Room to Grow: A Study of Parent-Child Relationships 9781442653535

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ROOM TO GROW

A Study of Parent-Child Relationships CARROLL DAVIS The lives of seven children provide the focus for this penetrating look into the experiences that shape personality. As they emerge from records collected over a twenty-year period by the University of Toronto's Institute of Child Study, they reveal the problems and frustrations met with in the process of growing up and point to the strong influence which family relations have on mental and emotional development. The records themselves, drawn from interviews and questionnaires administered to mothers and children, are unusual in their extensiveness. Covering the important years from nursery school through adolescence, they give unusual opportunity for a significant long-term study of the personality changes in individual children. Room to Grow is a source of insight into the needs of children and the problems of parents. As such it is an important book for parents seeking to establish a just balance between domination and permissiveness in their relations with their children. In addition, in its handling of the heterogeneous data resulting from longitudinal psychological research, the book will serve as a model of method and achievement for those who wish to build on the foundation its author has laid. Mrs. Davis has pointed out a new way of looking at the relationship between a child and his parents—a view that will be useful to many people who seek to understand and assess parent-child transactions: not only parents, teachers, case workers, counsellors, and therapists, but also scientists engaged in research into child development. CARROLL DAVIS, a graduate of the University of Toronto, has been associated with a number of nursery schools, including the Forest Hill Nursery School and the Windy Ridge Day School, and she has been Director of the Nursery School in the Department of Psychology, McGill University. Mrs. Davis is currently a Research Associate in the Institute of Child Study, University of Toronto.

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ROOM TO GROW A Study of Parent-Child Relationships

CARROLL DAVIS

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS

University of Toronto Press 1966 Printed in Canada

Foreword

IT IS A PLEASURE to write a foreword to a book so full of wisdom. Mrs. Davis points out a new way of looking at the relationship between a child and his parents—a new view that will be useful to many people who seek to understand and to assess parentchild transactions: not only parents, teachers, case workers, counsellors, and therapists, but also scientists engaged in research into child development. In an article in the January 1961 issue of the Journal of Abnormal Social Psychology, C. B. DeSoto pointed out that our cultural heritage has given us a predilection for ordering the complexities of experience into simple one-variable hierarchies (pp. 16-23). This predilection has been valuable to the development of science because it has fostered measurement; at the same time it has retarded science because it has often hampered understanding of phenomena which result from the interaction of multiple influences. The viewpoint presented in this book provides a much-needed corrective to our predisposition towards simple ordering. The viewpoint itself seems simple, perhaps because it is clearly presented—but the simplicity is deceptive. It is not easy constantly to keep even four variables in mind simultaneously and to consider the balance and interaction between them. The key concept of this book is the assessment of the growth of the child towards maturity and emancipation in the context of the degree of reciprocal trust he has in relations with his parents. In assessing reciprocal trust—and emancipation, which is the other side of the same medal—four variables are identified as significant. The maximum degree of reciprocal trust and the

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optimum condition for development occur when the four variables are in balance. Emphasis upon one or another of these variables, with failure to consider others, has been responsible for the fads and fashions that have been conspicuous in child-rearing practices. Within the last few decades alone there have been several wide swings of the pendulum, each swing having gained impetus from the undesirable excesses of the previous swing. Stress on the importance of early training gave way to recognition of the dangers of overstimulation. Stress on the importance of a child maturing at his own rate is now giving way to recognition that well-timed stimulation is essential for optimum development. Exhortations not to spoil a baby by picking him up when he cries compete with exhortations to give him the closeness of contact and intimacy of interaction that he needs for the growth of trust. Exhortations to be permissive rather than dominating compete with exhortations to enforce discipline and to set limits. The viewpoint provided in this book will be a useful guide in avoiding excesses in principle and practice. Research in child development has also been distorted by imbalances resulting from emphasizing one pole of a variable at the expense of other relevant and interacting variables. Led on by a laudable desire to bring more precision into our understanding of parent-child relations, research scientists have turned to tests, ratings, and other measures which have arranged the complex data of parent-child interactions along independent bipolar continual autonomy-control, dependence-independence, compliance-rebellion, and the like. It may be recognized that the extremes of either pole are unhealthy; yet, as Mrs. Davis implies, the Golden Mean cannot be a statistical average. Let us consider the autonomy-control continuum as an example. It is impossible to imagine how a parent could, in his dealings with a child, consistently find the mid-point between exerting control over him and giving him autonomy of action. Any parent who approximated this impossible practice would, at best, confuse a child. No, the mid-point is not the optimum. A child needs both autonomy and control. He needs a balance between them. He needs control in some areas of his life and freedom in others

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—and these areas differ at different points in his development. What is required is an assessment of the extent to which a child is given autonomy in activities in which he can make good use of freedom, and the extent to which he is given control in those aspects of his life with which he is not yet prepared to cope without danger to himself or to others. Mrs. Davis does not offer specific tools for such assessments. She presents not tests, rating scales, inventories or check lists. What she offers is a frame of reference for viewing parent-child transactions, irrespective of the methods through which data have been gathered. The assessment of the degree of balance or imbalance among the four major variables requires a judgment —a clinical judgment or perhaps a commonsense judgment— but a judgment based upon the interaction among the four variables. It is a judgment that can be made at any age during the developmental period, and in regard to any or all of the significant facets of a child's life at a given age. Indeed, it is not possible to make the judgment without taking into account the age and experience of the child, and without specific reference to the particular facets of his life which are under scrutiny. It is a challenge to the scientists who study development to evolve techniques to assess interacting variables. At present we have neither statistical techniques nor computer programmes which enable us to make such judgments automatically. Nevertheless, there is more flexibility in our present techniques than our fixation on independent bipolar variables would indicate. The chief requirement is to recognize that where there are interacting variables the interactions must be taken into account. It can be argued that even four variables viewed in interaction yield an over-simplified and misleading picture. The traditional clinical approach uses a great multiplicity of variables in an effort to comprehend the complex of particularities in the individual case. Are we in danger of losing the insights and flexibility of the clinical approach if we filter them through the assessment scheme suggested in this book? The danger is, I believe, much less than it might appear at first glance, for many of the variables valued by clinicians may be fitted into the four-variable framework without substantial distortion.

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Mrs. Davis arrived at her viewpoint after a painstaking analysis of longitudinal data obtained from the sixth year of life to late adolescence. My own research has focused upon transactions between mothers and infants in the first year of life. Those variables which are emerging as significant conditions of healthy development, both of interpersonal attachments and of cognitive function, fit into Mrs. Davis's framework very well indeed. Any scheme of assessment which seems applicable from early infancy throughout the whole developmental period is certainly one that deserves close attention. Mrs. Davis's contribution grew out of a long-term longitudinal study, begun many years ago. Consequently, the data left much to be desired in the light of our present knowledge. To reap a rich harvest under these circumstances required sharp wits. The data do not speak for themselves; or rather, they speak in many conflicting tongues. We are grateful that Mrs. Davis had the sharpness of wit and the depth of wisdom to develop a frame of reference that not only has helped her to comprehend her own data but also will help many others chart a course of understanding in the complex sea of parent-child interaction. MARY D. SALTER AINSWORTH

Acknowledgments

FIRSTI would pay tribute to the many parents and children who 'participated in the longitudinal study of child development conducted by the Institute of Child Study in Toronto. For years these parents and children demonstrated their faith in the value of the research project. They kept records, they came for tests and interviews—and they taught us a great deal. This book reveals only a small part of what we learned from them. To them we express our heartfelt gratitude for making the study possible. Next, I would like to acknowledge the debt I owe to the late William E. Blatz. A pioneer in the field of child study, he established the first nursery school in Canada in 1926. He also developed what he called a theory of human "security," a theory which was never static. It was constantly being revised as knowledge increased, and he often discussed his ideas with his colleagues. We did not always agree, but we were always stimulated to greater efforts to understand how a child comes to maturity. And he never let us forget that theory and research must go hand in hand. Among those who launched this longitudinal study were Mrs. Helen Bott, Mrs. Nellie Chant, and Mrs. Frances Johnson. With the courage to begin an ambitious project, they helped plan the first interviews and collect the early information. Many members of the Institute staff carried forward this task of collecting information. Thirty years after the project began, Professor Dorothy A. Millichamp, Mrs. Pearl Karal, and I set about analysing the material which had accumulated. Professor Millichamp was the

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guiding spirit in developing a method of using our descriptive data in a systematic and psychologically sound fashion. Other members of the staff gave generously of their time and knowledge to assist us. I am particularly grateful to Dr. Mary L. Northway, whose ability to ferret out the valuable and discard the trivial has been tremendously useful. The study of parentchild relationships, in terms of the theory set forth in this book, has continued with the assistance of two government grants: National Health Grant 605-5-309, and Ontario Mental Health Grant number 5. This publication was assisted by the Publications Fund of the University of Toronto Press. Finally, I thank my secretary Jessica Roff for her efficient and tireless work on the manuscript, and for her unfailing cheerfulness which so often made the hopeless seem possible.

CARROLL DAVIS

Contents

Introduction / xiii PART ONE 1 A Study of Individuals / 3 2 The Meaning of Emancipation / 12 3 Reciprocal Trust and Emancipation / 23 4 Emotional Balance / 40 PART TWO The Stories of Seven Children

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5 Frank's Story / 62 6 Amy's Story / 83 7 Eve's Story / 101 8 Celia's Story / 116 Twins as Foils for Each Other / 140 10 Bert's Story / 158 PART THREE

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The Method of Assessing Reciprocal Trust and Emancipation / 173 12 Failures in Reciprocal Trust / 192 13 Observations and Conclusions / 202 References / 213

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Introduction

Background—An Early Longitudinal Study of Child Development THE THEORY and the method of assessing parent-child relationships described in this book grew out of an earlier study. The collection of information about children's growing began with the opening of a nursery school in 1926 under the direction of the late Dr. W. E. Blatz. The setting was the Institute of Child Study at the University of Toronto (13), a research and teaching centre concerned primarily with children who are not emotionally disturbed, retarded, or otherwise handicapped. The Institute studies children who are called "normal," "ordinary," or "well," for lack of a word to include their variety, their surprises, their assets. The original definition of "normal" by which the children were selected was simple and practical. The policy of the school was to refuse only children whose prior physical or psychological history made it seem unlikely that they would fit into the life of the school. The subjects in the longitudinal study all attended the Institute's nursery school between 1926 and 1945, and as there was no way of predicting how two-year-olds would turn out as adults, the plan was to study all who entered the school, and to find out not simply what they would eventually become, but also how they would manage along the way. To this end, parents were asked to participate in the research programme by helping the staff review their child's progress every year, from the age of five to twenty-five. Each year parent and child came for interviews to provide

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us with information. When the study was first planned there were no clear-cut ideas about the influences on child development. That was probably just as well, because we were free to ask about everything that occurred to us as having a possible bearing on the subject. Interview questions covered the child's daily life at home, his friends, his school, his temperament, his fears and angers, his physical health, and any behaviour problems. Child and parent were seen separately and were asked many of the same questions. To the child's list were added questions about his dreams, about what he had enjoyed most in the past year, and what he had enjoyed least. All this resulted in some lively accounts. The day came when the number of graduates was too large, and the staff too busy with wartime nursery schools. With some misgivings, a change to written questionnaire records was made. However, the questions were designed to elicit descriptive answers rather than a simple yes or no. These open-ended questions reflect a change in thinking about research in child study. Projective techniques were teaching us the value of descriptive material. As the parents participating in the study were literate and thoughtful, their written answers turned out to be a richer source of information than earlier interviews. The written answers gave a more direct contact with the parent than did notes taken by various staff interviewers. Additional information about each child came from school reports, from intelligence tests, and from projective tests when these came into use. Building Individual Life Stories from Longitudinal Data Data were collected over a period of thirty years. It should be emphasized here that this information had practical uses. When parents or children came, through the years, to consult the staff about personal problems, the history material was looked into. Furthermore, the staff learned a great deal about growth processes from the material. Their knowledge has contributed to the teaching of students and the guidance of parents. As research data, the follow-up records on nearly two hun-

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died children were not easy to handle. We tried classifying the information: various aspects of the child's life were divided into categories and the relevant items of information were listed under each heading. But looking at fifteen years of a child's life this way told nothing—all the sense had been analysed out of it, and nothing was left but inert pieces. Each child had been reduced to a series of lists of rather imprecise items. Only the "corfiments" column, where miscellaneous explanations were reported, gave any inkling about a real person. For instance, anger, at twelve years, might be listed as occurring "almost daily, lasts two or three minutes." This entry was only brought to life by a "comment" such as, "She has lately become resentful of even routine requests, never likes to be told what to do. Is often angry at her brother." This did not, in itself, tell very much, but at least it was a real clue about a real child. Still looking for a research method, we abandoned the categorizing which had been designed to compare one child with another. We found that as we read through a single child's records, year after year, a picture of his personality began to form. He grew before our eyes. Determined not to lose sight of this reality, we made each child a research study. Previously, when the aim had been to compare the details of one child's behaviour with those of another, the fact that each case was reported by a different observer, the mother, had been a disadvantage. The situation was completely altered when the goal was to understand an individual child: then his mother, in the role of observer, told us about herself as well as about her child. Knowing both partners in the relationship helped us to see why the child grew up the way he did. The very tone of a mother's statements about her child added to our understanding of them both. For example: Frank's mother saw him as "getting mad all the time; nothing pleases him"; Daisy's mother saw her as "easy to get along with, seldom angry, only if she feels she is unfairly treated." At least part of the difference between those children was in the mothers. From many such items a picture of a relationship developed. With this revised view of what constituted valid data, we began to build up individual

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portraits of maturing children. We had found a new approach, and a way to let the material speak for itself. The nature of our material determined our use of it. Since each child grows up in his own way, we had to find the means to fathom each process. The quality in our material which we valued most was that it consisted of the genuine facts of childhood: feelings and events, described by parent and child, at the time they occurred. Looking at those descriptions in retrospect, we could not change them, nor could we squeeze them to fit a particular scheme. The reconstruction of the parent-child relationship was based on real-life events. Any scheme built must incorporate them all. We knew our facts were incomplete, as they must be in any study of a "whole" child, but we had large samples of behaviour which were detailed and frequently dramatic. There were many quotations, descriptions of feelings, and exact accounts of events that had happened. Ivan said, at fifteen, "My parents and I often disagree, and they always win"; he sounded discouraged about his parents' winning, but at the same time he often disagreed, so apparently they did listen to him. His way of putting it added another dimension to the relationship. The accounts of the same boy, at eleven, were even more contradictory. He said then that he was "spanked, scolded, sent to his room"; his mother said he was "very sensitive to disapproval . . . he gets mad and bangs around." Yet when asked what he had enjoyed most in that year, he said there were "too many nice things." These are just samples of the kinds of items that had to be reconciled and that taught us to look below the surface and behind the obvious. The method of building the histories was elaborated as we went along, until a consistent approach was worked out. The lapse of thirty years since the study was begun proved fortunate: the study gained in depth because of the accumulation of insights in child psychology. The attempts that failed were based too literally on the belief that from little blocks of data a structure would arise. The new method took a quite different approach. Instead of adding up small items of behaviour, we tried to find out what each kind of behaviour meant to that person at that moment. Each bit of behaviour in a history derives its meaning from the way it fits in with, and adds to,

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what else is known about the child. When something he does seems to be at odds with the rest of his behaviour, then either the "odd" event is being interpreted incorrectly, or what we thought we knew about the child needs to be re-assessed. Items which seem contradictory have to be taken into account in such a way that the pattern of behaviour will make psychological sense. A coherent picture of a whole person in action gradually emerges. This is a clinical method, with the difference that these stories added an installment each year. Each installment came to the inquirer as a separate account, not as a link in a causal chain. The reader had to discover the links, and each installment could confirm or disprove interpretations made in the past. The stories became more than a simple account of what happened; always there was the underlying "why?" Why did the child do this, why did he choose that, why did he start off in a new direction? And how did his various efforts work out? On each story three members of the research staff worked independently with the same body of raw data. One analysed the child's life with his family; another his social life; the third his vocational-avocational life (school, jobs, play interests). Thus there were built up three separate life stories for the years from nursery school to the early twenties. This division of each child's life into three areas could be followed easily, though not too exclusively. Since each story was concerned with large patterns of growing, it often had to reach into other areas for explanations, and some overlapping resulted. Events in the child's life were significant in more than one area, and inevitably had to be viewed from more than one angle. Building this kind of dynamic history depended greatly on the researcher's knowledge and experience. She needed both practical experience and theoretical understanding in the fields of child development and personality growth. There are also, probably, personal attitudes which make for success or failure with this type of approach. We found, when we tried using graduate students on the project, that some could summarize events but would miss dynamic interrelationships; others lacked sufficient experience with children to catch the meaning in small items of behaviour.

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In addition to these three histories of each child, a fourth view of him was obtained from a Thematic Apperception Test given at age twenty. The test was first analysed by a psychologist unfamiliar with the history material, and thus gave an independent appraisal of adult personality. Having now obtained four separate views of a child, the next step was to put him together again. All who had worked on his stories met in seminar sessions with senior staff members who were hearing the various accounts for the first time. Each member of the research team presented a reasoned account of one aspect of the child's life, and supported her conclusions with evidence from the original records. Then came the weighing of influences and events in the life of this one individual. As each member of the research team was familiar with the whole of the original data, interpretations were frequently challenged, and it was sometimes necessary to go back to the yearly records for clarification. Theory was needed to illuminate a child's behaviour; and real-life happenings provided a check on the theory. The final summation of each child's developmental history was arrived at by the group, thinking together. Definite conclusions were not always possible, due to gaps in the records; then we could only admit our doubts and leave open questions. Thus the life stories were built up—or it might be better to say they were discovered. This marked the end of one stage of the longitudinal study of development begun so long ago. A method had been devised for turning descriptive material into psychological histories, and ten such histories had been completed. They told of real people with their individual patterns of maturing. As a member of the team which had built up the stories, I had worked on the "familial" area, and I continued to search for a common core, a unifying point of view that would bridge the differences in ten growth patterns. Changing Views of the Parent-Child Relationship The present method of assessing the relationship between parent and child is based on a particular view of their interaction, a view which focuses on the child's growth in independence, his growth toward maturity. In the first place, instead of

Introduction

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dealing with parent behaviour and child behaviour as two separate but converging universes, this method deals with them at the point of their convergence. So we view the parent-child relationship in this way: a child needs from his parents several kinds of care (protection, control, assistance), and at the same time, he needs room to do his own growing (to learn skills, to choose goals, to make decisions). The parents' permission for this growing I have called parental respect for the child. Whether or not the parents are meeting both types of needs can only be determined by examining the child's behaviour in order to see through his eyes what his parents do. He knows whether he feels both cared for and respected. Herein lies an operational definition of the reciprocal trust which I take to be a foundation of the child's maturing. A child grows when his needs are met. He moves from the outer controls provided by his parents to the inner controls he provides for himself. A key to the recognition of reciprocal trust is a four-fold concept which for convenience we have come to call balance. A parent gives to the child a balance of care and of respect; care and respect go hand in hand, and proof that they are in balance is the evidence on the child's side that there is a satisfactory ratio between comfortable reliance on his parent and confidence in his own efforts. Reliance on parents and selfconfidence also go hand in hand. Together with care and respect they constitute the four variables in the parent-child relationship. The four-fold view can be applied in many situations and at all stages of a child's growing-up. This method of assessing the interaction between parent and child has two general uses. The first is practical and immediate, a means of judging whether or not the interaction between this parent and this child, here before us, is promoting the child's emancipation. The second is as a research device for assessing both short-term and long-term effects of various kinds of parental handling on a child's personal growth. On the practical side, the method of assessing reciprocal trust and emancipation draws attention to the child's general requirements. Because it also provides a method of judging if trust and some degree of emancipation are effectively present, it has turned out to be a useful teaching device. Parents like it because

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of its positive approach—it gives them something to aim for. It is a fresh way of looking at their child, and at their own behaviour and attitudes. Teachers find that it applies to the classroom situation, to the relationship between teacher and child. It helps them see where a child needs help and where he is ready for independence. Help is not necessarily "babying"; it can be a preparation for self-reliance. But too much help can say to the child "You are not up to doing it yourself." The adult's lack of confidence can deflate him, just as denying him freedom can wither the challenge of independence. I like the four-fold way of looking at the adult-child relationship because it sets up general principles instead of specific rules; every case has to be looked at individually—and one must have the imagination to see the world as it looks to this child. A built-in safeguard is the avoidance of extremes: what is "enough" for this child must always be sought between too little and too much. We cannot take the bit in our teeth and go all out for love, forgetting the child's need for limits and controls. The balancing of four kinds of behaviour is a simple idea; full appreciation of it comes with working through, and assessing, actual case material. As a diagnostic tool the four-way definition of reciprocal trust and emancipation is proving useful. In our research school the parents are free at any time to come to the staff to discuss a problem or to ask for an assessment of their child's progress. In such instances the home history material is put in the form of an emancipation appraisal—in balance-imbalance terms. This makes descriptive material about the child both easier to handle and more meaningful. Suppose a child is described as "having no friends." Is this a lack of confidence which shows up in other areas of his life? Or are other areas too demanding? Or is he so busy and keen elsewhere that friends are secondary just now? Perhaps he has a friend or two, or a number of casual contacts, and this is enough for him. Perhaps the social ambitions are his mother's. We can show her how well he is doing in other areas and that these areas will bring him social confidence in his own good time. An emancipation appraisal is a fine way of pointing up to parents their children's positive gains.

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In the clinic a child often presents us with the type of behaviour he has used with the strategic adults in his world. He may have developed ways of seeking dependence, or of denying his need for it, or of refusing any form of help that is offered him; or he may be so lacking in confidence that he wants help even in choosing a toy to play with. He shows us some of the deficiencies in his present relations with adults, and hence he reveals what we must offer him in a way that he can accept. Through starting with an emphasis on balance and on the "normal" child, we come to a recognition of the imbalances and the deviations. As a research device, the method of assessment of reciprocal trust and emancipation provides a basis for defining variables in parental and child behaviour. It begins by defining the desirable types of behaviour. These are, in a sense, mid-points between extremes—what Bronfenbrenner (5) calls the "optimal level" which comes between "too much love or too little, too strict discipline or too lax." His study of adolescent responsibility points up the deleterious effects of such extremes. If the mid-points are determined by the four-way test for balanced interaction, then the extremes are recognized by their imbalance. Balance and the extremes of imbalance provide a system for classifying parental behaviour variables. For instance, parental care for the child is of several kinds: it provides for his material requirements, it assists him in what he cannot do, it has controls for his safety and for his socialization. Whenever any type of care is overdone the child experiences restriction, is given too little room. When each kind of care is accompanied by parental respect, the child is assured enough room to grow. On the other hand, when care of any kind is lacking, the child has too much room. A number of types of parental behaviour have this effect. The child may be neglected or rejected, he may be over-indulged in a way that leaves too many decisions up to him. So much may be expected of him that he finds himself in an alien world—again he is denied care. And let me repeat, the classification of parental behaviour is determined by balance or lack of it in the behaviour of the child. The system developed by Schaeffer (19) for classifying parental behaviour affords some interesting comparisons.

