Poor Behavior Linked to Time in Care

A New York Times article, "Poor Behavior Is Linked to Time in Day Care," (March 26, 2007) reported..."the largest and longest-running study of American child care has found that keeping a preschooler in a day care center for a year or more increased the likelihood that the child would become disruptive in class — and that the effect persisted through the sixth grade. The effect was slight, and well within the normal range for healthy children, the researchers found. And as expected, parents’ guidance and their genes had by far the strongest influence on how children behaved. But the finding held up regardless of the child’s sex or family income, and regardless of the quality of the day care center...On the positive side, they also found that time spent in high-quality day care centers was correlated with higher vocabulary scores through elementary school."

The article generated high interest -- it was the second most downloaded article in the Times for the day it appeared. And, early childhood experts were quick, and of many voices, in responding.

Long time vocal child care critic Jay Belsky, now at the University of London, observed, “This study makes it clear that it is not just quality that matters,” That the troublesome behaviors lasted through at least sixth grade, he said, should raise a broader question: “So what happens in classrooms, schools, playgrounds and communities when more and more children, at younger and younger ages, spend more and more time in centers, many that are indisputably of limited quality?”

Others experts were quick to question the results. The researchers could not randomly assign children to one kind of care or another; parents chose the kind of care that suited them. That meant there was no control group, so determining cause and effect was not possible.

Ellen Gallinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute, noting the recent pressure on centers to focus on academics, noted, “What the findings tell me is that we need to pay as much attention to children’s social and emotional development as we do to their cognitive, academic development, especially when they are together in groups.”

Loudell Robb, program director of the Rosemount Center in Washington, which cares for 147 children ages 5 and under at its main center and in homes, said she was not surprised that some children might have trouble making the transition from day care to school. “At least our philosophy here is that children are given choices, to work alone or in a group, to move around,” Ms. Robb said. “By first or second grade, they’re expected to sit still for long periods, to form lines, not to talk to friends when they want to; their time is far more teacher-directed.”


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