event of insufficient stimulation, family deprivation can now occur instead of maternal deprivation . At around six years of age, the well-developed child is so independent (ready for school) that it can build new relationships outside the family (neighboring children, teachers, school class) and can endure a temporary separation from the family.
Diagnosis of deprivation damage
Due to its complexity, the diagnosis of a deprivation disorder requires interdisciplinary cooperation between parents, child and adolescent psychotherapists, pediatricians, child and adolescent psychologists, psychologists, social workers, educators, possibly neurologists, etc. The condition of the child (physical and psychological development, Deficits and strengths), the family situation (personality of the parents, separation experiences) and the social, economic and cultural conditions and educational opportunities are clarified and evaluated.
In the classic picture of the psychological deprivation of a small child, one usually finds, among other things, a marked lag in language development , since language develops exclusively through relationships. In addition to pronounced stammering, the delay in terms of grammar and poor vocabulary is striking. They learn to use personal pronouns and compound sentences very late (beyond the age of 3). The early inexperience in comparing real objects with their depiction results in a delay in grasping the symbolic nature of a graphic sign, which is seen as one of the roots of their failure in reading and writing in the first grades.
The timely diagnosis increases the chances of the effectiveness of therapeutic and educational measures. Pediatricians and educators should therefore be aware of the symptoms of the consequences of deprivation.
Therapeutic measures
The therapeutic measures include reactivation (adequate supply of stimuli), new learning (reididaxis, healing learning), re-education (psychotherapy) and re-socialization (sociotherapy, family therapy). The usually insufficient satisfaction of the child's emotional needs can be remedied by correcting previous emotional experiences. To do this, a close emotional bond between therapist and child must be built up, which can then become a bridge for the child to gradually develop new, richer and more realistic relationships. The therapist's personality is usually more important to therapeutic success than the type of therapeutic method.
The first studies in the 1940s were still very pessimistic about the success of therapeutic measures. Although these are judged more optimistically today, the therapy and healing of such children often remains very tedious. Therefore, the more effective and economical prophylaxis is of particular importance. It is probable that if therapeutic measures are started before the age of eight to ten, a more or less complete regression of the deprivation can be expected. However, there are starting points throughout the entire school period and also later (success in sport, career transition, marriage, parenting, assuming responsibility for fellow human beings, etc.) which can be used to influence deprivation. Placement in a good foster family, possibly with the support of professionals, can be very helpful in many cases.
Preventive measures
When it comes to prevention, it is essential to ensure that the stimuli from the environment should correspond to the child’s developmental stage, because too early or too late stimulation can be ineffective or harmful. The basic requirements (meaning, rules of conduct, stability of the environment) for intellectual and social learning must be ensured. Long-term positive relationships between the child and primary educators are necessary for healthy development . The child must be enabled to integrate into the community.
Particularly important is the education of the parents about questions of the cohabitation of the spouse, the development psychology and pedagogy of the child, the inner attitude towards the early education of the children, the social values etc. Long before the child is born, parents form their attitudes towards them based on their own childhood experiences and their relationships with their own parents. According to Matějček, educating parents about the prevention of deprivation of children of one generation also serves to prevent deprivation of future generations.
Preventive measures require accompanying measures through the social policy of the state, the education of the public and of young parents, couples and family counseling , a health service as a safety net for children at risk of deprivation, help for incomplete and broken families, support to reconcile family and work , assistance for foster families etc.
literature
- John Bowlby: Maternal Care and Mental Health . World Health Organization, Geneva 1952
- John Bowlby, Mary D. Salter Ainsworth et al .: Deprivation of Maternal Care . World Health Organization, Geneva 1962
- René A. Spitz: From infant to toddler. Natural history of mother-child relationships in the first year of life. Klett-Cotta Verlag, Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 360891823X (English first edition: The First Year of Life , 1965)
- Josef Langmeier, Zdeněk Matějček: Mental deprivation in childhood: children without love . Urban & Schwarzenberg publishing house, Munich, Vienna, Baltimore 1977, ISBN 3-541-07901-0
- John Bowlby, Mary D. Salter Ainsworth: Maternal Love and Child Development . E. Reinhardt, Munich, Basel 1995
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d Josef Langmeier, Zdeněk Matějček: Mental Deprivation in Childhood: Children without Love, Urban & Schwarzenberg Publishing House, Munich, Vienna, Baltimore 1977, ISBN 3-541-07901-0 )
- ↑ a b c Wi.Pö. (2000). Orphan experiments. Lexicon of Psychology . Spectrum Academic Publishing House, Heidelberg.
- ↑ Fromkin, Victoria A .; Krashen, Stephen D .; Curtiss, Susan; Rigler, David; Rigler, Marilyn (1974). "The Development of Language in Genius: a Case of Language Acquisition Beyond the Critical Period" "(PDF). Brain and Language. 1 (1): 81-107. (P. 82, fn. 3)
- ↑ a b c Robin N Campbell & Robert Grieve (12/1981). Royal Investigations of the Origin of Language. Historiographia Linguistica 9 (1-2): 43-74 DOI: 10.1075 / hl.9.1-2.04cam
- ↑ Abul Fazal (reprint 1993): The Akbar NAmA of Abu-l-Fazl, translated from the Persian, transl. H. BEVERIDGE (1902-1939). Reprinted 1993, 3 vols (in 2), Delhi: Low Price Publications. quoted by M. Miles: Sign, Gesture & Deafness in South Asian & South-West Asian Histories: A Bibliography with Annotation and Excerpts from India; Also from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Burma / Myanmar, Iraq, Nepal, Pakistan, Persia / Iran, & Sri Lanka, c1200-1750. Archived on February 22nd, 2008 in the Internet archive .
- ↑ Meinhard von Pfaundler (1924). About institutional damage to children. Monthly journal for paediatrics, 29, 661 ff.
- ↑ The mother figure is vital for the child (English)
- ↑ J. Koch: An attempt to analyze the influence of home conditions on the neuropsychological development of 4-12 month old children. Cslkà Pediatric. 1961
- ↑ Cathleen Erin McGreal: The father's role in the socialization of his infant , Infant Mental Health Journal, Volume 2, Issue 4, pages 216225, Winter 1981, abstract
- ↑ The mother-child relationship and the father-child relationship are, for example, regarded by Grossmann and Grossmann (2005) as being equivalent and at the same time “the secure bond with the mother” and “the sensitive challenge from the father” as optimal conditions for considered the development of the child. See K. Grossmann, KE Grossmann: Bindings - the structure of psychological security , Stuttgart, Klein-Cotta, 2005. Quoted from Klaus Hurrelmann, Matthias Grundmann , Sabine Walper (ed.): Handbuch Sozialisationsforschung , Beltz, 7th edition 2008, ISBN 978 -3-407-83160-6 , pp 132-138