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Schaeffer's hypothetical circumplex model for maternal behaviour shows the behaviour variables arranged in a circular order, without beginning or end. The hypothetical axes of this circle he calls autonomy-control and love-hostility. They divide the circle in four parts. Starting at the top with the extreme of freedom (autonomy) and moving clockwise, we come to acceptance, the extreme end of the love axis. In this segment are the more positive variables: "freedom, co-operative, democratic, accepting [attitudes]." The segment that moves from love around to control passes through "over-indulgence, protective indulgence, over-protective [concern]," to "possessive" as the extreme attribute of control on the love side of the lovehostility dimension. The next segment moves from the extreme of control, through "authoritarian, dictatorial and demanding, antagonistic," to the extreme of hostility. This last attribute signifies rejection. In the final segment hostility lessens and freedom increases; behaviour patterns pass through "neglecting, indifferent, detached"—and we are back at autonomy again. This statistically derived arrangement of parent variables makes good sense and is clear-cut and neat. Looking at this construct, one is struck by the fact that the kinds of behaviour which are generally considered to be good for the child cluster in one quadrant, between autonomy and love. That there are more kinds of poor parental behaviour than of "good" is not just a function of studies that focus on inadequacies. It seems obvious that there are more ways of being a bad parent than of being a good one. This is emphasized if we look through a child's eyes and let him be the judge of what he needs. However, a child looking at the Schaeffer variables would surely have to choose two quite different kinds of parental behaviour. From the freedom-acceptance, positive area he could choose a democratic parent. However, this alone would be inadequate, he is not up to the decisions and skills involved in democracy. This is no mere semantic quibble—he also needs a protecting and controlling parent. As presently set up there are only negative-sounding parental behaviour patterns included in the lovecontrol segment. Undoubtedly our child would choose parental behaviour in the general love-acceptance area, but within that

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he has two divergent requirements, freedom and control. In theory the ideal treatment for the child is halfway between freedom and control, but when this ideal is translated into behavioural terms the parent is required to do two quite different things, both necessary. It becomes apparent that the concept of a statistical midpoint, or halfway mark, between autonomy and control obscures what actually happens. The words themselves suggest a double view: the autonomy is in the child, the control is from the parent. A child cannot be half controlled and half free, but he can be controlled where he needs to be and free where he is able. An assessment of parent-child interaction in terms of a mid-point between freedom and control is misleading because it hides the dual nature of the child's requirements. Freeing and controlling are alternative forms of parental behaviour which must be assessed in conjunction with each other in each situation where they are pertinent. They belong together as related alternatives. A parent who allows all freedom about bedtime and exercises strict control over play, might represent a hypothetical mid-point in an overall view. This example is far-fetched in order to illustrate the possibilities for confusion when we talk about control as a parental quality rather than as behaviour experienced by a child. When a parent is called loving or hostile the same difficulty arises. In theory one can say that both love and hostility play a part in every human relationship, and that some free expression of both contributes to a healthy relationship. For a child, however, there is no mid-point optimum here—he needs to feel sure he is well loved. Then he can be ready to experience the reality of anger or hostility, both in himself and directed toward him by another person. And to express emotion is better than to bury it. Probably the love-hostility dimension is a parent variable that has nothing to do with the child. It is how the parent expresses love that is important—and he may express it through care, and through respect. The passing angers of daily life can be an expression of care when a child does something dangerous; they can be an expression of respect when a parent admits his own all-too-human frustrations. Such angers are not

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at the opposite pole from love; they co-exist with it. The child recognizes them as belonging within the bounds of love. Attention focused on the effect which adult behaviour has on the child forces us to make explicit what is often only inferred. For example, when Kagan and Moss (15) take "restrictiveness" as a key variable in maternal behaviour, there is some ambiguity about what the child is doing. Presumably if a parent is rated highly restrictive, the child is experiencing restriction, or what I call too much care—because control is one aspect of care. But a child may also feel restricted by the rules imposed for his protection. I am sure that the Pels observers described by Kagan and Moss were taking such distinctions into account, but a convincing portion of their evidence is hidden when we are not told the child's responses to the restrictiveness. A "reasonable" amount of restriction would be recognized by two types of evidence—the child is both accepting controls and putting forth independent effort. Control and autonomy then go hand in hand. The simultaneous assessment of the behaviour of parent and child is not possible unless one can break down their interaction into smaller units. A single overall assessment of reciprocal trust would bog down in a welter of conflicting detail. But the detail of each relationship can be taken into account if we look at the interaction between parent and child in the small natural divisions of their life together, in the events, requirements, and challenges a child encounters in growing up in a family and a community. Various family activities, friends, the use of money are such natural divisions. The four-way test of reciprocal trust can be applied wherever there is a back-and-forth flow of action and reaction around a usual activity or function. Obviously it is impossible to look at all of these, but a system of sampling can be arrived at which will give a fairly complete view of a total relationship. The sampling system which I have worked out makes thirty to thirty-five separate judgments, as described in chapter 11. Althougji the whole sampling procedure needs further study, this kind of breakdown into smaller units makes it possible to assess the parent-child relationship with some confidence. Also

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the resulting composite picture should be more precise than that gained from overall judgments. For example, part of parental care is the setting of rules and limits for the child's protection. This kind of care would be judged several times, once for each division of the child's life, a technique which gives due weight to the fact that rules can be restrictive in one area and permissive in another. When a child is very young, single judgments may be sufficiently reliable. A baby's world is small, his needs recognizable and limited. As he grows older his wants proliferate, his complexity increases. From work with longitudinal data I have become convinced that overall estimates of parental methods or child behaviour become less and less reliable as the child grows older. His relations with his parents can show remarkable variation from one area of life to another. Within the total relationship, many patterns of interaction are possible. Although the significance of various patterns is yet to be determined, the fact that a relationship may be assessed in the same terms in different areas and at different ages makes it possible to study the effect of various patterns on the process of emancipation. The deeper meaning of parental behaviour and of child behaviour derives from their contribution to the patterning of a relationship. In long-term studies the matter of equivalent assessments at different ages is a familiar problem. The Fels study, previously mentioned (15), reports an interesting finding in this connection. The results show what the observers call a "sleeper effect": assessments of maternal behaviour made during the period from birth to three years were more predictive of adult adjustment than were assessments made at later ages. One could thus assume that parents establish a relationship with their young children which has a lasting effect. If this is the case, then one becomes extremely curious about apparent changes in the later childhood years, and the Fels study does some valuable speculating on these matters. However, my experience suggests that the most likely reason for the "sleeper effect" could be the increasing difficulty, as children get older, of finding the real quality of a relationship beneath the surface behaviour. Surface

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frictions, problems, or worries in one area can obscure a sound relationship. Conversely, a satisfied parent with a conforming child can convince us that all is well and blind us to hidden stresses in some portions of the child's life. In any event, a number of questions are raised for further investigation. In the following chapters the four-fold assessment of reciprocal trust is suggested as a means of making comparable judgments, either between children, or in long-range studies of individuals. When we wish to study the effect of various parental attitudes and practices on child development, the method has an additional advantage. It takes into account a child's present method of responding to any particular kind of parental behaviour. His present ways of reacting will surely influence his later adjustments. If his mother is over-protective he may acquiesce passively or rebel actively or evade her by various means. The method he chooses will have a future effect. Contemporary parent-child interaction should be more predictive than either parental behaviour or child behaviour taken separately. Viewing the state of interaction also gets around the question of "who started it"—is the mother being domineering or is she reacting to a rebellion? New studies at the Institute of Child Study, based on this method, are investigating the constancy in the quality of relationships—both through the years and across the board from one life area to another. What are the influences which tend to change the quality for better or for worse? What effect do various patterns of interaction have on a child's adjustment outside his home? And on his overall personality development? Can we test the basic hypothesis that a child's crucial needs are for reliance on his parents and for room to be himself? When we insist that the needs are crucial, we still have to know how crucial. In other words can some deficiencies be compensated for and others not? The general scheme for assessing reciprocal trust and emancipation sets up variables in the behaviour of parents and children which lend themselves to statistical treatment. The course of a parent-child relationship can be traced in terms of variations in parental care, parental respect, child reliance, and child emergence. A research method begins to take shape.

PART ONE

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1. A Study of Individuals

BRINGING UP A CHILD is an art. Perhaps it always will be, but to let the matter rest there is to give up too soon. The art involves working with an unusual medium, one that has a mind and will of its own, a child who is constantly his own designer. A parent can enter into partnership with the child's process of self-creation, or he can stifle it. A good deal, fortunately, has been discovered about the possibilities and potentialities of this medium. Nevertheless each parent faced with a child is facing a new problem. In this book I attempt to set out some general principles for the guidance and comfort of the practitioners of the art of bringing up children. The ideas presented here grew out of my work on a longitudinal study which followed a group of children each year from the age of five to over twenty. This long view demonstrated many contradictions and diversities in the growing-up process, and the effort to reconcile them led to a theory about emancipation, a term which seemed to be most useful as a way of referring to the process by which a child becomes a self-directed individual. The theory includes within it a method for appraising a child's progress in becoming emancipated. To become such a self-directed individual a child has to go through a long process of moving away from dependence on his parents. This process is his "emancipation." In the course of moving away, he is also working toward a higher goal, that of becoming a person who finds satisfaction in his own uniqueness, yet one whose belief in his own worth and integrity quickens his faith in others. A child begins very early to work towards this goal. Relinquishing his childish dependence on his

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parents is thus a prime condition for progress, and to say he is separating himself from his parents is to say he is becoming an individual, a person in his own right. As I watched various children in the study growing for fifteen years, their strivings for individuality appeared truly dramatic. Each one tackled the matter in his own way; and each one tied all the major strands of his life into the project. In all cases individuality had its beginnings within the home and was influenced by parents, siblings, and family circumstances. In this setting, the child's own make-up determined what he could do; each child could move easily in some directions and not in others. What challenged one child to greater effort led to another's downfall. A child faced by too great pressures strove in whatever way he could to defend his growing self, but unfortunately the need to build defences could become so great that his sense of self was weakened by the struggle. Struggling for independence did not necessarily lead to greater maturity: obstacles weakened one child while another throve on them. One child grew strong through making choices and decisions, another would twist and turn to avoid making up his mind about anything at all. Some children clung to their early reliance on their parents; others were increasingly ready to do without it. These are but a few examples of what I had to consider in developing a systematic view of the emancipation process. When parents are faced with bringing up one particular child, information about children in general helps only up to a point. Knowing about stages of development and the usual capacities at different ages gives a general framework within which to view an individual. His uniqueness is still a puzzle; by definition it fits no norms. His parents wonder what he may become, and, if they are conscientious, they want to foster his differentness in constructive ways. They may believe that he will do his own growing and they need only co-operate. If, on the other hand, they believe they must mould and train him as they think best, then individuality is secondary and the problem is a different one—to persuade this child to grow in a direction chosen by someone else. Which of these alternatives is better: stress on individuality or stress on training? The obvious answer is that

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the child needs both. He needs to conform to social requirements and also to be fully himself. But the problem is not really solved until we can say how much of each. To that question this study is directed. While not ignoring training, I am concerned here more with the means of safeguarding individuality. How can we insure for each child the opportunity to develop his own potential? Some features are common to all children, and I am looking especially for similarities in the roads that lead to uniqueness. One similarity can be stated in this way: every child needs enough room —neither a padded cell nor unlimited space. "Enough room" consists of dependable care plus freedom. In real-life situations we need a method of assessing enough room for this child at this time. Can we learn to look through his eyes and see if he has enough, or too much, or too little? Do We Want Emancipated Individuals? The idea of giving children enough room for freedom and independence meets sometimes with opposition which has deep roots in the past. It also runs counter to some present trends. In the Old Testament stories, which are still part of our heritage, the Patriarch loved and protected his wives and his children, his servants, his camels, and his cattle. All were equally his property and he could do with them as he pleased. Coming quickly to the very present, we laugh at Clarence Day's depiction of "Life with Father," but we laugh partly because it is credible and we half sympathize with the father's feeling that he should be master, even while we think he goes too far. The shift to another point of view is recent. The changing status of children has been reflected in legislation. In England the first Factory Act, in 1802, forbade the shipping of "pauper apprentices" (very young children) from London workhouses to the cotton mills, located beside the water power in remote northern valleys. In 1819, night work for children was prohibited, and a twelve-hour day prescribed. As there was no provision for the inspection of mills, this new

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law was little more than a benevolent gesture, along with other humanitarian causes such as freeing slaves and preventing cruelty to animals. However, the Factory Act of 1833 further reduced work hours for children and provided for inspections to ensure that the law was carried out. The Education Acts, which came next, had as part of their purpose the protection of children from the parents who exploited them. This was in the end a more effective way of preventing child labour, as it included the children working on farms and in home industries. Society began to see, too, that it had a stake in what happened to all children. With the extension of the vote to town dwellers, as well as landowners, came the realization that "now we must educate our masters." Changes wrought in the status of children by ideas and words have been less concrete, but perhaps more potent. For a hundred years novelists and biographers have been opening doors to show us the world of childhood. Dickens' pathetic urchins have cried for sympathy, and stories of cruel parents and cruel teachers have pointed up the plight of the young. Now psychologists and educators have taken on the job of convincing us that saving the children is more than a humanitarian cause. The future of mankind is at stake. Society has thus come a long way: children are no longer sold as chimney sweeps; they are no longer owned by their parents. But a new slavery threatens as children become increasingly the responsibility of the state. They must be cared for, and all must be given equal educational opportunities. The schools get bigger, the children are engulfed in them for more and more years, and the goal of fitting them into society becomes uppermost. An equal chance for all can override the needs of individuality and difference. Of course one does not make a blanket condemnation of the schools; they must stress conformity in some measure in order to run at all. Also, the schools provide what the majority of parents demand of them— parents insist that facilities and courses and methods must be alike for all. We are in danger of ending up with one mould— and of trying to pour all children into it. Many of them dislike this pressure; many are misfits. Some parents and some educa-

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tors are trying to stem the trend, and one may hope they will eventually succeed. In the meantime parents can do something about these pressures now, something they have done well in the past. They can promote individuality. Put two different parents together and the result is a unique household with its own special character. Each of their children brings to it his own particular heredity, and as all these personalities influence one another further variety is added. One function of the family may be to train children in the ways and values of their society, but even at its most traditional it has also produced individuals who changed society, for better or for worse. As mass production and mass communications push us toward conformity and persuade us that safety lies in being alike, there is an opportunity for families to recognize the asset which lies in their hands. Though variety can be puzzling and unnerving, it will in the end be wiser to trust children more, to let them think new thoughts. When they are freed through this encouragement of difference, they may not all become original thinkers, great statesmen, or scientists, but all will contribute to a climate which encourages exceptional individuals, a climate ready for new visions and new solutions to old problems. The promotion of differences between individuals can be seen in one way as an advantage to society, or in another way as of primary importance to the individual himself. The latter aspect is my chief concern here. If we start from a belief that each person has the right to direct his own life, then we must also grant him the right to be different from each other person. Only then is he in a position to make his own choices. Looking at a young child with this goal in mind, we see that it is not possible to persuade or coerce him into being selfdirected. His own deep desire to be unique is a prerequisite which we must accept. Many descriptions of mental health rest on the premise that man is agent and creator, that he only fulfils himself as he takes a hand in his own destiny. Erikson (9) says "Development of a healthy personality depends on a certain degree of choice, a certain hope for an individual chance, a certain conviction in freedom of self-determination" And he

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goes on to say he is "speaking not only of high privileges and lofty ideals but also of psychological necessities." Johoda (14), summing up many definitions of mental health, gives the essentials thus: "a healthy personality masters his environment actively, shows a certain uniformity of personality, and is able to perceive the world and himself correctly." However we say it, at the centre of the concept is an abiding sense of the self as distinct and unique, and as having a degree of autonomy. Allport (2) in speaking of "original dispositions and capacities to ensure growth and orderly structure," says, "one of the capacities most urgent is individuation, the formation of a life style that is self-aware, self-critical, and self-enhancing." In the course of this book we shall see that children form such a life style comfortably and effectively when they have sufficient room—neither too much nor too little. In the existentialist view: "Man is not a ready-made being; man will become what he makes himself and nothing more. Man constructs himself through his choices. . . . "(Ellenberger, 8.) The making of choices requires an orderly world, for in a chaotic state choice is meaningless or impossible. For a growing child an orderly world and enough room are essential requirements. There is a good deal of evidence for the belief that an ordinary child, one not deprived or warped, really wants to become a free and independent person. Each has within him the potential and the urge toward positive growth. Like an eager explorer he strives to make sense of his world, and to build his own identity. In our stories the evidence for this belief is largely circumstantial, and the belief may be, at bottom, a matter of faith. An alternative view of the child asserts that he starts more or less a blank, with certain needs destined to ensure his survival, needs which can be used to train and mould him and fill him up until he is an acceptable member of society. Despite the bluntness of this simplification, the difference of approach is fundamental. It would seem that we must begin by agreeing at this level, if there is to be further agreement on how to help children grow up—or even on methods of studying children. A collective look at the children in our study at first reveals few similarities among them. As adults they are poles apart in

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their activities and interests, in their values and goals—in short, as personalities. Their backgrounds are too similar to offer explanations for their variety. As children they attended the Institute's nursery school together and went on to similar schools; all had economic security; all had educated middle-class parents who were concerned for their welfare. Yet each child selected particular interests and goals, special aspects of the environment available to him, and passed over others. Their personal involvements in life, both as to kind and as to degree, seem to have been shaped from within themselves, and only secondarily by external circumstances. To a large extent each one chose his own way. Caught by their variety as young children, an observer found it increasingly difficult to see similarities as they matured. Yet there must have been elements in common. The most important was right before us—we had indeed been tripping over it. What every child wanted at every age, was to be unique. Small wonder we found them so different—they had all been working at it. Here, then, was one common theme, central to the building of each individual personality. If this desire was at the heart of their life patterns, many other events began to fall into place around it. In the early stages of working on the stories we came to realize we were paying too little attention to the children's mothers. One of the pitfalls was that each child became, through the medium of the yearly records, a personal friend; we cared very much how he made out. Although this sympathy alerted us to the helpful things that happened to him, and to his good efforts, we tended to applaud him as the hero, and to hiss the villain—often identified as his mother. This was a measure of our shortsightedness. The mother was a main character in the drama and she provided much of the essential information. We had taken her into account in some ways but had failed to recognize the importance of her own hopes and expectations and problems. Her views, we knew, could not always be taken at face value. She might say, "There is something wrong with my child. I have tried everything—nothing works." Or she might listen to the child specialists and decide the fault was

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hers. Moreover, parents seemed to think then, as they often do now, that problems were what mattered. Their reports tended to pass over what went well, to take that for granted. A focus on problems missed the good qualities often existing under surface friction. Blaming the parent, or the child, obscured the fact that strength or weakness migftt lie in the relation between the parent and the child, not in one alone. Sometimes a parent did the oddest things and her child got on well; in other cases a conscientious parent did all the "right" things and ran into difficulties—or at least her child did. In the long view it was possible to figure out what had been happening, but this was only hindsight. Obviously the contemporary view of what was right or wrong for the child needed some revising, and we came to re-examine our own ideas. We had been far too sure we knew what "good" methods looked like. Another feature conspicuous in the long view of the parentchild relationship was that the fruitful relationship tended to run smoothly. Emancipation came without rebellion. When parental ideas and dictates seem rigid and confining to a child, one expects he will rebel. On the surface, rebellion has a flavour of independence, yet it may be the opposite of genuine confidence. Getting away from parents is necessary, and some children do manage it with ease. Where a smooth relationship with parents is leading to emancipation, the child must be asserting himself in ways satisfactory to himself and acceptable to his parents. However, one cannot make the converse assumption —that any sign of difficulty means a poor relationship. Nor could one say that because a relationship runs smoothly it must be good. A relation between slave and master can go smoothly. To the suggestion that children should rebel, that standing up to parents shows they are becoming emancipated, the only answer is a question: What kind of parents should be stood up to? The answers to this and similar questions begin to come into focus if we compare the goals and values of the child and his parent. These are a major factor in their relationship. As each child looks to the future, does what he wants for himself coin-

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cide with what his parents want for him? If both child and parents are headed in the same direction the future looks bright; if they are headed in different directions trouble may be expected. This sounds like a mere truism until we make the more definite statement that every child wants to be unique and self-directed. He wants many other things as well—to stay alive, to be liked by other people—but for personality growth, uniqueness is vital. The necessary steps in this direction are away from childish dependence, and I believe it is possible to judge if parents are helping or hindering. In order to see a child whole, and to understand him in action, we must consider not only "where from," but also "where to." The child moves from what he has been toward what he is to become; he has been a helpless infant, he is to become, we hope, a confident adult. This change implies a transformation in his relations with his parents, and to accomplish the transformation he needs his parents' co-operation. When parents and child combine their efforts so that emancipation may be accomplished, those efforts have, in all cases, certain basic qualities. Herein lie the similarities which facilitate the development of individuality. The theme of emancipation can be used to specify what is "enough room" to become a free and independent person. When one speaks of emancipation one takes a particular view of the relationship between parent and child, a view that brings together the details of a child's daily life into a coherent picture of growing up.

2. The Meaning of Emancipation

IT TAKES A LONG TIME to become a person. There may indeed be no end to the process. The first years of childhood see the fastest progress and are considered the most important. The growth may be slower in the years from five to twenty, but this jump too is spectacular. And it is harder to assess because of the variety of directions in which an older child may go. One constant through it all is the child's emergence from the shelter of home. His method of getting away interests us, and so do the parents he is leaving behind. I am suggesting that we look at what goes on between them through a particular pair of spectacles. To cut off our view of the child where parental influence ends means, of course, that we have less than a total picture of him. However, in one sense, the whole story of a child's growing up is centred in his relationship with his mother. It touches nearly every part of his life; his mother has some influence even when she stays out of his affairs, since to stay out is to take a particular line toward him—one quite different from her previous care for his helplessness. Though I speak here as if a child had only one parent, it is partly because the early longitudinal investigation at the Institute of Child Study, from which this work derives, contained little information about the part played by the fathers of the children. So we concentrated on the mother-child relationship, and this concentration has been continued as a means of simplifying the problem. I am assuming that what is learned about the mother-child relationship will throw light on the child's relationship with his father, or with any adult on whom he depends, whether teacher, grandparent, or adopted aunt (see Millichamp, 17).

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Because the parent-child relationship is going to be used as the central means of examining a child's growth toward independence and individuality, the term should be described more fully. The words "parent-child relationship" are often used very glibly, as if there could be no doubt of their meaning, and yet what one sees in the relationship will surely depend on what one is looking for. I suspect it is usual to watch the child; particularly what is being done to him and how he responds. On the other hand, if we look at both child and parent, over a long period, we become aware of how much they affect each other. Patterns begin to appear in the way they behave toward each other. It is not so simple as "mother does this and then child does that, then she does thus and he responds so." Rather, what she does second is, in part, an answer to his way of responding to her first effort. This sounds obvious but in actual observation it is no easy matter to keep focusing on what goes on between two people—it is like watching a ball thrown back and forth, the throwing and catching follow a pattern because each player anticipates the other's manner of throwing or catching. This analogy suggests a variety of possibilities: one in which the two usually catch each other's throws; one in which each is throwing wildly, sometimes missing, sometimes hitting painfully; one in which each player tries to out-manoeuvre the other and there is more antagonism than reciprocity. The comparison with a game of catch has served its purpose if it keeps our attention on the continuous interacting between the two. To follow their interaction we must watch it for a little while —long enough to see what really goes on. A single spanking does not make a dominating mother, nor a single outburst a rebellious child. Finally time itself comes to play a part because both the people are changing constantly: the child more noticeably as he grows fast, the mother less quickly but just as surely over the years. The patterns between them may or may not adjust to the change with age. A child and his mother are partners in his growing-up operation. Watching one or the other is never enough to explain the intricacies of the relationship. Saying that patterns appear in the way mother and child act toward each other means simply that mother and child tend to do the same kind of things over and over. Sometimes they show

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the same behaviour patterns in many settings; other times the behaviour varies with the setting. The ways in which they make demands, requests, appeals, or the ways they respond or comply, tend to recur. These behaviour patterns-reflect underlying feelings about and toward each other. Under the more fleeting irritations or enthusiasms are abiding attitudes which affect the general tenor of their interactions. Identifying these patterns in the relationship, along with the feelings and attitudes that accompany the patterns, provides a way of integrating detail into a larger design. It should enable us to compare one child with another, to translate the varieties of parent-child interaction into similar terms. The patterns contain the real meanings. In searching for the meaning of a behaviour pattern in the life of a given child, we often asked the questions, "What does he want?" "What is he trying for?" and we also learned to add the questions, "What does his mother want?" "What is she trying for?" Combining the two sets of questions usually brought some answers in an individual case. Then looking at a group of children forced a general question, "What do all children want?" And putting these questions together leads us to ask what parents and children want of each other. Reciprocal Trust Every child needs to trust his mother. This generally accepted belief provides an answer to the question of what the child wants. We may take this a step further and add that the mother needs to trust her child. Then what both of them want comes together as reciprocal trust. It can be the foundation they build on; the whole tenor of a child's relationship with his mother depends on whether or not they trust each other. For instance, sometimes a mother seems to be saying: "When my child shows he is trustworthy, then I will let him do it himself." The child, equally clearly, seems to be saying: "When I am trusted then I will prove my trust." Such an impasse is in direct contrast to the situation where trust exists, where the child moves forward and his mother's faith in him is vindicated. We, as outsiders looking in, and looking at both sides, can make fairly confident judgment about whether or not trust exists. Still, it would be

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difficult for a parent to make an honest self-appraisal, or even to accept our view, unless we can state the reasons for our judgments. To say that we sense a mother's feeling about her child—which we do—is not a sufficient explanation. An intuitive judgment based on wide experience can be a good one, and is an accepted part of clinical practice, but if we want to be able to communicate fully with others, then an exact and explicit method of judging must be found. A constant point of comparison from one case to another will also make research possible. Is "trust" merely a nebulous feeling? My aim is to take it out of the realm of the mystical, to see it as tied to the words and deeds of interaction patterns. We start from the view that a mother's feeling is conveyed to her child by what she does; then the feeling is a halo which accompanies behaviour and cannot be separated from it. Nevertheless, the manner in which this halo exists for the child will depend on what he is seeking in his world. His own view of himself, and of his world, determines what there is, for him, in her behaviour. Together, the mother's behaviour and his reception of it tell about the trust between them. Though trust has many guises that make it illusive, its basic ingredient is surely mutuality. If one friend trusts and the other mistrusts, then friendship fades. To apply the test of mutuality to the trust between a child and his parent brings us at once to the fact of their obvious inequality. That they are so far from equal sometimes blinds us to the need for both to trust in the two-way relation between them. The answer, in part, seems to be that they trust each other for different things. Each trusts the other to make his own appropriate contribution to their common goal—that the child shall survive and flourish. Most compelling, and the first in time, is the child's need to trust his parent to take care of him and to love him. However, to fulfil this birthright his mother also must trust, trust that he will enjoy being cared for. Thus will he thrive on her care. She loves him and trusts that he will return her affection. Sometimes this is stated the other way around: she should have confidence in herself and in her ability to care for him. Certainly he can only trust in confident care, not in worried or uncertain care. But this

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is only half of the truth, as it leaves out her trusting the child, which, in the first instance, is a trust that he will enjoy being cared for by her. Care is a partnership in which his enjoyment is the proof of care. The second aspect of a mother's trusting has to do with her child's vital need to have his parent believe in him, assure him that he is a fine fellow. She has faith that his faltering steps are leading him to a good life of his own. Added to the trust between protector and protected is the subtle trust in the good will and good intentions of the other. Though the child does more receiving and the parent more giving, the trust between them is warm and comforting to both because it includes the feeling of being trusted. When there is trust, parent and child are in harmony; when there is distrust, they are at cross purposes. Harmony comes when their goals are the same, when they want the same kinds of things, which means, in this unequal relationship, the same kinds of things "for the child." To be at cross purposes means just what it says: to be going in different directions. When I talk here of goals and directions, I mean, of course, something basic and fundamental—not such details as whether Johnny should have a new bike, but rather the principles on which such judgments are made and accepted. Most of the rest of this book is about the translation of trust into action, about the implementing of long-range goals; but first we need to be clear about the nature of the trust and the goals. Trust develops when the hopes of both child and parent lie in the same direction. Parents in general, most parents, good parents, all want to care for their children; at the same time they hope to see their children moving away, no longer needing their care. Thus what the parents want accords perfectly with what the children want. They want to be looked after, and, given even half a chance, they want to grow in independence. Every child's aim is to move in two directions, towards his parent and away; and his parent's aim is to welcome both his coming for help and his going away. Again there can be a catch in the last statement if the mother says, "Yes he should go away, but I know best what direction he should take and when he should go." And

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indeed the mother's knowledge may be greater, but her attitude leads into a blind alley if it concentrates on methods and loses sight of goals. It can amount to giving freedom with one hand and taking it away with the other. It raises complicated arguments about how much freedom and when, as if freedom is something a parent doles out, or a child earns. Confusion is avoided as soon as it is understood that a child must have freedom all the way, just as he must have care—including controls. This double view of the child makes a useable guide to his welfare: always there must be care and freedom, an orderly world and enough room. Trust Has Four Parts The key to sufficient room in an orderly world is, for the child, a four-part relationship of trust between him and his parent. If he requires appropriate amounts of both dependence and independence, then he requires support from his parents for both. A mother cares for her child, and the child relies on that care; a mother respects her child's individuality, and the child emerges as an independent individual. Here are the four parts which allow the child room to move away, he can rely on his parents while he grows in independence. The significant feature of moving away is becoming an individual, and we thus talk of self-reliance, self-effort, self-worth, self-determination. Selfhood is achieved through making choices, so making choices becomes a main method of "moving away." Yet, because of a child's inexperience, many choices are beyond him and have to be made for him by his parents. They are responsible for his well-being: this is the care part of trust. Looking at decision-making in terms of trust changes the question from "How much freedom?" to "Who makes which choices?" This may seem like an artificial distinction, but in actual practice it can make a big difference to the relationship between parent and child. Each one's area of operation can be clarified. Freedom is no longer something to be earned, or grabbed, by the child. Dividing up areas of decision can be a fair and mutual arrangement which even a small child comprehends and appreciates. And the parent has by no means

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thrown in the sponge and given up all controls. Finally, this relation of trust works when parent and child each accept, at least to a large degree, the decisions made by the other. Increases in the child's area of decision come with his readiness to take over more, starting from deciding what he will play with, or whether to wear his blue socks or his brown, on up to choosing which courses he will take in college. In this choosing and accepting of decisions by each of the two people, we have, once again, the four fundamentals of trust between them, and this is the relationship which facilitates and promotes the child's emancipation. This expression of the tie between trust and emancipation is just a special view of a familiar process: the child finding his way to adulthood through the mediations of his parents. A trustful relationship may look different when a child is twenty than it did when he was five, but it has, in fact, the same four basic elements. If all has gone well with the child, the areas in which he is still in a "childish" relation to his parent are now few and small. A grown-up daughter who manages her own social relationships might still be coming to mother for help with matters of social usage; or her mother might intervene to tell her what is customary. In this small area emancipation would be unfinished, and the four-way trust relation would be continuing. On the surface, independence seems to be the essence of emancipation, and every gain in it a step in the right direction. Let the child learn by doing, and when he can manage by himself, let him. A mother can withhold help or she can urge her child to do things himself, to achieve. When dealing with a single piece of behaviour, like putting on shoes or solving a puzzle, this can be a good enough method. But it is a shortrange method which may fail to take into account how the child feels. The child who is becoming emancipated is more than competent—he is better described as confident. Self-confidence is the badge of true independence of spirit and action. So becoming emancipated and mature is vastly more complex than the achievement of independent acts. Or than replacing dependent acts with independent ones under which may lurk

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anxiety and fear. Rigid adherence to rules is another road to superficial independence, an independence that is brittle and limited. Confidence is the bigger concept, and as such must be looked for, not in bits and pieces, but in the whole life of the child. According to Blatz's theory of "security" (4), a child's confidence stems from two main sources: trust in parental care as a safe haven of comfort to step out from and to return to, and trust in himself. The latter builds up gradually through the acquisition of skills and knowledge, through a willingness to try new things and to accept the consequences. Erikson (9) speaks of the "proximity in time of such opposites as not letting mother out of sight" and "wanting to be independent." I am suggesting not only that it takes twenty years or so for such opposites to be resolved, but also that they can abide in harmony along the way. Perhaps the relationship of parent and child is a counterpoint in which each aspect complements and enhances the other—when the parent evokes a propitious climate. Sometimes a child clearly alternates between wanting support and wanting no interference; sometimes he manages to do both at once—he may want his mother to hold his hand while he makes advances to a stranger. At other times he moves directly from one position to the other, he may want his mother to take him up to the door of the dentist's office and then allow him to go in alone. Whichever way he does it, there need be no "break" with his mother. She supports him both ways: she helps him gladly, and equally gladly she keeps hands off. She cares for him and she has faith in him. His learning and experience and confidence are carrying him away; he is finding support in the world beyond his home, from friends, teachers, other adults; and his mother's part is growing less. In order to include both concepts, trust and confidence, I wish to use the words reliance and emergence to describe the child's requirements. His reliance refers to his leaning comfortably on others for needed help; and emergence refers to his stepping out as a self-reliant individual, with all that that implies. Reliance on a parent and emergence as a person are not alternatives. One does not exclude the other, as do the

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terms dependence and independence. Rather, reliance on a parent and emergence as a person are necessary to each other; ideally they combine and work together, and this is the way a person grows. The adult's contribution corresponds to the child's needs, it provides care for him to rely on, and it gives respect to his emerging self. Here are four basic components of the parent-child relationship; together they permit trust in action. Emancipation Depends on Balanced Interaction It is my contention that we can recognize the good, the productive relationship by its balance. The four strands of trustful interaction are woven together, and each one must be sufficiently strong if emancipation is to proceed steadily and hi an orderly fashion. A single strand or element cannot be assessed alone; but one can make a judgment about the whole in terms of the relative strengths of all parts. If a child is both accepting help and making an effort on his own, then his side of the relationship is in balance. If he tends to refuse help which he needs, if he attempts to do everything for himself, it is not; nor is it balanced if he wants all help and fears or avoids independence. Similarly, if his mother gives dependable care and at the same time respects his efforts, then her side is in balance. If she tries to do everything for him, she shows a lack of respect and her side is not balanced; nor is it balanced if she expects too much of him, helps him too little. Obviously then, there is only one balance, and imbalance may take a variety of forms. Balance denotes the desirable relationship in which parent-child interaction is running out because the need for it is diminishing. I shall endeavour to show that a balanced relationship allows the child the greatest scope for individuality and personal development. He will be no over-adjusted mediocrity. The imbalances may seem to show more variety, but each one warps in its own way. The Assessment of Balanced Interaction Balance or imbalance can be recognized in a given parentchild relationship by looking for the four parts of a balanced

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state. This, in essence, is the method used for assessing and evaluating the emancipation of children. The apparent simplicity of the method is perhaps deceptive. Because we are accustomed to looking at and assessing one thing after another, it requires a conscious effort to assess four aspects of a two-person relationship simultaneously. A linear consideration of the parts fails if one misses the total configuration. I shall keep coming back to this point. In the meantime it is sufficient to state that balance signifies trust, and imbalance signifies mistrust. Some of the children in this study showed more trust than others, and this puts us in a dilemma. If we stick to my definition of trust, then "degrees" of trust are nonsense; one cannot partially trust someone, for partial trust becomes mistrust. However, one can trust a person for some things and not for others; you might trust your daughter with money and not on late parties. Thus with cases we studied: seldom was the pattern of interaction between parent and child similar for all areas of the child's life. Some areas were in balance, showed the presence of trust, and others did not. This finding coincides with the everyday observation of unevenness in the way parents and children get along together. Family life may go smoothly, and friction arise over school work or social life, as though the area itself is a sort of third factor that affects the tone of the relationship. Parents do not all think the same things important, nor do all children find the same things easy or congenial. Nevertheless, a particular parent and child seem to react to each other in a rather consistent way in any one area, even though the patterns vary from one area to another. The overall picture at any one time has its own arrangements of balances and imbalances which tell how emancipation is progressing. A greater amount of trust appears, then, as a greater number of areas in balance. Assessing balance in one part of a child's life at a time is easier to do, and the danger of putting too much weight on a slender clue is less when the area is small. A mother who details endless complaints that her son is slovenly and that she has to be at him all the time gives the impression that there is endless friction between them. Actually she is giving vent to her own

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irritation in this one area. To her son the fussing is utterly inconsequential compared to his mother's confidence in his efforts at sports and in his choice of friends. Thus three judgments would be made: the area of his personal care would be out of balance; and the other two areas, interests and social life, would be in balance. This way of analysing the parentchild relationship also enables us to follow shifts and changes in the areas of balance or imbalance as the child grows older. The areas I have used in assessing balance in this study are the common, everyday divisions of the child's world at home and beyond: learning personal care, living with the rest of the family, handling money, free-time interests and activities, school work and jobs, social life. Each of these areas is a meaningful whole to the child; each is easily distinguished by an observer; each has its own set of rules, procedures, and values. This list was chosen because it fitted the material I had available; it is all-inclusive, and it can be followed in children from kindergarten age to young adulthood. More studies are needed before it can be decided whether this is the best division to use, but it can be said that for the children studied, these areas varied in significance. It is convenient to look first at each area separately, and then, by putting the child together again, assess the whole child in his real-life situations.

3. Reciprocal Trust and Emancipation

AS WE LOOK for the four essential elements of balance, many questions call for answers. One is forced to decide such things as whether the care a child's mother provides is what he needs or only what she thinks he needs. Is it more or less than he wants? Similarly, if she shows him affection and at the same time finds him a worry and a nuisance, does this latter reaction hide her affection from him? Her affection is a form of care but it could be obliterated by her worry. A child's behaviour, too, is subject to question as we look for the "why" behind what he does. Are his constant refusals a bid for parental care and attention, or is he avoiding care and domination? These are not easy questions to answer, and they are the more difficult since, in looking at the interaction between these two people, our concern is with the child, and only through his eyes can we see it as he does. The ability to do this depends on how well we know children; it depends, too, on a knowledge of the significant points in a child's world. Taking his point of view becomes less mysterious when we know what to look for and where we may find it. In this the balance scheme can be a guide. PARENT

CHILD

The parent cares for the child

The child relies on parental care

The parent respects the child

The child emerges as a confident person

The method of judging balance can be illustrated by a square area: one half represents what a parent does in relation to

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the child; the other half represents what the child does in relation to his parent. Each part of the square is again divided: the parent's section being halved into care for the child and respect for his efforts; the child's section being halved into reliance on parental care and emergence toward self-reliance. When the four elements are balanced, emancipation is promoted. When one or two parts are lacking in the relation there is imbalance, and emancipation is arrested. The Method of Assessment of Reciprocal Trust and Emancipation When the recognition of balanced and unbalanced relationships is used as a means of gauging a child's emancipation, the observer tries to decide whether or not, in a given area, two things are happening at once. Does the child both rely on parental care and grow in self-confidence? Or does he do more of one and too little of the other? And is the parent supporting him in his two directions or only in one? These basic questions are asked over and over in many situations. According to this method of assessment three general types of parental behaviour are possible. And all three can be expected to show up in every parent-child relationship, although the proportion of each type will vary widely. First is the balanced parental behaviour already described, in which the mother gives all the kinds of care her child needs, and because she respects him she gives him enough room to grow in his own way. Second is the unbalanced behaviour of the mother who gives too much care, and because she lacks respect for the child she cramps his living space. Possessive, smothering, or dominating, she wants to guide or control him every step of the way. The third type of parental behaviour is unbalanced in the opposite direction. Too little care is given, and the child has too much room; too many decisions are left up to him. Here a mother may be neglectful or overly permissive, or she may expect too much of the child, may urge him to grow up faster than he is able. In all of these cases the results are similar—

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the child feels he is not looked after. Lack of care for a child can be called a false respect for him, and, whatever its source, it denies him the comfort of falling back on parental support. Each of the three general types of parental behaviour outlined here includes many variations, but in actual practice the three types can be distinguished from one another. A child, on his side, can have three kinds of relationship with his parent. First is the balanced relationship in which he both relies on his parent and emerges by his own effort. Second is an unbalanced relationship in which he is overly dependent on his parent and makes little effort on his own behalf. He may be openly seeking help, or his more noticeable behaviour may be his avoidance of independence. Third is the other unbalanced relationship, the one that shows itself as too little reliance on a parent, as overly independent behaviour. This child may be pretending not to want or need help, perhaps making a show of how he can do it. He differs from the emancipated child in that his emergence is false, is largely bravado. His denial of reliance on his parent may be extreme, and so may his fear of appearing a failure. These three ways of relating to a parent can be discovered in a variety of forms of behaviour. Also, as with parents, it would be surprising to find any child involved in only one type of relationship; he too, may vary from time to time or from one life area to another. These three "types" of parent and three "types" of child are the guides in gauging emancipation according to the definition of reciprocal trust. The observer bears in mind that it is necessary to assess the situation through the child's eyes, and looks carefully to see which combination of types is present. The child who is too independent may be reacting against a dominating parent, or he may be going along with his parent's high expectations. Similarly the over-dependent child may be avoiding being pushed into independence, or he may be simply accepting over-protection. This method of assessing the behaviour of parent and child is not quantitative in the sense of measuring the amount of care a mother gives her child, or the amount of freedom she

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allows him. To measure either of these by itself would be extremely difficult, and would still not tell us if that was "enough" for a particular child at a particular age or stage. For example: Bert at eighteen spends little time in social activities, and any quantitative measure would probably give him a low score for social development, but we would not know if what he has is enough for him. Instead, we can make a judgment of balance in this field: Bert enjoys a bit of sociability with his family (reliance), and he also manages a little on his own, as well as living with boys his own age on a summer job. His mother enjoys his company at home but does not urge him to do more with the family; nor does she urge him to get out more. She sees he is not very social but feels he is working hard and will get around to being social when he is ready. This may seem a rather backward picture for a boy eighteen years of age, but the boy's relationships are in balance and he is going in a positive direction. Bert's emergence is not far advanced, but then his whole social field is restricted. The main point is that the restriction suits him at this time and will neither hinder future social growth nor warp total personality development. Bert may never be a great mixer but he will probably be social enough to suit himself. Granted the limited view of social life presented here, and that other factors than family trust enter into relations with friends, still we can say that his development is in a positive direction: his parents are helping, not hindering, his emancipation. The amount of Bert's social independence is not the best criterion; the appraisal of the trust-in-action between him and his mother has greater value in predicting the outcome of development. The above outline of the scheme for gauging emancipation requires elaboration. Although in actual use the four parts of the parent-child relationship must be considered together, it will be useful here to examine each part by itself: first I shall discuss what each part is like in the balanced relationship which promotes emancipation; then what each part is like in the unbalanced relationships which deter emancipation. And I would remind the reader again that in gauging emancipation in terms of reciprocal trust, the concern is not with discrete items of

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behaviour, but with a flow of events. Finally, as this close human relationship is not to be assessed by lining up items to be counted, I shall try to convey the feeling tone underlying the patterns of behaviour. The Parent's Side in a Balanced Relationship The parent cares for the child The parent respects the child

Care for the child Herein lie all the provisions a mother makes for the dependency and immaturity of her child. Comforter, provider, guardian, policeman, teacher, authority, and oracle—she is part and parcel of them all. Loving care informs all her help. Closely tied up with the trust between her and the child, it brings warmth and understanding to the whole relationship; it contains her desire to stand by her child through all manner of trying circumstances. The mother is not only caring for him; she is learning too. Feeling her way through all she must do for him, she learns to play the many roles expected of her—in short "to be a parent to this child." She can say to herself, "Now he needs me to comfort him; now to be a policeman who enforces safety rules; now to be a patient teacher; now to tell him what is what." In every one of these roles she is taking care of him, and through it all she shows she cares about him. Mother and child learn together, and many mistakes are made, but none is too damaging as long as trust holds. If the mother is honest with him, her child trusts her good intentions, knows she will do her best for him. And that is enough. Beyond actual help there is her sympathy to cushion the inevitable troubles. Respect for the child For every kind of help that is given to a child, there is a counterbalancing respect for his own growing competence. His

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mother respects him as a person, and she demonstrates her faith in his good intentions by allowing him to do things for himself. She admires his efforts to move away from her. She likes to see him go. She encourages his curiosity and urge to explore by letting him have his head. At the same time her care has set restrictions just sufficient to save him from the too drastic results of his inexperience. This strand in the web of interaction could be called learning "not to be a parent"— in the caretaker sense—as a mother watches her child develop his essentially human qualities. This is the mother's other role, being a person. In it she is no longer a constant authority and helper; she steps aside and keeps hands off. She is undismayed by the awkward attempts of the young. The very essence of respect is her confidence. Mistakes are part of his learning, and do not require a "See! That is what I told you would happen." This stepping out of the caretaker role occurs throughout the whole emancipation process, from the child's infancy on. The mother who never steps out of it until the child is almost an adult finds the child unready for adulthood, and herself unable to give up being an authoritarian helper. At any age her respect shows itself as a willingness to get off the parental high-horse and accept the child and his world at their present level, to see his efforts for the real merit that is in them, to see how far he has come even though he still has far to go. In a burst of helpfulness he washes the dishes; does it matter really if the kitchen is a mess? He likes his game of "bears" to be played his way, with coke and marshmallows in a den; natural history information is for another time. When he tells about the "awful" things the kids on the street did, he wants a listener, not a homily on nice behaviour. If he is worrying through a problem he likes the odd suggestion, but not a blueprint which takes the matter right out of his hands. And so it goes: the child is respected where he is now, and is trusted to go on growing in the future. Respect is never just permissiveness, nor is it indiscriminate praise; it is, at the least, serious consideration, and at the best, imaginative understanding.

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The Child's Side in a Balanced Relationship The child relies on parental care The child emerges as a confident person

Reliance on parental care The key here is a child's enjoyment of being looked after, loved, and cared for. He appreciates having his own comfortable place where he is guided and taught, where an understanding authority is in charge. His easy acceptance of help offered shows not only that it is satisfying to him, but also that it gives him Lebensraum. His underlying feeling about his family is a free belonging, and all the care and attention make him feel he is an important and worthwhile person in this small community. He carries this initial outlook over into the wider world as a "good feeling" about people, and about his place in the world (Flint, 9). Dependability and orderliness in his home-world help him to make sense of the myriad bits and pieces of daily living. Patterns and meanings emerge in the relationships of people and things. What are spoons for? What are people like? How do people get along together? This goes on to bigger questions: How did the world get made? Why are we here? First understanding comes from his parents who provide the foundation on which he builds, and much of the raw material for his growing mind. Dependence on his parents has many facets and he makes use of them all as he grows from one step to the next. Ainsworth (1) points out "Dependence, itself, involves some effort on the part of the child"; even babies are active in their dependence. "Dependence cannot be called passive and independence active. In both cases the child is active—the proper way to distinguish between the two is to call dependence 'active with the help of another,' and independence 'active without an outside helper.'"

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Emergence as a confident person Emergence is the child's growing away, becoming himself. Secure in his relation to his parents, he begins to step out confidently as a unique individual building his own life. Yet until emancipation is complete he still counts on some family help, or at least on the feeling that the family is there, standing by if he needs it. This assurance of help available is often as important as what a family may actually do. Their respect upholds him, too, in that it increases his feeling of being a worthy person whose ideas and efforts are taken seriously. The inevitable troubles and set-backs of growing are less upsetting because his parents' faith in him is unshaken. Their respect is often intangible, yet he is fully aware of it. The integrity of the private world of this emerging child is so secure that he can safely let his family into parts of it; he knows they will not try to take over, nor will they break down his confidence by their disapproval. The privacies of dog-eared notes in his desk, or of budding ideas in his mind, are safe from prying until he decides to produce them. The feeling of being trusted is built of many small things and a child is not easily fooled. He knows whether he is considered an endless series of problems or an interesting source of surprises. Once firmly established, trust and respect between parent and child make for smooth sailing that can survive occasional disagreement or criticism; friction and anger only ruffle the surface temporarily. Criticism and frank talk there will be, and sometimes rebellion, too, for this emerging individual is no panty-waist. He can say no; he can disagree emphatically. New challenges, new directions to explore, old ideas to take apart: these are the spice of life to the confident child. He may not always be easy to live with but he will seldom be dull. The four parts of a balanced interaction have been looked at separately in order to clarify the meaning each has for the child. In actual practice all are considered together. We judge that what the parent gives to the child is "enough care" if the child relies on it comfortably and is also emerging. We judge the child's emergence, not in absolute terms, but in terms of this child as he is now. We ask if his behaviour shows some

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confident independence, and whether he counts on his parents' confident non-intervention. In the simplest terms, we look at what the child does and what the parent does, and then judge how each feels toward the other. Emancipation comes about step by step. A child moves forward from the trust relation with his parent and takes over a whole small portion of his life into his own hands. For instance, when he takes over dressing himself, feels he no longer needs any help, then this area is emancipated. However, as he grows up, new matters come to be areas of interaction with his parent. Things like choosing and buying clothes are coming within his area of competence, though he still needs some assistance. The typical parent-child relationship has moved into a new area of operation from which he will, in turn, become emancipated. Forms of Imbalance in Parent-Child Interaction I have described what I consider a sound interaction between parent and child, an interaction that signifies reciprocal trust and thus promotes and enables the child's emancipation. Now let us look at the ways in which this balance may be upset. With a part missing, the relationship is out of joint, feelings and attitudes are altered, and the process of emancipation stalls. To complete the picture we shall look, then, at each part in its inadequacy, when it is insufficient to promote full growth toward maturity. Again this dissection is an arbitrary procedure, for the purposes of our analysis. Imbalance on the Parent's Side Too little care Too little care

False respect Too little care by a parent can be simply that; and it is called neglect or rejection. It can also take a subtler form which has a similar effect on the child. It can come to him as a false respect,

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an over-ambition that pushes him toward achievements he is unready for, toward excellences devised by his parent. Disliking his childishness, a mother may over-value her child's high performances and good deeds; his every mistake is a failure, a crisis. The child is shoved along toward difficult goals in a world where he never feels at home. Too little care (false respect) may also come from an over-estimation of what the child is able to cope with or to figure out on his own. Particularly in the early years he looks to his mother to be his guide in making sense out of all the things and happenings that whirl around him. She fails him if she sets no limits to his area for personal exploration, or if, in interpreting the world, she talks over his head, literally or figuratively; or if she hides meanings in a spate of words. When she confuses him she destroys his trust. She proves herself not reliable when she fakes explanations in order to manoeuvre him, or to save face, or to avoid embarrassment, or to save time: Santa won't bring toys if you have a dirty face. I didn't bring a present because all the stores were closed. You are too young to understand. God made it rain. Too little care may appear as failure to help the child with his fears, to stand by him in fear-producing situations. Using fear to control the child is the ultimate denial of care; the parent becomes a source of fear instead of comfort. The use of fear, as well as the handling of anger and frustration, is discussed more fully in a later chapter. Lack of care, then, takes many forms, but the result is the same: the child misses the inner feeling of trusting his mother. Trust underlies his reliance on her; it is bigger than any single isolated action of hers, bigger than the mistakes she makes, bigger than her incidental failures along the way. Lack of trust comes from a more generalized failure in the parental attitude. A mother may fail in her understanding of the child; or her own insecurity, ambition, or indifference may stand in the way of trust. Too little respect If the child is respected, he feels he is valued for himself, not just for his good deeds. He knows he makes mistakes and would

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Too much care

Too little respect like to make fewer, but he gets a lot of satisfaction from what he does for himself. He thinks he has fairly good judgment, though he knows this is something one has to work at, and his parents uphold him even when things do not work out too well. As a tearful nursery school child said, "My Daddy loves me even when I am naughty." It was perfectly clear to her that she was good even though her behaviour was not. This was her solace. Respect for the child falters when a mother feels she must prevent him from making any mistakes, must lead him through every difficulty so that he never has a chance to be wrong. She jumps in to help him with his coat before he even has time to pick it up. Such over-solicitousness tells a child quite clearly that his judgment and his efforts are untrustworthy. We have here a timid but overbearing 'mother with a timid child. He, in turn, either shows his timidity or hides it under some form of bravado. Allowing children to take risks and make mistakes requires courage, and there are times when parents will sit with their fingers crossed, hoping they have been wise in letting a child do, or decide, for himself. Still, they refrain from running out to haul the child back. The final test of their respect is their handling of the outcome: they congratulate success or sympathize with failure—they never blame, because the failure does the teaching. The parents' respect for a child includes respecting the limits they themselves have set for him. Unfortunately, parents sometimes take away the freedom they have just offered. "You may choose the dress you like—but the black is really too old, the white is impractical, so the blue would be most suitable." Parents may fool themselves when they do this sort of thing, but they seldom fool the child. If a mother sets up too rigid a blueprint for what a good child should be like, she lacks respect for individuality. She

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leaves room for only one kind of person. This can apply to character as well as behaviour: boys should be tough and aggressive and good sports, girls should be- sweet and submissive and artistic. Or preferences may be more personal than these stereotypes: exuberance and outgoingness may be ideals the quiet child does not fulfil. Efforts to change him by withholding approval, by persuasion, or by force, by ridicule or shaming or whatever, can only show him his lack of worth. An inability to comprehend the goodness of a child's efforts to grow up is often at the bottom of the dominating care that denies him respect. If parents could see what his goals are and what problems he is facing, then his efforts might appear admirable, or at least appropriate. If respect is in abeyance, gaining it may become one of the child's goals. If he takes to dramatic outbursts or jumping off the piano, his methods seem odd. We say he wants attention, and he does, but putting it this way glosses over his real need. Since parents are more experienced than he, it is up to them to sort out the situation. In this case he wants to be valued as a person. Parents happily acknowledge such accomplishments as learning to walk or talk or read, but less obvious achievements such as settling a dispute with his brother, or not crying when disappointed, or chatting with a stranger, are little noticed. Instead they pounce on dirty hands or a forgotten thank-you. Discovering the positives can change one's whole perspective and save one from committing the unpardonable sin of disrespect, which includes laughing at a child's ideas and misinterpreting his efforts. Setting all a child's goals for him is another evidence of lack of respect. Parents may fear that their child will be too different, or that he will stray from what they regard as the righteous path. Their goal of "responsibility" may turn out to be nothing more than a desire for obedience without the need of a policeman. Or they may set their hearts on objectives such as academic success, and require all lesser choices to be made with this end in view. The child's heart is not in it; it is not his own goal. Worse still, he is being denied the experience of making choices. If the goal chosen for him also happens to be difficult or uncongenial, his confidence ebbs with every failure. Even if he succeeds he will

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feel he owes his success to parental guidance, and his feeling about himself will reflect his parents' want of confidence in him. Even such an achievement as winning a scholarship will bring no sudden upsurge of self-assurance. Confidence grows slowly through making choices, through surviving failures, through a chain of small successes. Imbalance On the Child's Side The child who is too independent

A child who cannot easily and comfortably rely on his parents must find some other means of protecting himself. He may try to be better or stronger than he is, to deny his need for help. By so doing he may fool others as well as himself. One alternative is bravado or rebellion: "I know what is what"; "I am never wrong, or if I am, I don't care"; "It is not that I am unable, it is only that I choose not to"; "I'll do what I like and not be bossed." Another way around the need for help is to conform. The conforming child tries to do everything correctly and well; he avoids mistakes, or covers them up by blaming others. He is able to excel by following an "authority." Most children enjoy conforming at times, but this child carries it to extremes. The child who affects bravado is taking the other tack. Ignoring imposed limits or trying to make his own, he is the know-it-all who refuses to listen to others. One child excels and the other rebels; both deny their need for adult help. The rebel denies his fears but is easily threatened or irritated. The conformist also hides his fears, perhaps by being cautious and playing it safe; and he may turn his anger into righteous indignation at injustice and stupidity, either fancied or real. He may avoid frustration by tackling only what he knows he can do easily. A child compensates for his lack of reliance on parental care by a false emergence, a hollow self-confidence, that has to be

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bolstered in some way. Narrowing down his world is a frequent way out of the dilemma; both the rebel and conformist tend to cut down on what they attempt, in order to maintain their positions. Both find it difficult to admit mistakes, as this means turning for help that they feel unsure of getting—so they deny they need it. Asking for help would contradict their facade of self-assurance. Leaning on false supports is characteristic of uneasy selfassurance. The truly emerging child leans on parental care and on his own efforts. He has less need for false supports, for the defence mechanisms which take an extreme form in seriously disturbed children. The child who is too dependent

This child wants to be helped and never feels adequate without someone to lean on. He may cling to mother, or he may be very obedient. He may find devious ways to keep her constant attention. Being a constant source of problems is one way of reassuring himself that he is cared about. If he does disobey, he does so when he is pushed toward independence; otherwise he prefers to stay within the limits set, to be cautious and exact. A two-year-old's bedtime rituals begin as a familiar way of coming to terms with the night-time world, but if this sort of dependent behaviour continues and intensifies, if it becomes compulsive, then it is an avoidance of the step into the future, of moving along into a wider world. The child who is not emerging distrusts his own judgment and has difficulty making up his mind or keeping to a decision. While he wants an authority he may constantly question it in order to be reassured. His curiosity is meagre or superficial, of the "what is that?" variety, a means of keeping social contact with a parent or other adult, rather than a means of investigating

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the unknown. The world is frightening to him and hence confusing—or confusing and hence frightening—so he withdraws instead of coming to grips with it. Both frustration and anxiety increase his confusion, stand in the way of his emergence, and he has only the desperate hope that someone will save him or that magic solutions will appear. The overly dependent child can still grow if his reliance on his parent is upheld by solid and dependable care, and if his parent leaves the way open for his own efforts. Obstacles in the outside world may be causing him to avoid moving outward. However, unless the obstacles are many and great, he could be expected to begin to face them if his relationship with his parents stays firm. Waiting for a child to get on his feet again can be trying for the parents who have to deal with their own fear that he may always act like a baby. It may take him a while, but I am quite sure that when a secure reliance on his parent is established, he will begin to emerge. The child who has only a pseudo-reliance on his parent is in an entirely different position. Instead of having a firm base to step out from, he must struggle to maintain some semblance of dependence, and he expends all his energy seeking care. He is caught because he dare not let go. When dealing with a child, an observer can usually distinguish between these two types of over-reliance on parental care. By taking into account the full pattern of interaction with the parent, one can judge whether the child is receiving what he feels is sufficient care from his mother. Resting comfortably on parental care is quite different from struggling for it constantly. Summing Up The method of assessing reciprocal trust and emancipation in terms of balance leaves an observer with only a limited number of choices to make. As there are two people, there will always be at least two of the four parts present in the interaction—each person, by definition, has to be doing something. Balance, in whatever field, always has four parts truly present; none can be outweighed or displaced. When care and respect, reliance

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and emergence are all there, there is a balance which constitutes one judgment of the parent and one of the child. For the parent, as well as for the child, two other assessments are possible. They are made in the unbalanced situations where the parent gives too little care or too little respect, and where the child shows too little reliance or too little emergence. If this same gauge is applied to the various fields of the child's life, the result is an overview of the parent-child relationship with its assets and liabilities. Putting the fields together gives a profile of the child at any one time; putting together a series of profiles gives a life story. And here I should emphasize that, in my judgment, to find a parent-child relationship with no unbalanced interactions at all would be most unusual. Even the best of parents is off balance sometimes—a characteristically human affair. Emancipation is accomplished when a child takes over the management of his own life; what we think of as the parentchild relationship is outgrown. The way it happens might be this: The Child, as he is ready, takes over management of parts of his life. In these things he is emancipated; in others the typical parent-child interaction continues. One by one his dependent areas disappear, until the old relationship is no longer needed; then parent and child are ready to find each other face to face as friends. All too familiar are the people who never become emancipated; who are unable to meet their parents as friends because old bondages stand in the way. The child may be holding to his dependence, relying always on parental help or advice. Even after his parent dies a child may continue to depend on the parental name, money, or prestige. Alternatively, the grown-up child, struggling to be free, may keep away from his parents to avoid friction or domination, or the belittling effect of closer contacts. He avoids a dismayed parent, a mother who "only wanted to help him." A parent may be hard put to distinguish between legitimately influencing a child and dominating him. But the child knows the difference and, if we have the wisdom to see, he can show us. His feeling about himself gives one clue. Does he see himself

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as a worthy person, confident though not omnipotent? Does he see his parents' help as something he can accept or decline? He needs their ideas and ideals, but if he swallows them whole they offer little sustenance. If he works them over himself, chews on them, they become his own. Out of free discussion, even heated discussion, a child finds his own way, and he and his parents discover one another anew. Understanding and respect are mutually reinforcing as parents and child continue to grow.

4. Emotional Balance

EMOTIONAL BALANCE is a fine goal, if one can find out just what it means, and if one can find ways to achieve it. The trustful relationship between parent and child, which I have called the balanced relationship, implies that, within the family, emotions are well handled. But this simple statement glosses over the inevitable intensity of feeling in family life. The stories which follow in the next chapter show some of the variety possible in emotional interaction. But before presenting these individual patterns, I shall try to show how the concept of balance can be used as a guide to the emotional life of the child. Where Has Love Gone? "Love" has been avoided so far as if it were a bad word. On the contrary, I think it is a very good word around which much heat and confusion have been generated within the field of child training. At first the obvious place to fit it into my scheme seemed to be with "care"—to talk of loving care. This is in line with current thinking; the experts have adjured parents to love their children and show it. Popular literature has picked up this idea and over-simplified it in order to give parents something easy to apply, and so they now dutifully hug and kiss their children. The emphasis on physical affection has gained impetus from studies of infancy, at which period it is highly important, and from studies of emotionally disturbed children. But Bettelheim calls his book Love Is Not Enough. Love is no panacea, and all too familiar are the cases where it has failed to work the expected magic.

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As a way out of the confusion and vagueness about the word "love" I suggest we think of it as including respect as well as care, as being able to bridge a gap as well as to hold close, as implying trust as well as caresses. Good and adequate care given willingly and kindly is what a child grows from, but respect is what he thrives on. The danger is always present that loving care can become selfish, boosting the ego of the donor. Looking after the helpless has its satisfactions. Loving respect is something else. Although giving is still involved, loving respect requires the selflessness and generosity of appreciating another's efforts. For parents it is the happiness of watching their child get along without their help. It could be that a gardener makes a better parent than does a hospital nurse, though the gardener, too, can go too far, if he expends all his efforts in forcing one dahlia-bloom for his own greater glory at the flower show. Respect gone astray becomes personal ambition in the parent. "Love," then, should have two aspects, care and respect, and ideal for a child is the conjunction of the two. Though mental health is our interest here, from the ideal through the range of moderate deviations, it is worthwhile to look at some extreme deprivations of love. The neglected slum child, the delinquent, the child in hospital deprived of his mother's presence, the institution child who has never known a mother—all these are said to suffer from lack of love. Yet these children are in dissimilar situations and they come out of their backgrounds differently. Many an institution child is apathetic and disinterested; many a slum child is wild and unpredictable. This description is an over-simplification but it gives a clue to the nature of each one's deprivation. The slum child has missed care: the kind of care that assures him he will be looked after, the care that sets limits to his world so that he can feel at home in it, the care that interprets his world to him in a meaningful way. An unpredictable child, he has failed to develop a sense of identity because he has had no security on which to build. The institution child has had dependable care of a sort which may suffice for a very young baby, but lacking a responsive adult he has failed to develop, to emerge as a person (Flint 12). This responsiveness is an early stage of the respect for others

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which I take to be an essential human characteristic. One becomes a person through being treated like one. If institution babies are treated more like things, they too fail to achieve an identity, even to reach for identity by exploring the world around them, by relating to things and people. They do not even start. In the lack of respect shown them lies the explanation for the now accepted belief that even poor homes where the child is "somebody" are preferable to institutions where he is a well-cared-for "something." This brings us to the practical point of trying to say something less ambiguous than that the child needs love when he is running into difficulty. General prescriptions such as more discipline or more love are no answer, as everyone knows who deals intimately with children. Yet society is always seeking general solutions. The aim here is to bridge this gap between the general and the particular, to set out a general prescription which takes into account the needs of each particular child. This is the middle way of love in the form of care-plus-respect. One may ask, is it possible to change a mother's feeling about her child? Or is a change in her behaviour the only possible one? In the Institute of Child Study's long-range study of the child and his mother, the changing of parental feelings and attitudes was clearly apparent. Changes toward more respect for the child came about when a mother was helped to grasp the quality of his performance and hence could be persuaded to treat him with more respect. A change in her feeling about him followed her changed ways and his changing behaviour. It was as if she had been persuaded to test him out and had found him not wanting—in other words respectable. On the other hand, changes toward more care given easily and comfortably came when a mother was assured that her child really would grow up; helping him wash at four years will not lead him to want this help at fourteen. In some cases a mother could understand an older child's problems, though she had been badly confused by him when he was younger. Therefore, not only does increased understanding bring changed attitudes, but also changed methods can bring a mother a new feeling about her child.

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Joy Without attempting any complete or systematic account of emotions, I suggest joy as one of the great positives in the life of a child. Love is another. Love we give him, and the love becomes mutual. Joy he must create for himself. We can show him our enjoyment, for a happy attitude is catching, but unless our example is backed up by something solid it may remain superficial, sugary, and unconvincing. One thinks of the honeyed tones adults inflict on children, and the wise children who scowl their disbelief. I have chosen the word joy because it covers a range of positive feelings. The Shorter Oxford Dictionary defines joy as "a pleasurable emotion due to well-being or satisfaction," a description which could apply to a well-fed baby. Then it goes on to a "feeling or state of being highly pleased," "exultation of spirit," and this adds the sense of individual accomplishment, or personal fruition. Personal effort is essential in satisfaction, in enjoyment, in joy itself—these feelings can only briefly be triggered by a gift from outside. It is this emotion of joy, mild or intense, that accompanies a child's emergence as a person. What the child does himself brings quiet satisfaction or delight, interest or enthusiasm. Watching him, we recognize many shades of this emotion. Perhaps his "joy" on Christmas morning stands out for us because, for once, we feel we have given it to him briefly. Other times we only help, or make it possible. Sometimes we make it possible by firmly controlling our own urge to step in with unwanted assistance. Little brother is working on a puzzle. Big brother reaches over and fits in the last piece and is greeted by a howl of rage. Little brother has been robbed of his joy. We can add our interest and enthusiasm as long as he experiences the joy of his own activity—then the joy of his emerging can be shared. Humour, too, is catching. One can be serious about it and call it a way to relieve tension; or one can appreciate it for what it is—a sense of fun, a delight in the incongruities all around us, a way to be gay instead of sombre. And people don't have to wait for humour to "just happen"—they can watch for it

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and cultivate it. Children are terribly good at it, but to enjoy their gift adults must accept their level, and laugh with them. Children's early play on words is, to them, hilarious, and so are their misconstructions, when they are in on the joke. "I saw a mouse skiing down the big hill." Humour catches the unintended meaning, makes the unexpected comment. A boy stumbles and his friend says "Walk much?" It is all too easy to laugh at children; to laugh together at the jokes we make ourselves is the joyful thing. Sharing family jokes leaves the members of the family freer as it binds them together. Although joy, at all levels of intensity from quiet satisfaction to exultation, is the child's feeling as he emerges, his parents need not be left out. The parent's joy is different, that of a participating audience, they delight in the child's feeling and in his emergence; and as he moves away into a world of his own, they have the satisfaction of a job well done. Fear and Anger in the Emancipation Process We now move to the realm of the impossible, and to the accompanying feelings of fear and anxiety, of anger and frustration. The child's ways of dealing with these so-called negative emotions are of course often a reflection of particular methods and attitudes of his parents. Fear and anger are not to be considered as separate phenomena, but rather as integral parts of the life areas in which they occur. A child can be frightened or frustrated by almost anything, but fears and frustrations have two general sources. Their arousal may be due to a particular life situation; or they can be generated right in between the parent and child, and the situation can be merely the arena. In the latter case either one, parent or child, may fear the other; or they may frustrate each other. When this happens there is a real failure of trust, and the relationship is out of balance. The negative emotions are pertinent to the state of balance or imbalance when they arise between child and parent. Fear and anger which have causes outside the family relation are another matter. Learning to face the unknown, and to accept frustration,

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are part of a child's emergence, and to be successful he needs both help (care) in dealing with his feelings, and respect for their validity. A mother's role is confusing. As policeman or caretaker she may be the immediate cause of frustration, or even fear. It seems as if she is asked to frustrate her child, and at the same time to help him bear frustration. Then, to cap it all, she is asked to let him know that she thinks his feeling is justified. Confusion clears if we take a broader view of fear and anger, if we see them as not solely negative, but as having positive value. Then the child's process of emerging includes learning to make good use of these feelings. As they may crop up anywhere, he learns to handle them and to use them wherever they occur. In theory, fear and anger are quite different emotions; in the life of a child they overlap or turn into each other in a rapid and alarming fashion. Sometimes it is hard to tell if one is treating an angry child or a frightened one—particularly when the upset reaches major proportions. However, in the following description of a balanced relation, I am more interested in how the child comes to make constructive use of these disturbing feelings, than in their destructive possibilities. The outlines included here will help to round out the picture of a whole child in a balanced relationship with his parent. Though far from complete, they can give a starting point for thinking about "fear" and "anger" in terms of balance. Fear Care and respect for the child and his fears A child fears the unknown. When much is strange and too little is familiar his whole situation seems to disintegrate and become threatening, a chaos in which there is nothing to take hold of. The young child, with little understanding and few ways of coping with the world, relies heavily on his parents' familiar close presence to keep fears away. He relies, too, on their explanations and demonstrations to translate the unknown into the familiar: a big bang will follow the lightning—here it comes; darkness can be banished by pushing a switch. In each new

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CHILD'S SIDE

Care

Reliance

The parent ... protects from unavoidable fear ... makes the unknown familiar ... distinguishes the real from the fanciful ... teaches skills for safety

The child ... feels safe with his parents ... turns to his parent for protection ...feels his parent is honest ... learns safety measures

Respect

Emergence

The parent ...accepts fear as real ... accepts expressions of fear ... sees fear as useful ... sees fear sometimes as unavoidable and sometimes as enjoyable

The child ... feels he can express his fears ... feels he has ways to handle fear ... is not afraid of fear ... enjoys some fears, is daring, likes new experiences

situation part of his trust in them results from the dependable guidance he has had in the past; he follows their lead into strange situations if he has not been fooled. If told to pat the nice doggie, and the nice doggie snaps and barks, his faith wavers. He needs to learn what is safe and what is dangerous; at first the "dangerous" includes only the things that happen to scare him, and he is oblivious to much that is actually harmful. A two-year-old may be undaunted by an oncoming truck, and yet beat a hasty retreat from frightening guffaws of adult laughter. His parents lead him by easy stages to accept and enjoy small fears. Even peek-a-boo, if he enjoys it, accustoms him to the new or sudden. Unavoidable fears are something else again. Admitting fear is the first step; it means facing fears instead of running away. Talking about them matter-of-factly brings them into the realm of the known, reduces their potency. If a child's fears, even the unreasonable ones, are respected, he is spared the added shame

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of trying to hide them. If he is "expected" to be very brave, a new fear is added—that of losing status, of being "chicken." Learning to discriminate between reasonable and unreasonable fears is a slow business, as witness the nine-year-old who said he was afraid of ghosts, though he knew there weren't any. Trusted and familiar adults help the child through this maze; they help him recognize and deal with real dangers such as traffic and fire; they teach him how to cross streets and how to light fires safely. They respect his ability to care for himself. The child, instead of running away, or putting his head in the sand, learns to say, "I am afraid. What can I do about it?" Reliance and emergence in the handling of fear The unknown is frightening; the new is challenging and interesting. This fact has far-reaching meaning for the child's whole life; his feeling about the world will depend on which predominates. Schactel (18) puts it this way: "The relative strength of ... the forces of growth and the anxiety of separation . . . differ at different stages . . . in different individuals . . . but both forces are present in all men." The above statements come together in the sense that the "forces of growth" always lead away from the familiar into the new and unknown. That fear (anxiety) is the response to leaving the familiar, and that fear is a recoil from the unknown, seem to be two ways of stating the same thing. Taken together they indicate practical ways of helping the child handle fear and anxiety. Blatz (3) suggests that the solution lies in carrying forward an element of the familiar into the new and strange. To an infant, his mother is the familiar element through her loving, caring, feeding relationship. She continues to be so for a long time, though she is constantly being replaced by his increasing comprehensions of his world. He feels at home in his world of people and things as these come into a meaningful relation to him. We say he understands. In other words, he acquires his own familiar elements which he carries along with him as he steps into each new situation. When the child is truly becoming emancipated, his feeling and his behaviour unite as he reaches outward: the comfort of what

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he knows ameliorates the fear of the new. He feels almost as brave as he acts. For a long time his parents are his strongest source of comfort, to be returned to when other resources fail. But his own familiar resources are increasing: people—older people or his peers—whom he knows well enough to count on; skills or know-how suitable to new occasions; knowledge or understanding from the past which can be applied to at least parts of a new situation—these familiar elements all give confidence, so that when the child moves forward and outward, as he wants to do, assurance outweighs anxiety. He has enough confidence to face fear in order to feel the joy of tackling problems and trying new things; suspense and insecurity are part of the challenge. Besides the fears that are inherent in growth, some come at us from the world around us in the shape of accidents, mishaps, sudden changes in our circumstances. When this happens to a child he turns to his parent, who may be able to provide only the comfort of sympathy and affection. The band-aid his mother puts on his hurt is a symbol of her concern and a reassurance that something can be done. He is hurt but not helpless. Then when she directs him back to his play he sees that the world goes on, that the set-back was temporary. There is a kind of magic in which the child makes contact with his protector until he gets used to hurts. One small boy used to run to mother to have his "injury" patted, but he grew more and more perfunctory about it, until he merely ran to her, pointed to the spot, barely waited until she touched it, and dashed back to get on with what he was doing. Finally he forgot even this vestigial gesture of reliance as he moved from having his fear exorcised to facing it calmly alone. Fear imbalances I shall mention the negative side of the picture only briefly: the state of imbalance when feeling and behaviour do not match and fear becomes anxiety that is pervasive and often hidden. If a child faces the challenges of his world without confidence he must hide his insecurity, perhaps even from himself. Because he lacks reliance on his parents he may lean on false supports such as compulsive conformity or psychosomatic symptoms.

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He may put up a false front, deny any need for help, explain away his failures by blaming others or making excuses. Either deliberately or unaware, he may, for example, sacrifice sociability as he struggles for honours standing in his school work. He is still making an effort, but he has narrowed his world in order to protect himself. If his lack of confidence is so paralysing that he refuses challenges, he may cover the shame of his inadequacy by expressing disinterest, by being critical or aggressive, or by various evasions. When he behaves this way it becomes difficult for a parent to help him. If, on the other hand, he admits his fear by openly clinging to his mother, she has a better chance of recognizing and satisfying his need for protection. In all imbalances there is some element of tearfulness behind the child's lack of confidence. Anger PARENT'S SIDE

CHILD'S SIDE

Care

Reliance

The parent ... limits the child's world to cut down potential frustrations ... helps direct anger at its proper cause ... provides controls when the child's control fails ... shows permissible ways to express anger

The child ... feels frustration and anger are part of life ... expects some form of help and sympathy ... knows his parent will help him handle his feelings ... knows which forms of expression are not allowed

Respect

Emergence

The parent ... believes the child's anger is valid ... believes the child can cope with frustrations himself ... sees his outbursts as safety valves

The child ... is not afraid to show his anger ... likes to attack difficulties vigorously ... has suitable ways of expressing anger ... knows he can control his anger when he has to

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Anger too has both a positive and a negative side. On the positive side it increases effort or it may shade off into realistic indignation or into enthusiasm for a cause. On the other hand, extreme rage is like taking a wrong turn into a byway; like intense fear it causes the child to lose his grasp on reality, so that his behaviour is likely to follow suit and disintegrate. When rage makes his world come apart, so that he is no longer able to see it clearly, then he finds himself in an unknown country. His anger becomes mixed with fear. Perhaps he gets "so mad that he cries." Anger, which attacks, turns into fear, which runs away—an impasse in which he is helpless. Or guilt envelops him as he not only fears the frustrating situation, but also fears what he may do. Rage becomes complicated by fear of the self in action in a chaotic situation. It is not easy to state briefly the four parts of "anger" in terms of a balanced interaction between a child and his parent. The four parts are there, but tightly woven together, as I hope to show in the following outline of the positive use of anger. Anger used constructively neither degenerates into rage nor hardens into resentment. Care and respect for the angry child rvn anger cmo^-r as QO having TiaT/inrr positive rincit on value opens up the possibility of helping a child direct it rather than repress it. Instead of telling him to "count to ten," his parents may help him see what he is angry at. Rather than leaving him to succumb to blind rage, they may put the anger in the context of what he is aiming for. Seeing the whole situation, with all its parts, enables a child to control his behaviour. The likelihood of being blinded by an obstructing detail diminishes as anger is fitted into a larger context. The feeling of frustration is still legitimate, but the way is opened for positive action. As parents try to help a child with his anger they find that his need for respect nearly outweighs his need for care. In the final analysis he must deal with his anger himself. There are several ways parents can help: one is to limit his world suitably, so that he is not faced with hopelessly difficult or confusing alternatives. They do not confront him with play materials that T f\r\\f\r\ct Looking

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are beyond him, or with complicated social situations, or with anything too far beyond his ability and experience. Another thing parents may need to do in the early years is protect people or property from a child's angry onslaughts. They are in no sense retaliating or punishing—the angry child has not become a wicked child—they are simply saving the situation by supplying the controls he has not yet learned. They protect him from himself. Another part of their care is to ensure that he does not find anger a useful tool for controlling people. In other words they show that they are unperturbed and unswayed by his anger. He cannot, by getting mad, scare them into giving him his way. As he gets older, it is hoped his friends will help him learn the same lesson, but he starts at a disadvantage with them if he is in the habit of using temper to boss his parents around. On the side of respect, parents accept the child's feelings of frustration as valid. At the same time that they help him relate his frustration to its source in the outside world, they demonstrate their belief in his ability to handle the situation. When anger is at his own inadequacies, the answer still relates to the outside world: he has either to learn to do better, or to decide to give up that particular attempt as too difficult. In general, anger is frustration at an obstacle that comes between a person and what he wants. It has many degrees, beginning with mild annoyance, and it has many negative names, such as aggression, bad temper, rage. However, a parent with respect for the child tends to think of anger's positive aspects, such as persistence, assertiveness, willingness to attack a problem. These are also ways of reacting to an obstacle. The whole matter is bigger than "what do we do about temper tantrums?"; it becomes "how do we deal with frustrations and difficulties?" How a parent can combine care and respect for an angry child, realistically or otherwise, is shown in some everyday examples, though no two instances are ever identical. A scream of rage (or pain) from five-year-old Tom brings mother quickly to a scene of furious frustration over a plastic car that has been stepped on. If her relief at finding Tom all in one piece leads her to say, "Oh, is that all!" or "No need to get in such a state about it; you have more cars," then his anger

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will turn on her. He may accuse her of stepping on it; or he may introduce all sorts of irrelevancies about his brother being allowed to break his things. In the heat of the moment minor past annoyances are blown up and joined to his current distress. If these red herrings distract mother and she gets angry too, the situation is disintegrating rapidly—and he has new places to vent his rage. The alternative would be for the mother to swallow her own relief and accept Tom's feeling as genuine. Saying sweetly, "Of course you are angry, dear," is too false to impress him; it would probably make him madder—and at her. Instead, her acceptance of his feeling must come to him as a sharing of it: "Oh, too bad—what a misfortune!" (A big word is a note of respect—Tom may even say in his mind, "Gosh, I have had a misfortune.") This sharing with him is carried further in the next step: "Let's have a look at it, see how bad it is," and then, "Can we fix it?" Tom may still stamp around and say it is busted completely and refuse to look. Nevertheless a direction, or a re-direction, is being offered, and chances are if mother goes on examining the car quietly and trying to put bits together, Tom will join in. With glue and scotch tape the anger is given a constructive turn. Even if the repair work fails, an entry has been effected into a joint appraisal of the whole situation: how the accident occurred, how he could save up for a replacement. Perhaps bored with the whole thing by now, he admits that he has other cars he can use. This particular frustration is now seen in perspective and no longer threatens to blight his whole life. Even when mother and child are both justifiably angry, all may not be lost. She can use this highly charged situation to make some real distinctions: that the child himself is not being attacked, although his deeds are deplorable. If she feels this way, he will too. Similarly, if she can take his anger at her as being anger at the instrument of his frustration, at the enforcer of rules, then she need not take it personally. He can get mad at her and still love her. She loves him even though he exasperates her—why should it not work both ways? For beneath mutually frustrating behaviour, trust and respect remain, provided anger is given an external referrent related to the situation.

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If frustration is unavoidable, as when a boy's mother refuses to let him go to hockey practice with a bad cold, then energy must be redirected. There is an opportunity here to help him see that life goes on, that there are other things to be done. The unhappy reaction would be to offer him bribes as solace, thereby suggesting that if life treats one badly it owes one a compensation. A misleading hope. The meaning of frustration is also learned from the ways parents handle their own angry feelings. If they admit the feelings and then make constructive use of them, if they face situations squarely even when it means admitting their own stupidities and failures, their child is apt to do likewise. If they evade, rationalize, blame others, or denigrate what they are unable to do or have, then their child accepts these ways of dealing with difficulties as usual and proper. The extent to which children take over their parents' defences is often quite startling. Constructive direction of anger, as the true means of control, is a lofty objective which may never be wholly realized. The less mature the child, the more likely it is that some of his angry energy will spill over before it can be directed, either by himself or with help. Frustration builds up a great head of steam, of energy bursting to go somewhere. Part of what we call control is, therefore, a matter of finding suitable or at least harmless outlets for the sudden anger that takes one unawares. Here, again, is the distinction between acting and feeling—the latter is legitimate, the former is sometimes to be deplored. One may stamp, or scream, or yell "liar" or say "My learned friend is under a misapprehension." In the appropriate social setting these reactions are permissible expressions of feeling. Children learn early to suit the expression to the occasion; this gives them confidence as well as a safety valve. Another outlet for exasperation is to talk it out to a sympathetic listener; and a mother's understanding ear introduces a child to the value, and the limitations, of this source of comfort when things cannot be mended. In brief, the child is learning to pick the middle way of constructive effort which lies between the extremes of bottling up his anger and floundering in helpless rage. His parents help him learn, but they by no means step in whenever he meets a frustrating situation. They step in often enough to help him build

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a positive attitude to difficulties, and they stay out often enough to let him try things out for himself. To do this is less complicated than it sounds: as he learns to handle frustration they have no call to step in; when they realize he is on the right track they overlook some swearing and door-slamming. In fact he is exercising some control when he blusters about instead of throwing the crockery. If all goes well, the day will come when his parents know that no matter how angry he feels, he will not give way to rage that is blind and damaging. This is one sign of his emancipation; the other is his ability to turn anger into increased effort.

PART TWO The Stories of Seven Children

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AUTHOR'S NOTE THE STORIES of seven children are told here in two ways. First, they are told biographically, but not to show events as such—not to tell how Willy got to be president or won a battle, but to show how he made out in his striving for independence, confidence, and individuality. As with all biography the problem is to summarize and evaluate a mass of factual detail so that a clear course of development emerges. When each child's emancipation is taken as the cardinal point in his becoming an independent individual, then his progress is seen in the loosening or tightening of his ties to his parents. Each such biography will tell of these ties to his parents in descriptive terms, as a running narrative. The second way of telling the stories is in symbols. The course of each child's emancipation is depicted in the symbols which show balance or imbalance. As described in previous chapters, his relationship with his mother, when in balance, has four parts present. This trustful relationship permits the loosening of ties. The unbalanced relationships lack something vital; trust diminishes, the interaction between parent and child tends to intensify. In both cases the method of assessment of reciprocal trust and emancipation takes a special view of the child and his parents. The biographical method shows us real people with whom we can empathize. The symbols of the emancipation scheme, though impersonal, deepen our understanding of the dynamics of the relationship. They assign strengths and weaknesses to the various areas of the child's life; they enable us to record his progress briefly and follow it from year to year; they show us the pattern of his development. It becomes possible to compare one child's pattern with another's. The symbols lack life and colour, but they serve to summarize and evaluate biographical data. By describing three age-periods in each story—childhood, the middle period, and young adulthood—instead of giving yearly accounts, we are able to shorten the stories greatly. In each ageperiod the story deals with six areas of the child's life. As explained in chapter two, these six views of the child were originally worked out to take account of the fact that different degrees of reciprocal trust seemed to occur in different cases, or in the same case at different periods. The six areas, which apply to children from the ages of five to twenty, are listed below. Personal care includes eating, sleeping, dressing, cleanliness, health. This area expands into the taking care of clothes and possessions, and the choosing and buying of them. It begins as the "habit training" area and comes to include all of the individual's private life.

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Family living includes all joint activities with the family; things one does as part of a family group. Chores and recreation are included, as well as all the give and take involved in sharing living quarters, whether expressed as "Get out of the way and give me a turn," or "I will help you find your things." Use of money includes what is done about first allowances and cash gifts, and expands until the child is earning his own living. The prominence of this area in the teen years is the main reason for its inclusion. Activities include the things the child does under the heading of recreation and playtimes—all his solitary pursuits, and those in which the social aspect is secondary. When the social aspect of some activity seems of equal importance to the child, the item is included under both activities and social life. School includes the aspects of school life in which the mother plays a participating role, even indirectly by her attitudes and values. Homework, contacts with teachers, and planning for courses, jobs, and careers are all situations in which the mother may or may not take an active part. Social life includes the child's relationships with his contemporaries at school, in clubs, and at play on occasions both formal and informal. It takes in all matters where the mother helps, controls, or influences. The simplicity of these divisions reflects the child's view of his world. Adults are only too aware of the complexities and wheelswithin-wheels as the child's life expands. Some of the confusion is eliminated if we concentrate on the child's view of each situation, and if we look at each area separately before moving on to an overall picture. Because areas overlap, looking at them singly is an arbitrary procedure. The overlap can be taken into account in two ways. First, if an item belongs in more than one area, it is included in each area. When a mother insists that her son wear clothes he dislikes, this is part of personal care; when the clothes make him look silly to his friends, it is a social matter. She may see clean hands as a social virtue, but a small boy does not—to him this is personal care only. The second level of taking the overlap into account comes when the assessments of all areas are combined. This can be done either descriptively or by means of balanceimbalance symbols. Either one can give a dynamic account of the way a child is becoming emancipated from parental influences. Interpretation of the symbols requires a background knowledge of the stages of child development. When a child is five, family living is a very big area and use of money is a very small one. The situation may be expected to reverse itself by the time he is twenty. Similarly, social dependence on parents has a different and more serious implication at twenty than at five.

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Furthermore, the emancipation profile does not indicate the stage of emancipation that has been reached. Other measures of progress in school and social life, hi interests and skills, are used to fill out the picture. Assessments of balance tell how a child's interaction with his parent is proceeding at any given moment. Only when an area of a child's life, or part of an area, is emancipated from all parental intervention does the profile show much progress has been achieved. Such areas are labelled emancipated [E] instead of balanced or unbalanced. The explanation of the symbols for balance and imbalance given on pages 60 and 61 is designed as a guide in following the story diagrams. A full description of the various interpretations of the symbols is given later, when the further development of the method of assessment of reciprocal trust and emancipation is discussed in detail. The stories of seven children have been chosen to illustrate the method of assessing reciprocal trust and emancipation. The method itself was developed to winnow the descriptive accounts of parents and children in action, and so find the deeper meanings which had lain hidden. The method offers a systematic presentation of anecdotal material. A more mature use of this type of information is possible when information is collected for the specific purpose of assessing balance and imbalance in a parent-child relationship. The seven children presented here are real people, though they are not identified by their real names. The authenticity of then: stories rests on information collected close to the time of the events described. The stories themselves show that memories of past events are easily distorted. A child of eighteen would say that he and his brother had always been close companions, though earlier records were filled with indications of discord and antagonism. I hope that enough of the story line has been given in each case for the reader to make his'own judgments and predictions as he goes along. Hie stories begin with the first home records, collected after the children left nursery school at five. The records of the nurseryschool years had dealt almost entirely with the child in the school, and unfortunately they omitted any systematic account of his home life at that time. However, the descriptions of each chiltf as he steps out into the world rely heavily on the nursery-school records. We know him well as we bend our steps with his on the fifteen-year journey ahead.

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The label "Emancipated" (E) indicates that an area, or part of an area, is now entirely in the child's hands. His parent is no longer a participant. BALANCE The parent cares for the child

The child relies on his parent

The parent respects the child

The child emerges as a person

This represents reciprocal trust. The four essentials of the interaction are ail present.

FOUR IMBALANCES An empty square indicates a deficiency. The parent gives too much care

The child is too dependent on parental care

The parent gives too much care The child is too independent

The parent is neglectful or ambitious

The child is too independent

The child is too dependent The parent is neglectful or ambitious

The parent gives too much care and lacks respect for the child. The child is too dependent on the parent and is not emerging as a person. The parent gives too much care and lacks respect for the child. The child resists parental care and shows a false emergence. The parent gives too little care, shows a false respect for the child. The child denies his need for parental care and shows a false emergence. The parent gives too little care, shows a false respect for the child. The child seeks more parental care, resists emerging as a person.

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Author's Note TRANSITION IMBALANCES

Transition stages are stages in parent-child interaction in which one part of the interaction is lacking. They occur between imbalance and balance, and show that the interaction is moving towards one or the other. PARENT

CHILD

Gives care

Through over-reliance becomes dependent

Gives respect

[Does not emerge]

PARENT

CHILD

Through too much care becomes dominating

Relies

[Does not give respect]

Emerges

PARENT

CHILD

Gives care

[Does not rely]

Gives respect

Over-emerges (is too independent)

PARENT

CHILD

[Does not give care]

Relies

Gives false respect (is ambitious or neglectful)

Emerges

5. Frank's Story

IN NURSERY SCHOOL Frank used to dig his heels in and refuse almost everything suggested by an adult. With an angelic face and a big deep voice, he was bellicose and emphatic. His apparent independence and assurance were misleading; no small child could refuse help and stand on his own feet as Frank tried to do. He had a history of many temper tantrums beginning at eight months, when he was described as getting "red in the face and stiff with rage." In nursery school he eventually came to accept everyday requirements, but as one of his teachers commented, "he thinks the world is his oyster." In retrospect one can see this spectacular independence as his particular defence against confusion and insecurity, a defence that could not continue to serve him, for the "world" was bound to have a say in the matter. Frank's home life, after he left nursery school, continued to be filled with battles and constant change. His mother is described in the records as insecure and unsure of herself, and yet the evidence suggests that she had, in her own way, great strength. She was intensely devoted to her child, regarding him almost as a part of herself. Puzzled by her inability to control him, she never gave up her faith in him, and never ceased to be impressed by his oddity. When one method of handling him did not work, she optimistically set out on a new course. She wats puzzled, too, by the situation she found herself in: born in another country and educated in this, she was unsure of her values. She had adopted the obvious ones of fitting in and of improving her position; concrete evidence of social advancement was highly important to her, and she sought to give Frank every advantage. She wanted him to do all the right things and

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none of the wrong ones, but her lack of knowledge of community ways led to a wide variety of changing goals. Any voice of authority added new items to her list, and she stressed each one at some time. Appreciate music, be "nice," be popular, eat faster, have possessions, go in for sports, go to the best schools—all were important. And as Frank grew up we can see how many of these goals he managed to decline. Childhood Period, 5 to 9 years His mother continued to come to the "experts" for advice, always trying to find out what to do next. She carried out suggestions briefly and on a superficial level, and then as one thing failed she would try another. She was permissive in that Frank very often got his own way, even though she attempted to supervise nearly every aspect of his life. Her expectations were in line with her values, but they made chaotic demands on a small boy. She knew all the things she wanted him to do and to be and he refused the lot. The strength of his angry refusals caused her to redouble her efforts where a weaker woman might have given up. She cajoled, coaxed, threatened, and bribed. She deprived him of things, but seldom made it stick. Frank never seemed afraid of her. It was more the other way around—he outwitted and dominated her. Through it all, he received much affection, and certainly he never lacked attention. His mother talked and talked, to him and about him, rather glorying in his "awfulness" which, in a way, hid her failures. But there was more to it than that: in spite of all the fuss, she really was impressed with him and she made him feel important. With minor variations this general pattern of relations between parent and child carried through all the areas of their life together. After outlining the behaviour in each area, I shall then discuss the appraisals of imbalance during the childhood period. Personal Care [.+'] and ['+.] At five Frank had tantrums at ordinary routine requests, refused to take time for dressing or the bathroom. By seven or eight his behaviour had changed, and he would dawdle, evade, or play when he should have been doing something else. The interviewer reported, "His mother is too considerate, lacks

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authority, is afraid of him; she dare not insist that he turn the radio off during meals." She would remind, insist, ignore, tell him he must co-operate. She would speak to him about his various tics and his bad posture, would try to get him to eat faster, and would fuss about his poor health. So much emphasis was put on the negative side that we heard little about the positive. Presumably Frank was dressing and washing and taking over some responsibility for his personal care, albeit with urgings and reminders. The interesting thing is that his arguing and demanding began to give way to evasion; more often now he avoided a showdown instead of going out to meet it. At nine, he would shove his books and toys out of sight if his mother appeared when he was supposed to be dressing or bathing. Family Living [.+'] and ['+.] His mother said that his general mood at home was improving, though she also called him sulky and irritable. The tantrums continued; sometimes they were more frequent, sometimes less. He would become angry if interrupted. His mother said he argued, demanded, criticized; "he has no respect." The accounts of Frank's troublesome behaviour cover up his mother's devotion to him. But at the same time they show her lack of insight into the nature of his feeling or the reasons for his actions. From Frank himself came some rather revealing comments. At seven, asked what he had enjoyed most in the past year, he said, "Nothing. Everything is worse, nothing I like has come along yet." And a couple of years later, "I never had anything nice happen to me ... I don't look forward to anything." Asked what he had disliked most in the past year, he finally found a question he could agree with: "That's more like it." At five his ambition was to be a truck driver, or perhaps it was the truck he wanted to be. At seven he was described by the interviewer as being "against the world, . . . belligerent in his answers to the examiner." When he was nine, the interviewer said he was "co-operative and friendly, but he swaggers and makes rude retorts. He is belligerent in his attitude to others; has an almost morose outlook." Yet, oddly enough, one could warm to this little boy who was both friendly and rude. Something about his forthrightness and his willingness to take on the

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whole world was appealing—though it boded ill for the future. His was a hollow courage. For four years Frank was an only child; his younger brother was born the year before he left nursery school. Their mother found the younger boy much easier to handle, and she tells us nothing of the impact of the new arrival on Frank. His pattern of behaviour, and her difficulties with him, were described without a break and without noticeable change. She appeared to treat the boys as two quite different people and denied any sign of jealousy on Frank's part. In all the talk about difficulties with Frank she never suggested any connection between them and the brother. Her first mention of the brother in the records came when Frank was eight years old: "They tease and fight some, Frank reads to him. They play together indoors." When Frank was nine: "They talk about school," and Frank "teases, bullies, and fights him." Frank said his brother bothered him, made him angry. Their mother never said what, if anything, she did about the teasing and fighting, but it is a fair guess that the "scolding, talking to, telling to be nice" applied here as elsewhere. Frank never seems to have felt displaced by his brother, and it may have worked the other way—he may have been relieved to be free from some of the pressure of maternal solicitude. As time went on his many dislikes and his tendency to go a solitary way gave him a form of distinction, a contrast to his brother's cheery outgoingness. An important feature of the three-way relationship between the mother and her two sons was that she kept the two boys separate and distinct, she loved each one and found it remarkable that they were so completely different. Through all the records, on both boys, I found no hint that she valued one above the other. With equal pride she could tell you, "This is the quiet one and this is the noisy one." For this reason one might give an additional score of care-plus-respect to the mother's side, except that the younger brother, by his very nature, received more attention. With his temperament he tended to usurp Frank's share of the limelight. Use of Money ['+'] Money is not an important area between the ages of five and nine. For Frank it was just one more place where he was dictated

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to, where he was neither given room to make his own decisions nor allowed to take consequences. At five he was given a few cents every night to put in his bank on the theory that this would teach him to save. At seven he was occasionally given money to put in his bank; at eight he was given an allowance of seven cents a week—and he banked it. At nine he got ten cents. His mother kept the key to his bank and was quite upset because he would open it and take out some of his money. She tried to keep him from buying candy and "eating things on the street"; he was supposed to buy only toys. Frank said he put his money in the bank and asked for what he needed; "I buy toys or candy, whatever I want." Again his mother showed a lack of respect; she would do everything except trust him with some money of his own. Activities [.+'] and ['+.] Frank was generously provided with play materials and equipment and was, presumably, free to use them as he pleased, though his time for play may have been limited by his mother's various plans for him. Music lessons were continued for a long time. He had a "good ear" and began lessons at age six. By nine his mother said, "He now accepts his weekly lesson," but still "hates the practising" which she supervised "for forty-five minutes a day." She started when he was very young to take him to concerts and children's plays, but she found him restless and hard to control. At eight, he said about a Disney movie, "It is the only one I didn't like—it was rotten." His mother had taken him to it a year previously, and it was the only movie he had ever seen. He resisted whatever his mother promoted. By the time he was nine his mother had given up her attempts to introduce Frank to outside culture—she said he would rather do things with the boys than with the family. At home she stopped reading to him when he was seven, hoping he would read to himself. He did for awhile, and then stopped. His own comment was, "Books I have read I hate—they are too easy. I don't like any stories. Mother doesn't read to me—I read to myself." One wonders if he felt rejected by his constant helper. By nine he was doing a lot of reading; his mother complained that he did it "when he is supposed to be doing something else."

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His only physical activities were swimming and boating, which he was "afraid of," though he was "not afraid of the water." He "refused to skate." The picture in this field may be skewed through being incomplete. Hearing chiefly about the mother's efforts and Frank's refusals, we may well be missing a good area of constructive play effort which Frank put forth when left to himself. He was said to prefer meccano, painting, puzzles, and books. "Daydreaming, imagining all the time" were mentioned several times in connection with Frank's "inattentiveness" to his mother's talk, but this was not so much a pervasive pattern as an escape from her. An infringement of his rights in this area, another sign of lack of respect, was his mother's taking away his toys as punishment for disobedience elsewhere.

School [:+:] School gave Frank his first real opportunity for positive effort. He began in nursery school to find some satisfaction in doing things for himself. In grade school he was lucky in having teachers who recognized his ability, who gave him the firm, consistent controls he had never known at home, and who patiently encouraged his individual efforts and accomplishments. One of his teachers pointed out that "he can carry througji a project on his own; but not until the end of a year did he join in a group effort." Although his mother claimed to "supervise his homework," she showed confidence in his academic ability, apparently trusting him more when she was relieved of direct responsibility for his progress. She no longer had to try too hard and do too much. By the time he was nine the relationship was balanced in this field.

Social Life

[.+'] and ['+.]

As can be imagined, Frank's desire to dominate, his "nothing is any good" attitude, his belligerence, were not conducive to a happy social life. When he was seven or eight his mother said, "He seems to play nicely with others," and "He gets along well." However, when he was nine she admitted she "used to have difficulty getting him to play with the boys." Always the story was told from her side, never from Frank's point of view.

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Frank was less optimistic than his mother about his social life. He consistently listed fewer friends than she named, and at seven said he had "no special friend." He played cowboys and Indians in the neighbourhood, but his least enjoyed memory was of a "wrastle with another kid—nearly broke his leg o f f . . . . Boy, I can fight that kid—light as a feather!" The next year he recalled being hit by a snowball: "I cried—it hurt." "I don't like when I save up firecrackers and a guy takes them and lights them—where was I left? A waste of money. I'll call the police next time." Although his behaviour and activities often suggested physical timidity, neither he nor his mother offered this, even indirectly, as a reason for his social difficulties. His school reported a negative and hostile attitude to other children; when he was eight the report said, "He refuses all their advances and persists in playing alone." Certain contradictory descriptions of his relations with other children may be due, in part, to his mixing with two quite different groups of children. He attended a private school, but lived in a big old house on the edge of a district which had become almost a slum. Though his mother "tried to forbid one particular friend" in this neighbourhood, it may have been in this locality that his attitudes served him best. His mother tried to help him by buying him a lot of equipment to attract other children; she took him visiting, had a party for him—though he was seldom invited to other people's parties. And she talked and talked, urging him in many directions. She fussed over him in this social area, as in others, but as he grew older she found that she could do less for him. Emancipation Summary Personal care [.+'] ['+.] Use of money ['+'] School [:+:]

Family [.+*] [*+.] Activities [.+'] ['+.] Social life [.+'] ['+.]

Frank was an extremely insecure child who gave those around him the impression that he was pretty independent. His mother gave him endless care and attention which he refused and fought

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against; her care brought him no comfortable reliance. One can simply say she overdid it, became too dominating; and up to a point that judgment is correct. Still, why did he have to refuse so vehemently? Refuse everything and everybody? Why did he have to dominate the situation himself? Why such a violent conflict with his mother? In some ways he behaved like an uncared-for child. He often seemed to feel rejected, to trust no one. If this was the case, then the relationship with his mother must be called lacking in care on her part, with a compensatory seeking of care on his part, by means of his negative behaviour. Some children do seek care in this way, but in Frank's case the evidence suggests that he was also trying to control his world, as if he had to make his own kind of sense of things, to bring order into his world by his own efforts. This is emergence of a sort [+.], and as such is quite different from negativism to ensure care [+']. The solution for such a conflict of emancipation imbalances lies in distinguishing more than one kind of care. Frank lacked limits and controls to give his world shape and constancy so that he could find his way in it and know what to rely on. His mother gave him plenty of the kind of care that consisted of doing things for him. Yet she catered to him so much that in the end he was making all the decisions. She promoted many things, but as she did not carry them through, the final decisions were up to him. To refuse the lot was his way out, a way that gave him the illusion of being in command. He had a ready-made answer which had the advantage of putting close limits around his world, making him an island in the confusion where he lived. Now let us apply the various imbalance types to Frank's case and see which one fits. Obviously his was not a case of too much parental care on which he relied too heavily ["+"]. Nor was it a case of high parental expectations (or neglect) which Frank tried to live up to or to survive [.+.]. One might suggest it was "dominating care with the child refusing to be bossed" ["+.]. On the surface this appears to describe the situation, though one is puzzled that his independence was so false it often went nowhere, just stopped with refusal. Frank's change from the direct showdown to evasion was just an easier path to the same end—a false emergence. This imbalance assessment

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accounts for some of his behaviour, but not all. He attempted, often successfully, to dictate to his mother. By complaining, criticizing, being impossible to please, thinking everything was "terrible," he was often the one who did the manipulating. Though his mother devotedly tried to humour him, he was never satisfied. This is another kind of imbalance, the one in which the child makes a strong bid for care. He has to go on striving for it because what he really needs is never forthcoming [.+"]. Frank's case illustrates a source of parental failure in giving care. What Frank missed was stability, the provision of dependable limits suitable to his age—limits to let him know that, whether he liked it or not, this was as far as he could go. Frank's mother did not neglect him, nor did she set up high goals for him, but she did something which had the same effect. She let him make the decisions she should have been making for him. Granted that he frequently had to fight to get his way, still he got it. His mother was never sure she was doing the rigjht things, so she would give in. As the interviewer put it, she was afraid of him, and, too, she accepted the superficial view that he was very independent. To sort out the confusions in Frank's life we must look through his eyes. Two types of imbalance are indicated. To distinguish between them is to search for the sources of mistrust. Frank received both too much care and too little. Only an examination of specific detail can show how Frank experienced his relationship with his mother. Lack of care took the form of a lack of rules and boundaries to guide him—so he made his own rules. He did so in two ways: by manipulating his mother, and by refusing her assorted manipulations. In ignoring her conflicting demands, he virtually refused her care—the thing she offered him most of. He compensated for this refusal of care in other aspects of his relationship with her. He became hard to please and critical so that she would try ever harder to take care of him. Part of the difficulty in arriving at a clear picture of their interaction comes from the generalized accounts we have to work from. Plenty of specific detail is given, but it jumps from area to area and from episode to episode. It reflects the confusion of the world Frank lived in, but it seldom covers any field systematically. With a clearer view of what happened in each field—about rules,

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about help offered and refused or accepted, about who made the decisions on various matters—both imbalances would show up more clearly. Certainly two quite different things were happening at once. An overall assessment of Frank might pick up his refusal of care and miss his indirect appeals for more care. Or it might simply label him a spoiled child. However, there are many ways of spoiling, and they must be sorted out before one can recognize the true nature of a child's difficulties. I have dealt with this period of Frank's life at some length because it illustrates a special problem, and because for him it set the tone of his future attitude to the world. He moved out from his home with a chip on his shoulder, with bravado and bluster as a cover for his insecurity. The assessment of his relationship with his mother at this stage shows the school area balanced and the money area wholly dependent. The other areas have been appraised together, and each field is given the same two imbalance ratings [.+'] and ['+.]. His mother's false respect left him feeling uncared-for and he sought what he was missing. Her care was dominating and he resisted it. The Middle Period, 10 to 14 Years After Frank was ten years old a marked change appeared. His tendency to avoid issues, begun at nine years, continued, but the bluster and bravado vanished, and by fourteen Frank was called quiet and seclusive. Unfortunately, records were not filled in for the middle years of this period so we cannot follow the change in detail. However, the contrast between ten and fourteen is thus all the more dramatic. At ten Frank was "getting a little more reasonable""; the report noted, "tantrums and refusals are less frequent," but "he gets angry and argues"; he "flies off, cries, and waves his arms." He dawdled, procrastinated, hated changes. At fourteen he was "co-operative at times," and had a "quiet disposition." His mother said, "He likes to do what he likes, likes privacy." The interviewer had called him "more pleasant, friendly, and affable" at ten. At fourteen he was called "co-operative," but with "a

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rather scornful manner at times as though superior to this sort of thing." Personal Care ['+:] and [:+:] Frank's increasing ability to look after himself was reflected in the change in his mother's complaints. At ten he still dawdled and hid his book when she happened to appear on the scene. He hated to change his clothes and was a slow, poor eater; he was "inattentive" and had to be called several times if he was reading. By the time he was fourteen the list of complaints had shifted. His mother said he changed his clothes too often; he ate too fast; now, she said, his health was good, but "his mannerisms need to be corrected." Frank said his mother got mad and scolded him, and evidently his recourse was to remove himself from her view. As he grew in self-reliance, some of her complaints must have seemed silly, or at least unimportant. As he felt more sure of himself he could accept some help from her on his own terms. His acceptance was aided by her growing respect for his ability. She took things more easily, reported fewer problems, referred to things that "could be improved." To take some help from her no longer meant to be dominated. Trust grew between them. She was now able to let him be himself, and he could ignore some of her talk in an area which was of diminishing concern to him. Family Living [*+.] and [:+.] Similarly, in his family Frank withdrew in order to lead his own life. There seem to have been few joint family activities. Frank disliked visiting relatives; he did a few chores, unspecified, and these, his mother said, "required supervision at times." His father was never mentioned in the records until Frank was nine, at which time he was beginning to "assist with discipline and could get results with a stern voice." At ten Frank saw his father only at supper. He was saving up for a birthday gift for him. And that was all we heard of the father at that point. His mother always said "I," not "we," in the records. Frank was still saying that he got annoyed at his brother—"he hurts the cat." At fourteen his brother made him angry, and he

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said "I get mad and hit him about once a day." According to their mother, the brother would whine, and then Frank would flare up and shout but not do anything drastic. She did her best to run things, and Frank evaded as much as he could. As he refused to fight with her any more, things were less hectic between them. On the whole, the family picture remained confused, with little to encourage general good feeling. Frank's mother's affection for him was strong, but to Frank it still held the threat of domination, and he tended to pull away. The old: rebellion had disappeared now and Frank put more faith in himself— within the narrow limits he had set himself. Use of Money ['+'] Officially Frank got twenty-five cents a week for his own use, but he said the amount would be cut unless he saved, so he was saving for gifts, war stamps, a movie projector, and his father's birthday. A large order on twenty-five cents a week; what he accomplished is never told. By the time he was fourteen he received a dollar a week for "everything except clothes." There was no parental supervision, and Frank was called "not a spender." His thriftiness was no doubt due to the general narrowing down of his world and his wants, rather than to his having been forced to bank his pennies in earlier years. On the whole he had little interest in money; his mother said that if she borrowed money from him he never asked her to return it. Little was expected of him in this area, and he seemed wholly dependent. Activities ['+.] at ten years, ['+!] at fourteen Frank was moving away from maternal supervision of his activities and interests. They became his own affair, though his mother still tried to take a hand. She said, for instance, that she liked to know what he was reading. At ten she got him to try swimming, but later he refused and did not learn. Yet when he was fourteen his most enjoyed memory was of getting his fiftyyard swimming badge at camp. This was a big event for a nonsporting type who disliked school sports and only took part as required. He still disliked music practice and lessons, and he

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said, "There is no sense in music lessons, I am more interested in other things." When he was fourteen, music was still his mother's choice; she made him practice five or ten minutes a day. "If he has time for reading he has time for music," she said. To get him to do what she wanted him to she hid his books, and he went through her drawers looking for them. Reading was his great interest. His mother complained that he did little else; and he complained "I have got to get some reading done." He enjoyed the radio but said, "I can't count on mother to let me listen." Little else was mentioned, and his narrow range of interests appeared to be related to his meagre social life. He spent much time at home, where reading was both an interest and an escape. His mother said that at fourteen he waited for her to take him to movies, but as she did not "encourage going out in the evening," this did not add much in the way of recreation. However, his attitude indicates a change toward dependence on his mother. At nine and ten he had refused to go places with her, and on one occasion he had been forced to go out with the family by the threat of having to do arithmetic if he stayed home. Outside of his reading and an interest in current events, his activities lay in a narrow field and brought him few satisfactions. School [:+:] His school life was far more successful. He was ahead for his age, got good reports, and the principal called him a "good lad." When he was ten there were a few sporadic attempts by his parents to get him to work harder at arithmetic. His father tried paying him to do it. By the time he was fourteen his school lessons were well beyond his parents' jurisdiction. His mother now had genuine admiration for him in this field where she could not follow him. Any help she gave now was secondary; school was his affair. Pleased with his school reports and with his serious-mindedness, she left him to his own devices, and he trusted her to do so. Social Life [?] Though Frank had been quieting down and becoming less belligerent, his relations with other children did not improve. The

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interviewer, reporting on Frank at ten years of age, said, "He has accepted and taken for granted that other boys do not like him and is not letting it worry him." Frank said, "I don't pay attention to the boys when they tease me. They want me to get mad." The records are silent on any part his mother may have taken in this area. Frank's situation was not a happy one and she undoubtedly had something to say about it. One contribution she made to his social life was to send him to camp. He found it hard going at first but came to enjoy it, and that was positive progress. In general, however, information about the parent-child relationship in this field is insufficient for an appraisal. Emancipation Summary Personal cart ['+.] ['+:] Family [.+'] [:+.] Use of money [*+'] Activities [*+.] ['+:] School [:+:] Social life [?] A general withdrawal took place, during the period from age ten to age fourteen. Frank gave up trying to run the world, and his insecurity became more apparent. He narrowed his personal world in order to cope with it, and his family came to accept him as "the quiet one." His social life must have been rather unhappy; on the other hand he felt more comfortable at home as he began to enjoy some of the help offered, though he still seldom went so far as to ask for any. His emergence came about largely through his school life, with reading and world affairs as secondary interests. These years were perhaps a time of gathering strength rather than a time of definite outward steps. The personal-care, family-living, and activities fields all showed improvement, and came closer to being balanced interactions. Frank as a Young Adult Our final look at Frank focuses on ages nineteen and twenty, with a few references to the period immediately preceding. Now he was described thus: "Very quiet, dislikes interference. Doesn't like attention or to be asked questions." The interviewer said he seemed to "have established a pattern of

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being an adult in the house, and this is generally accepted." His mother still worried about a number of things, mainly his general withdrawal. Personal Care [:+: -» Emancipated] In this field Frank was about as close to being emancipated as he could be as long as he continued to live at home. Not much was said about the area of personal care. His mother said, "He speaks with irritation when advised to tidy up." Frank said, "I buy clothes with help from mother, my taste is lousy— everyday things such as style leave me cold." He was still uneasy about accepting help. His mother considered him "careless about his appearance," and she was "concerned about his personal habits." This "mothering" of hers no longer seemed to bother Frank, who told her he proposed to go his own way. Family Life [:+:] His mother now accepted him as a person in his own right, and said she was "satisfied with his moral development." He occasionally came to discuss problems with the family, but he usually asked for nothing. He enjoyed "family discussion at the dinner table with his father." There were trips and outings and Sunday evenings together, and Frank did a few chores around the place. Sometimes he would give his mother advice and treat her in a grown-up way, while maintaining his distance. The interviewer believed there were close family ties, although Frank's mother said there were no physical demonstrations of affection, that Frank was aloof and "inclined not to mention important matters." Apparently warmth and admiration were available for the taking, and though Frank was chary of getting involved, he must surely have felt supported more comfortably than he ever had been in early childhood. In his own later records Frank said little about his mother, and one guesses that he both felt superior and enjoyed being fussed over. At least no resentment is indicated, though it may have been there, and his late acquired reliance on her may have been long in dissipating. Frank's active, sociable younger brother now occupied the centre of the family stage. From his isolation Frank hardly competed, though he had a certain distinction as the student.

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Their mother said Frank would put up with his brother's noise and high spirits and treat him as a minor; she reiterated that they showed no jealousy. A couple of years earlier they had shared a "hobby table" which they were "supposed to keep tidy, and not quarrel over." Beyond the fact that they shared a few indoor occupations, and that they were very different personalities, we are told little about their relationship. As the brother grew into his middle teens his mother began to worry about his irresponsibility and "lack of serious-mindedness." This somewhat dampened her confidence in his bounce and charm, and may have increased her appreciation of the quiet, hardworking Frank. Use oj Money [*+*] Frank's allowance had grown to cover all books and incidentals. There was no supervision, and his mother said he never asked for anything—in marked contrast to his brother, who appeared to have endless wants. The matter of earning money never came up, and Frank showed no concern about his dependence on the family. He handled only the cash required for everyday needs. Activities [*+.] Aside from reading, few interests are reported. At seventeen Frank said he had a few hobbies, but "none I like particularly." At eighteen he said, "If it weren't for my interest in current events, I would be living in an ivory tower. However, current events keep me in touch and, even though not interested, I am aware of what is going on." Still using negativism as a shield, he avoided much in this area. His mother worried about his "lack of outside interests," and doubtless she said so frequently. However, his lack of interests can hardly be attributed, at this stage, to a desire to avoid his mother's bossing. The pattern had begun long ago and was now part of his general withdrawal; he had no compelling interests begun in earlier days to form a basis for present activities. Reading and listening to music appeared to be his main avocational resources. Now he even specified that he disliked swimming.

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The field was small; within it he did as he pleased. But as far as his relationship with his mother was concerned, he still had to resist her endless fussing. School [;+: -» Emancipated]

In the area of vocation and school Frank found his greatest strength; he called it his "main interest." With his good ability and single-mindedness he did consistently well. By sixteen he had decided on a career, and thereafter his ambition never wavered. His chosen field was closely related to his father's, and his father's influence was far stronger now than ever before. Frank and his father were said to "discuss a lot of objective topics/' which presumably left his mother and brother out. Frank's father was now the key family figure in this important area of his life. Information is limited because the mother filled in half the records. Frank, in his share of the records, described his own activities and said almost nothing about his family. We can make only tentative assumptions. We do know that Frank was showing confidence and independence in his chosen direction, and we are almost sure he was receiving support, approval, and respect from his family. And we assume that this encouragement came most tellingly from his father. His mother centred her life around the details of the household and family life. To her, Frank's career was more a family adornment than his personal accomplishment. Social Life [:+:] In this area Frank's mother was more in her element, and she expressed her concern over his "general withdrawal and lack of outside activities." She said he was "not shy with people, but he doesn't try to get out and away with people. He is reluctant to participate in activity, in social life." Frank himself was non-committal: through his late teens he had made such remarks as "Dislike parties," "No friends in lately," "Friends in once or twice on school work." Later he belonged to a bowling group, and said he preferred social affairs organized around some activity. Also he liked to be able to "participate well." Beyond this nothing—except his mother's accounts of

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family activity and socializing. Although she urged more, his position as adult in the family, and his determination to do as he wanted, put a limit to her pressuring. Always he was a welcomed and appreciated member of the family. Well within the "close family ties" noted by the interview, he was accepted on his own terms. Emancipation Summary Personal care [*.+! -> E] Family ['.+'.] Use of money ['+'] Activities ['+.] School [:+! -» E] Social life [:+:] More fields came into balance as Frank became accepted for what he was. His mother no longer tried to shape him in ever-changing ways. In several areas he was respected, seemingly for having the strength of mind to say "This is what I am—ibis is it." Frank won admiration and respect for his accomplishments in the school area. One wonders if he was left feeling he must always prove himself, must have external evidence of success. This kind of insecurity could stand in the way of deeper satisfactions in the work itself. However, as we leave Frank at this stage, it is clear that his strength in the school and vocational area was leading to independence. He was still largely unemancipated from his parents but the relationship had moved toward balance in more areas, and was expected to promote emancipation—albeit late. Discussion The final picture of Frank is tantalizing. We are left not knowing what he is really like. Right to the end he shut us out. One of his rare descriptions of himself, at eighteen, says, "About myself, nothing much to report. I am a quiet sort of person, a little lazy, perhaps." His records are full of factual detail, with no words stronger than "like" or "dislike." The old belligerence had vanished. His mother, with her external view of him, provided little insight, and his own records managed to hide him

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just as successfully. The continuing thread through all the vicissitudes of his story is his rejection of an unreliable, perhaps even untrustworthy world. The outcome is a rather rigid personality, conforming and not too flexible. The Thematic Apperception Test, administered when Frank was nineteen, described him as "characterized by a marked passivity. He is perceptive, he forms opinions and conclusions, but is hesitant to assert himself, and so he is tentative and frequently non-committal in his approach." Thus far there is agreement with the emancipation appraisal. But then the personality appraisal says, "Even as a young child he seems to have been self-effacing. He seems to have felt he was always in the wrong, always incurring parental displeasure." As we know, Frank was the least self-effacing child imaginable. However, Frank now saw himself as self-effacing, and he projected his present attitudes back into the past. The past he remembered may well have been the ten- to fourteen-year-old period when he was pulling into his shell. The shift from an unruly, belligerent small boy to a quiet, serious-minded, solitary young man is less startling if one focuses on the word solitary. Let us speculate for a moment. Two possible ways of standing aloof from the real world are to force the world into one's own design, and to retreat from the world, to turn one's back on it. Frank tried the first, and when that failed he took the second way. All through his story we see his fear of any involvement with people, and this fear had its beginning in early days before he came to nursery school. The failure to learn reciprocal trust had an early start. It was in no sense a total failure. He did trust his mother, and this trust seemed to increase in later years, but it was slow in growing and warped by certain deficiencies in their relationship. Early sources of difficulty are lost in the past—perhaps it was some combination of environmental factors and Frank's physical make-up. The more interesting aspect of his development is the gains he made after a poor start. Here we are out of the realm of speculation. Frank came to have a reliance on his mother when he found that he could have it without losing his freedom to grow in his own way. His mother's affection for him became tempered with

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respect where larger goals and directions were concerned. She nagged at details of behaviour, but she accepted him as the studious person he was, as the quiet one who disliked interference with his privacy. Frank's positive and successful effort came in areas where he could work alone—though not entirely without help. His earliest teachers made a big contribution when they recognized his ability and gave to him both understanding and dependable help. They liked him, too. Not put off by his negative, antagonistic attitude, they gave him something he had missed at home: a combination of care (help plus controls) and realistic respect for him as a person. At home his mother gave him unwavering affection and found him intensely interesting no matter what he did or did not do. Through all the confusion of being told to do many things, and never being held to a set course, he never doubted that he was an important person. Frank's withdrawal, his distrust of the world, came not because he lacked love, but because he lacked that other essential component of care—an orderly world. Quite possibly the different deficiencies in care produce certain typical effects in a child. In Frank's case the confusion of his world alarmed him and he sought safety by refusing to get involved. He introduced some order by imposing his own limits—and they were narrow ones. It is significant that his area of greatest effort and success was the school with its rigid controls and definite limits. Here he found what he needed and was able to make something of it. He could participate actively, have the satisfactions of accomplishment, and still keep his distance socially. He still shied away from personal relationships. The future will depend in large measure on what Frank can make of his vocational life, whether he will have enough confidence for real enjoyment and fulfilment, whether he will, through his work, find trusting relationships with other people. The personality appraisal suggests that "he has established no close ties with anyone and lives very much by himself. . . . With his passive approach it would have to be other people who make the advances." Again it must be remembered that Frank is just on the edge of adulthood and has only partly emancipated himself

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from the family. One wonders if he will eventually be able to let down his protective barriers sufficiently to find a good marriage relationship, or whether he will want someone to fuss over him and mother him and let him keep his distance. One could speculate indefinitely. Frank's mental health is at the get-along-in-society level; whether he has an adequate beginning for a full and abundant life is another matter. Like the other children in the study, he has shown a tremendous will and determination toward mental health, an unshakable urge to overcome difficulties and become a whole person. What will happen to this urge in later life is an open question—he has not had an easy time thus far. Always we wish we could renew our acquaintance with these friends of ours, know how they make out at thirty. Still unsatisfied, we would then want to meet them at forty, and at fifty. The story would never end—we would like to meet their children.

6. Amy's Story

AMY WAS a fortunate child, born into a close-knit family where affection and consideration for others were key virtues. Her parents were educated people with broad community interests; they enjoyed cultural pursuits and took an active part in helping the less fortunate. Both parents had a warm and sincere interest in their children and felt that serious thought and study were necessary in order to do their best for them. Holding similar views, they presented a united front on matters of child-rearing. The father played a real part in the life of the family. Amy was the sole object of parental concern for four years, until her sister was born. In nursery school Amy was a quiet, rather unobtrusive little girl. She conformed with the usual requirements and played well with other children. She was one of that middle group who are neither outstandingly conforming nor venturesome. Amy's superior intelligence was not yet particularly evident, but she made good use of play materials and appeared to enjoy nursery school in her own quiet way. When this story begins Amy's life at home was not going smoothly. Her mother, in spite of good attitudes and good intentions, was finding her small daughter difficult to manage. Hindsight suggests that some of her trouble can be blamed on over-scrupulous adherence to the dictates of experts who preached early habit-training and self-reliance. When Amy failed to come up to expectations her mother blamed her own inadequacy, and her uneasiness must surely have been communicated to Amy.

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Personal Care [.+'] Personal care was a trouble spot during most of Amy's early years. Amy resisted her mother's calm but emphatic insistence on a definite programme of self-help. Almost daily she would get angry and kick and scream. Her mother was hard put to cope with this behaviour, which recurred over so many small details. She isolated Amy for tantrums, and if Amy did not get herself ready for school in time, she would have to stay home. Amy never was late, in spite of the dawdling which worried her mother. In fact, Amy was conforming and doing most of what was expected of her. By the age of eight or nine she was quite reliable about looking after herself, and seemed to have outgrown the earlier tantrums and show of resistance. They were replaced by whining and complaints. Now she was easily upset over trifles, would wail, "I can't find my other mitt." Her mother referred to her "irritating manner." Amy's mother did her best. She set up consistent routines with definite consequences for non-compliance; she tried to keep calm and firm; and she loved her little girl very much. Somehow the affection and support failed to come through to Amy in this part of her life. She felt pushed toward independence in a way that overshadowed her feeling of being cared for. Too much was asked—not that any one demand was too difficult, but altogether it was too much. She was never allowed to fail, to relax and reassure herself that help was available. One sensed that she would have preferred to lean comfortably on her mother rather than keep up to standard all the time. Occasionally she stated her feelings: when told she was "not doing what a big girl should/' she replied, "I don't like you to talk to me that way." At six she often asked directly for help in getting dressed. Her angry outbursts and her complaints appear to have been similar pleas for help. During this period she had frightening dreams of being kidnapped or of her mother being taken away. Her mother comforted her when these dreams occurred, and was far from indifferent to them as signs of general insecurity. But she tried to deal with them by providing more care in another area

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rather than directly where it was being sought. Still insisting that Amy learn to look after herself, she gave extra help and affection at other times. In this field she insisted on independence while Amy tried to obtain more care. Family Living [.+"] In the family Amy's mother tried to give the care Amy was asking for, but her own high expectations prevented this area, too, from being in balance. Her mother's high expectations seemed to Amy more like dissatisfaction with her than like respect for her. Probably she felt she never measured up, and her feeling of inadequacy increased. She wanted help more than ever. Her mother, suspecting part of the trouble to be that Amy felt displaced by the baby, gave her a special time every day when they played games and did things together. She also took Amy into partnership in caring for the baby, let her help, and taught her mature ways of handling the youngster. Amy rose to the challenge, but such an adult role may be a strain in itself. Again she was asked to grow up too fast, as if childishness were unacceptable. Looking through Amy's eyes, one can guess that she would have enjoyed a little babying, along with her sister. Viewed from the outside, the family situation appeared good, with much to support the child. Amy enjoyed games, outings, and family fun; she received attention and consideration. Yet this was not quite enough; she was still unsure of herself and wanted to keep close to her mother. Even by the age of nine she was upset if her parents went out; she would get angry at the maid, presumably to keep them home. At least this was a straightforward way of going after what she wanted, a healthier sign than the earlier frightening dreams. Growing confidence also showed in the active part she took in family fun and chores. She would "help in a pinch"; her ambition was to be a "mother"; and she saw herself as a real part of the group. She was particularly fond of her father, and over the years they built a happy and confiding relationship. This picture is good in so many ways that it is not easy to find the source of Amy's timidity and unsureness. Her much

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younger sister does not seem to have presented a threat to her position. It seems fair to accept her mother's judgment that there was little jealousy, since she was frankly watching for it. The crux of the matter lies in Amy's relationship with her mother, who gave both affection and indirect support, but refused direct help. By wanting Amy to grow up too fast, she denied her the comfort of coming back to be helped and reassured. She behaved as if she feared a temporary regression would be a fatal backward step. As Amy grew older and increased in competence, the relationship became a more trusting one. The kind of help she was coming to need was less childish and more understandable to her mother; her timidity in new situations was something her mother could appreciate. And the kind of help she provided was now more meaningful to Amy. The imbalance of pushing parent and clinging child moved into a transitional stage, with some parental help given and Amy taking cautious steps forward. Use of Money [!+'.] Money was of small importance in the early years. Amy's wants were provided for and she was given a small allowance for her own use, with perhaps some encouragement to save. She felt securely looked after; and she was trusted to manage some money herself. The move toward independence was small, but the interaction was balanced as far as it went. At eight she was keeping a "clothes account," her mother's idea, as a preparation for wider limits. In the meantime she accepted much help and showed a little initiative. Activities [:+".] In this area the picture changes: her parents gave lots of help and attention; at the same time they were happy to see her following her own inclinations. They read to her and played games with her; they gave her play materials and a place to play; they allowed her to experiment undisturbed. They were not afraid she would be spoiled by too much, nor did they set standards of achievement. Activities should be enjoyed for their own sake, and Amy was given the opportunity to do so. She

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responded to this satisfying situation: she amused herself alone; she enjoyed doing things with her friends; and recreation with her family was important to her. School [:+!] School appears to have been a peaceful field in the family relationship. Confidence in Amy was justified. A bright little girl whose parents had no competitive goals for her, she chose her own rate and made good progress. Her parents were interested and helped her when she asked. At times her father helped with arithmetic; when she worried about tests her mother was sympathetic. A time for homework was fitted into the daily routine, after a family playtime, and while the younger child was going to bed. Beyond such helps, she went her independent way, coping with her own school life. In this balanced interaction all four parts were present, and Amy was progressing happily in a direction away from the family. Social Life [:+:] Perhaps the best evidence that the social area was going well is that the mother tended to slight it when describing Amy at this time. No "problems" appear; Amy got along well with the children at school and Sunday school; her friends were in and out of the house every day. She had toys and a place to play, and her friends were welcomed. Feminine interests predominated—she was no tomboy. Her parents made no demands for a higher level of sociability, or for assertiveness beyond her quiet ways. Possibly her mother would have preferred more animation and vitality, but she appreciated Amy as she was. She said, "Amy is probably not a leader; she must be sure she is wanted, but she does stand up for her rights." The timidity evident in this area may have been a carry-over from other aspects of her life. It was less marked here and could be considered part of a quiet, rather passive personality. On the whole, she had made a good start, and one could predict that if her parents continued to respect her efforts and to give help when she wanted it, she would pursue her individual way with increasing vigour.

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Emancipation Summary Personal care [.+'] Use of money [:+:] 5c&00/ [:+:]

Family [.+'] Activities [I+I] Social life [:+:]

During this childhood period Amy was rather quiet and somewhat timid. Able to be quite self-possessed in some situations, in others she would fly apart and become negative or irritable. She had frightening dreams and nightmares. This two-sided picture is illustrated in the above emancipation constellation, which has some areas of positive interaction and some unbalanced areas. In personal care and family living, areas that loom large in the early years, she was not given sufficient support for her immaturity. Loving care was certainly given, but was overshadowed by her mother's anxiety to have her grow up quickly. She was respected for what she could become rather than for what she was. This left Amy two choices: to try to live up to the high expectations and somehow manage her feelings of insecurity, or to cling to mother to assure herself that help and affection were still available. Amy chose the latter way. Though she did much of what was expected of her, she also got results by her demands for attention. The trouble was that her behaviour worried her mother, and the worried attention she received was not the same as care freely given. She could never be sure the care she wanted to rely on would be forthcoming unless she worked for it. To her mother any babyish behaviour made getting to be a big girl seem an even more desirable goal. Mother and child were each responding to what they expected of the other: Amy expected to be pushed out, her mother expected her to cling. The Middle Period, 10 to 14 Years In the course of this period imbalances began to disappear, trust grew, and Amy began to blossom out. Her mother had the strength to continue what was best in her relationship with her daughter, and although Amy did not always recognize it, her mother now had real confidence in her, a confidence that was

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not shaken by the difficult times they had to go through. Now that Amy was older her mother understood her better, and hence was able to give help which Amy could recognize and rely on. Asked about fears at age ten, Amy said, "I don't care much for Newfoundland dogs—but I don't have nightmares anymore." Personal Care [.+.] Amy could now look after herself and felt competent to do so. She no longer asked for help or demanded attention in the old way, by refusals and complaints. Her mother's comments were: "Behaviour no problem"; "Takes care of her own things"; "Responsible"; "She mends her stockings and sews on buttons"; and by fourteen, "Takes complete personal responsibility." Occasional "grumbling, slamming door, irritation at parental reproof," gave the human side of a picture that seemed almost too good for a child her age. One glimpsed behind it her mother's strong hand, which allowed "no slipping, no evasion." Standards were high, and now Amy was living up to them. She was even beginning to help her mother, instead of wanting to be helped. If this behaviour had grown out of a secure past, perhaps it could be taken at face value and called very early emancipation in the field of personal care. But the past was fraught with uneasiness and timidity, of which some evidences still remained: quick changes of mood, what her mother called "agitated depressions," and a nervous tic. The symptoms did not appear only in this one field, but this was one place where a high degree of independence was expected for a child of Amy's age. There was to be little relying on mother. Amy was living up to expectations, but at a price. Family Living [:+".] Amy's family life showed increasing trust. Her mother's respect and help now had meaning for her. Her picture of herself began to match her mother's picture of a contributing and valued member of the family. Amy co-operated in chores, helped entertain, and had a sense of humour that the others appreciated. Sharing in family games

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and fun was at once more casual and more significant to her. Her mother called her happy, affable, serene. Temper, moodiness, and grumbling became minor incidents. Her pleasure in her daughter comes through warmly now in her descriptions. She wrote, "We have consideration for her point of view and work out solutions together." Amy's companionship with her father continued; they would joke and tease in a most friendly way. He respected her, and she would bring problems to discuss with him. The young sister was one of the family group, rather than a cause for jealousy. While she was too young to provide real companionship for Amy, they did play, scrap, wrestle, and talk. Their mother occasionally intervened because, she said, Amy "gives in to her sister too easily." The signs of insecurity which lingered on were more related to other fields. Family life had become a source of strength to Amy. Though reticent with strangers and quiet at school, she was very talkative at home. The interviewer summed up by describing her as "shy, but co-operative and responsive, anxious to be friendly.'* Glimmers of resentment appeared in her quick flare-ups at her mother and in her depressed moments, but this was a diminishing part of a good overall picture. Use of Money [:+:] Amy's allowance was increased each year, and she managed it with confidence. Her mother talked over a budget system with her, but let her run her finances herself. By fourteen she took care of school needs, carfare, Sunday school, shows. At the same time she was satisfied to have her major needs supplied by her parents. Her parents provided help and also respected her ability to learn for herself. Activities [!+'.] Development in the field of activities shows a continuous progression. Amy expanded her activities in many directions; some interests were shared with the family, some with friends, and some occupied her alone. She began trying new things, a sign her confidence was growing. This exploration was made easy by

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parents with wide and varied interests, who felt Amy should not be pushed into activities for extraneous or social reasons; they left her free to make her own choices. Reading was a main intellectual interest and one she enjoyed; she made use of the school library and began to read adult books. Physical activities were numerous. In high school she began to play team games such as hockey, volleyball, baseball, basketball, and badminton. She continued a number of noncompetitive activities—skating, hiking, bicycling—and added new ones. Swimming, skiing, riding, gardening, and canoeing came to be included in her busy life. Artistic interests developed early, no doubt influenced by the family, which provided material to work with and paid for art and music lessons. The latter were her own choice, and she enjoyed the lessons and the practising. The creative effort and the drive to learn new skills came from Amy herself. School [:+'] Amy's school life is difficult to assess. The parent-child interaction was almost balanced: Amy did cope with the school situation, but she worried about it, did not sleep well, felt uneasy. The cause did not appear in the current home relationships. Her parents were giving all the help and support they could, and she relied on them. They respected her good abilities in a realistic way, without pressing for high standards. Hers was the concern for high achievement, which could, of course, be one sign of insecurity—she needed high marks in order to believe in herself. Undertaking to cope with school on her own, she counted on conformity and good behaviour to lessen the challenge. The school considered her a good student: "She does a project when asked but will not volunteer or put herself forward." The extra spark of self-assurance was missing. This extension of Amy's timidity may stem from her early insecurity in relation to her mother. An alternative explanation could be that the work itself was becoming markedly more difficult; or the trouble could have arisen from pressure by the school. However, the home situation had now improved, and if Amy was belatedly soaking up the dependence she had missed,

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she should soon be ready to meet new challenges. She could become emancipated as well as a child with an earlier start, though the process would take longer. Although these years were a transition stage, in terms of balance, they could have had positive value for Amy. Social Life Amy continued to have a group of friends who gathered at her house and with whom she got along well. Her mother had a few reservations about her social abilities: "She leaves the initiative to others . . . is slow to make new friends," but on the whole the verdict was good. Amy was comfortable with her own friends, although she was reserved in larger circles such as school. Children and adults liked her, though she took her time about getting to know new people. They were not automatically accepted as friendly and helpful. We judge from the descriptive words Amy's mother used that she had wished for a gay little friend-of-all-the-world. Nevertheless, her appreciation of Amy continued to grow. The only way in which she exerted pressure on her daughter was to get her to join groups with a religious background similar to her own. She felt strongly that this would be a good thing in the long run. Amy was reluctantly persuaded, and was helped to join some church groups. By fourteen she was beginning to feel at home with these new friends, and they became an important part of her social life. This bit of pushing does not seem to have upset the balance of the relationship between mother and daughter. It may, in fact, have strengthened it, if Amy appreciated the validity of her mother's reasons. Emancipation Summary Personal care [.+.] Use of money [:+:] School [:+']

Family [:+:] Activities [:+:] Social life [:+:]

The years from ten to fourteen were a real transition period for Amy. The relationship with her mother smoothed out, and emancipation moved forward. Amy became calmer and more controlled.

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In the matter of managing her personal care Amy still sensed that much was expected of her. Feeling the strain of living up to these expectations, she resented reproofs. In relations with her family she became more trusting and relaxed, though the two areas of personal and family life overlap to some extent. Her mother found her easier to understand as she became less childish; she could give help in a way that Amy appreciated. She no longer had to worry about Amy's old unwillingness to do small things for herself, or about her negativism, which had seemed so inexplicable. From the relationship of a pushing parent with a dependent child the situation changed to one in which Amy was given help that she could rely on, and respect which allowed her to grow at a comfortable rate. The earlier situation cannot be dismissed as a simple case of rejection that could have been solved by displays of affection. Amy received sincere affection expressed in many ways. Her mother had cared almost too much, she had wanted too much for—and from— her child. For a while the much that was demanded hid from Amy the much that was offered. Amy's activities and interests continued to be a source of strength. Her social life was broadening out, well supported by her mother. In spite of having had to adjust to a new group of friends, her social confidence increased. In school Amy did well, though in a conforming rather than a spontaneous way. Amy's past influenced her toward an adjustment marked by caution and reserve. She still tended to be overly dependent on her mother, and she showed remnants of resentment. Nevertheless she was now a well-integrated youngster who was becoming mature and emancipated, with the support of parents who loved and respected her. Becoming an Adult, 15 to 20 Years Personal Care ["+.] The personal care field had many vicissitudes, and it went on having its ups and downs until Amy was twenty. Her mother constantly emphasized that Amy had freedom about coming and going, about bedtime, and about taking complete personal responsibility. From Amy's point of view it looked otherwise.

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Her mother made comments and suggestions about bedtime, about what to wear, and what to do, all of which irritated Amy. She felt able to cope with these things and resented the unwanted help; perhaps her picture of her independent self was not well established and hence was easily threatened. Her feelings may have harked back to the early insecurity which made the present level difficult to maintain. In any case, friction between her and her mother never assumed major proportions; the field itself was no longer a major one. Although her mother did not really do much directing, tension was kept alive at the end of this period by her dislike of Amy's smoking. Intellectually she saw nothing wrong with it, but she was unable to suppress the irritation it aroused. One can only guess at causes of this flickering resistance toward her daughter beneath the serene surface. She was puzzled about it herself. Emancipation, for one with Amy's competence, should have been completed in this field. Before she was twenty she was looking after herself entirely, yet the emotional tie with her mother kept up some interaction after it might well have dwindled away. Amy's occasional resentment can be seen as an echo of the negativism of earlier years, or perhaps it relates to her current unsureness in the social area. After all, to a girl, personal care involving clothes and physical appearance lies close to the social area. Amy was still feeling restrained with other people and so, perhaps, was letting off steam at home, was seeing criticism where none was intended. Family Living [:+:] Trustful interaction continued in Amy's family life, where there were companionship and shared activities in which she felt herself very much a person in her own rigjht. The changes that came during these years were toward greater emancipation. Family life was still satisfying, but there was less and less of it, as Amy increasingly occupied herself with her own friends and interests. Time at home was reduced to meals together and some portions of weekends and holidays; yet within this lesser relationship the old good qualities remained. Amy relied on affectionate support from the family; she could come for help

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or advice without endangering her growth as an individual. Her family respected her enough to refrain from interfering. I have said I believe emancipation is not a severing of the relationship between parent and child; that it is, instead, a transformation. I would like to digress briefly on this aspect of emancipation. Adult-to-adult interaction is quite different from adult-to-child. In the mature relationship between two adults there must be care and respect on both sides. It seems likely that there is an early aspect of the relationship between parent and child which leads on to this outcome—it lies in the help a child begins to offer his parent. I am not thinking now of a child who, in later life, looks after an aging and infirm parent, but rather of the good companionship which is a consequence of emancipation. This is a form of equality that develops gradually, beginning in one area or another. Amy shows us some clues as to how it comes about. Very early she would "help in a pinch," and her helpfulness was mentioned by her mother with increasing frequency, and always with real appreciation. Her help was freely offered. There is probably a delicate line between asking your child's assistance on occasion and demanding it constantly as a parental right. Expecting help can be an insidious form of control by a dominating parent. On the other hand, the graceful acceptance of a child's help can build his self-respect by demonstrating one's respect for him. The help Amy gave was enjoyed and valued as a real contribution to her parents and to the family group. When Amy was a grown-up young woman who still enjoyed her parents' company one could look back to their early relationship and see the beginnings of mutual care and respect. Use of Money [:+: -» Emancipated] Amy assumed more and more responsibility for handling the money she needed. To her weekly allowance for incidentals was added a clothes allowance. Although still at school in this period, she was included in some of the financial planning for the family, and she made a contribution to the household budget by doing chores. A shortage of available help added impetus, someone in the family had to do these things, and Amy stepped into the breach.

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Amy's planning for her future included a job that would make her self-supporting. She worked in this direction and by her early twenties was earning her own money. Emancipation was then complete in the financial area. Activities [:+:] Amy's leisure-time activities branched out in many directions. She experimented with acting, voice culture, playing a guitar, and writing stories for the school paper. She developed some domestic skills. She continued the non-competitive physical activities she had enjoyed earlier, though by the end of this period they were secondary to intellectual and artistic pursuits. Theatre, music, opera, and ballet were enjoyed at the spectator level. Humanitarian interests were evident in various jobs she took on—teaching Sunday school, working at a children's camp and in a nursery school. Though she was a well-organized person and acquired some proficiency in most things she took up, variety seems to have been more important to her than concentrated effort in any single direction. However, she did not jump from one activity to another merely for the sake of keeping busy; she could become really intrigued by a variety of things—and this built strength for the future. Support and approval came from her parents, who had many interests of their own, and who shared some of her enthusiasms. But Amy was making her own choices. On the solid foundation of the past she was now making great strides. The interaction with her parents was balanced and had so diminished in amount that emancipation was almost accomplished. School [:+:] School provided Amy with another field for successful endeavour, a place where she was confident and competent. Though emancipation was virtually complete before the end of the period, her parents continued their friendly interest. Amy still lived at home, and her parents paid her tuition, but her performance at school was up to her. She made the plans and decisions toward her chosen vocation, and here her efforts were channelled in one direction. To make a choice that would

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be approved by her parents was not difficult, their highest value being that one should find an occupation of vital interest, preferably one which makes some positive contribution to society. And their views of a positive contribution were very broad. As their own activities were in line with clearly thougjht-out values, Amy had a consistent example with which to identify—an example far stronger than precepts. She found her parents' general outlook congenial, and chose her own road toward similar goals. Social Life [!+!] and [:+'] Amy's social life changed its course midway through her late teens, so two different assessments are required. At fifteen and sixteen she got on well with her many friends, both girls and boys, at school, Sunday school, parties, club meetings and "visiting around." Her school said she was now popular and active in extracurricular activities. With various groups of old friends she felt at ease, and seemed generally more confident socially than in the previous period. By the time Amy was seventeen things had changed again. She was called shy; her rapport at school was only "fair." Boys seem to have been the cause of the difficulty. Though interested in them, she lacked confidence. Sensitive about not being asked on dates, she saw herself as unattractive and blamed her appearance. A look back at her social progress suggests her difficulty was a recurrence of the earlier "slowness" to make friends. She had always been more comfortable with the familiar, and the new boy-girl relations had, at first, many strange elements. The old group pattern had altered. College added another new dimension to be faced, and she was ill at ease. These outside events sent her back to her mother for sympathy and understanding; a return to dependence which was unlike regression, in the usual sense, as she never resorted to childish behaviour. Instead, her assurance wavered in the face of new challenges, and she went back to a legitimate source of support—after all she was not yet a grown-up. With her mother's help she faced up to her difficulties and tried to solve them. The help largely took the form of much talk in which her mother treated her problems seriously. By helping her to view them

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realistically she helped her find ways to tackle them. One of Amy's solutions at this time was to narrow her social field somewhat. This, combined with turning to her mother for reassurance, accounts for the verdict of lack of emergence on her side. The slow-down in social emancipation raises a question about Amy's ability to form close personal relationships. The early lack of trust in her relationship with her mother might suggest that there was a difficulty, notwithstanding her childhood friendships which could have been formed on a superficial "activity" level. One remembers her "lack of initiative" and wonders. Some counter-evidence is in order. At sixteen Amy was described by her mother as very sensitive to the feelings of others; when a student in her class was made to look ridiculous she worried about it. In her twenties she described herself freely and with a good deal of insight, an accomplishment which suggests an ability to empathize with others. She called herself tactful, said she made friends easily, enjoyed talking to and listening to people, but would dislike directing or persuading them. She thought she was too much influenced by social approval, was too dependent on others, but she said, "My friends tell me I have my aggressive moments." There is much more in a similar vein, all of which leads one to the conclusion that Amy had depth and understanding in her relations with other people. I have jumped ahead for evidence of Amy's strengths in order to support the contention that the social difficulties in her late teens marked only a temporary lag in her emancipation. The solution Amy found at that time, of leaning on her parents and narrowing her field, may not seem very remarkable in shortrange terms, but it built solidly for the future. The slow-down gave her time to grow in confidence, and probably helped her come to terms with herself. Emancipation Summary Personal care ["+. -* E] Use of money [:+: -» E] School [:+: -» E]

Family [:+:] Activities [:+: -» E] Social life [:+' -» .*+:]

This is a fine emancipation picture. In earning her own living, in her activities, and in her vocation—in those areas which took

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Amy out into the world—the pattern is a good one. The area of family living, being balanced, was not holding her back. Seeing her confident and effortful in so many ways, one can fairly assume that the personal-care field was relatively insignificant, that the friction indicated there related to a very small amount of mother-daughter interaction, to minor irritations. The imbalance in the social field is a transition stage. Knowing Amy's parents, as we do by now, we can predict they will continue their support and respect until she is able to move away comfortably. When balance is restored, the amount of interaction will decrease, and the typically parent-child relationship will soon end. The constellation as a whole shows that dependence on parents in the social field has not affected individual growth in other aspects of Amy's life. She just needed some family companionship until she was sufficiently absorbed with her friends to move away from home ties. Amy's over-assertion in the area of personal care may be, in part, a reaction against her feeling that she was too dependent in the social area. The relationship between a mother and adult daughter is much too complex to assign single causes for the minor irritations. Perhaps Amy's mother still had a habit of commenting on her daughter's appearance; perhaps she had a lingering desire to go on taking care of Amy, hated to see her grow up entirely. Perhaps Amy's dependence was greater than she cared to recognize, so she resented the mother she saw as dominating—we know that later on she admitted to a dislike of authority figures. At this stage, she wanted the domination and did not want it, just as her mother wanted her to grow up and not to grow up. When one looks at the whole of a twoperson relationship it often seems necessary to accept inherent contradictions. Affection and understanding took mother and daughter through to new levels of appreciation of one another. Amy as an adult, over twenty-one, was a very pleasant and matureseeming young woman. Though quiet and somewhat reserved, she was self-reliant and capable. She had increasing insight into her own personality: described herself as easy to get along with, but too diffident and self-conscious in strange social situations. She tried to see herself objectively and was generally pleased

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with what she saw: "I generally enjoy life." She was enjoying people more, and felt that the "lack of assurance and spontaneity can be overcome." Frank about what she considered her defects, she usually ended on a positive note: she intended to do something about them. In her vocation she had an abiding interest, though no strong ambition. She may not have been using her good ability to full capacity, but she was finding her work satisfying and enjoyable. And in these years thoughts of marriage were much to the fore. We can look at Amy now with high approval—and her mother would agree with us. She described her as "well-adjusted, happy in her own quiet way"; "friendly and affectionate"; "understanding with people and concerned for her family." After Amy's marriage a cordial relation existed between the two families; they shared ideas and interests; and at last Amy's late dependence on her mother ended.

7. Eve's Story

THE STORY begins when Eve left nursery school. At five she was a cheery, active, sociable little girl, just the kind of child her mother liked: amusing, sometimes exasperating, never boring. Eve was always sure of a response, and the frank, open way she expressed her thoughts and feelings was typical of her family. She felt quite at ease, and said that when she grew up she was going to "just walk around and help Mummy like I do now." Childhood, 5 to 10 Years Family Living [:+:] Eve's mother, an assured person, liked to see drama and humour in her world. Everything was either "wonderful" or "dreadful," and she went in for detailed accounts of the verbal and emotional skirmishing she and Eve sometimes indulged in. Unscrambling this we find behind it all a far from helter-skelter household; the daily round went smoothly, and definite limits were set. Eve was considered a responsible child: "She comes to meals on time, is terribly honest, responds to praise, and is easy to handle." Beyond this was the borderland of backchat and stirring things up which both mother and daughter appeared to enjoy. Eve pretended fears of "bears in the cupboard"; she discussed running away, but never did it. She would call names on occasion, and make saucy retorts (often amusing), and when angry she would throw things around—using, however, some discretion about what she threw. None of this was taken too seriously by her mother, though she sometimes told Eve that she

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had a poor disposition, should learn control and not argue. It sounded as if they argued about not arguing. Eve, in an interview at nine, volunteered the statement, "Sometimes mother and I quarrel"—a matter-of-fact sort of remark with an air of mutuality quite unlike the more usual "Mother gets mad and scolds me." Eve had plenty of verbal gambits for keeping her mother's interest: she could be quite insistent and sometimes complained that the world was treating her badly. She could blow up her troubles and, like her mother, indulge in dramatic scenes. Just the same, home was a sheltering place, and Eve was an affectionate child who said, "Everybody loves me." In this atmosphere she grew in independence, liked to make her own plans. Usually she co-operated; sometimes she even offered to do some housework; at other times she refused and "couldn't be bothered." Family outings and events were a great treat, and she pulled her weight with gusto. But on occasion she rebelled or put things over on her parents, until her mother wondered if she was becoming too independent and self-assertive. Still, she thought it was probably a good thing, that it would be a valuable quality as Eve grew older. In this household there was control as well as freedom. At first glance talk appeared to be the mother's chief method of discipline, but Eve's calm acceptance of rules and of what "Mummy says" belied this interpretation. On some things her mother left no room for argument. She even said that Eve, at five, was "spanked often." Judging from the rest of the records, I doubt the "often." The remark tells more about the mother herself: she was not afraid to tell the staff at the Institute of Child Study that she disagreed with their views on corporal punishment. A more believable picture came from her mention of using "nursery-school routine"—an expression which had come to mean an orderly, undeviating sequence of daily events. Another element of control was the family accord of the parents, who agreed on methods, and who had fun doing things with their children; there were games, picnics, chores, holidays, and much talk. The parents managed family relationships in a way that minimized the potential for conflict between Eve and her younger brother. As the daughter of the family she occupied a valued

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place in their eyes, and in her own. Having a little brother may even have added to her sense of feminine superiority. She looked after him sometimes, but not very much was asked of her in this line. In fact she was very casual about him in her interviews, saying things like, "Oh we squabble a bit—just over silly little things." Of more importance to her was her enjoyment of feminine occupations and her desire to grow up and be the mother in a family. Her parents seem to have assigned each child a separate role, so that each found an easy way to stand out as an individual. Thus Eve's feminine role was firmly established and contributed to her satisfaction and status. Personal Care [!+'.] Eve's increasing competence in looking after her personal care was another source of satisfaction. We have not much detail here because her mother rather took these matters for granted, or at least found other things more interesting. She may have been flouting the "experts" again, with their emphasis on "habit training." Anyhow, we know more about the results than about the methods of achieving them. By seven Eve had taken over responsibility for her personal routines, and she liked to be alone when dressing. She said, "It makes me cross when mother tries to brush my hair." Remarks like this sound as if she was avoiding what she considered interference, and certainly she felt free to comment. Her reliance on parental care appeared in her easy acceptance of household requirements.

Use of Money ['+'] Eve had a small allowance for her own use—except that she was not supposed to buy candy. However, as there were no stores nearby and her parents were casual about the whole matter, she remained wholly dependent on her family in this area. They made ample provision for her needs at this stage, and thought that money was unimportant until she grew a little older.

Activities [:+:] Eve's parents provided for a wide variety of activities and let her find her own level in what she did. She had toys and a

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room of her own where she would play alone happily. Her parents taught her to skate and play badminton, and they shared interests with her. At seven she enjoyed being read to, but by nine she did her own reading: "Of course I'm a bookworm— Mummy always knew I would be." Again, this calm acceptance of what her mother said indicated a comfortable reliance from which she shifted over easily to doing things for herself. The scope of her activities widened steadily, a trend which showed up within the home in many small ways, such as progressing from feeding the dog, at six years, to bathing him at nine. She began to take life seriously, too, and "worried about the future." As this was reported by her mother, we assume that she was consulted in such matters. Eve told us, "Mummy wants me to design bedrooms when I grow up." Again she accepted the good arbiter, though she went on to say she was afraid she would design them all alike, that what she really wanted was to be a mother. She certainly felt free to voice her own opinions, and in the records at this time the implication was strong that in her family children's ideas were considered valid and important. On the whole children were very nice to have around. School [.+.] School life, however, presented a different picture. Eve stated her views on school with admirable brevity. At six she said, "It is O.K.; I'm the worst in the class." At seven, "It [school] is keeping up with others. I suppose I might as well grin and bear it." At nine, "I stood first at Easter, but I don't think I will again—Milly is working awfully hard." The incident she recalled as "least liked" was being late for school twice. In startling contrast are her mother's descriptions of Eve at this time. She said Eve loved school, adored her school work, felt she had a definite place in the school group, and got wonderful reports. Her "place in the group" was apparently at the top of the class, and both the teacher and her mother called her too competitive. Her mother saw this as a serious fault, but failed to recognize the ambivalence in her own attitudes. She was the one who, with her praise and enthusiasm, encouraged standing first. Toward the end of this period she was complaining that Eve could do better if she worked harder, and she

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thought her daughter did better if she herself helped her. Eve, in spite of her own terse comments, seems to have accepted her mother's goals and standards. Standing first brought her the double reward of beating the others and receiving special recognition at home. Any real sense of personal accomplishment was subordinated to these goals. The interviewer, noting the mother's conflicting values, pointed out that the pressure for excellence was making Eve tense and anxious, and suggested that she try to lessen the competitiveness by interesting Eve in non-competitive pursuits. Social Life [:+:] Eve's competitive attitude did not carry over from school into her social life. Children gathered at her house. She had friends at school and in the neighbourhood and went on visits to family friends. Her mother's comments in this area were all full of approval of Eve's sociability and assurance. This outgoing child fulfilled her mother's hopes without urging, and she was doing what she enjoyed. She had social poise with adults as well as with children. The interviewer found her friendly, co-operative, and self-possessed. Though she could still amuse herself alone, her interest in her friends increased. By age nine she liked to make her own plans and preferred to be with the girls rather than with her family. At the same time, she accepted the rules her parents laid down about what she might or might not do. At one point she said "I really shouldn't play with Joe. Mother doesn't want me to." She thought this was her mother's view—there was actually no rule about Joe. Her mother's only comment on this friendship was one of amused interest. On the whole, her parents were still very much a governing factor in Eve's expanding social life. Emancipation Summary Personal care [:+:] Use of money ["+"] School [.+.]

Family [:+:] Activities [:+:] Social life [:+:]

In review, this is a fine emancipation picture. In the fields most important at her age, Eve had developed a comfortable

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reliance on her parents and increasing confidence in herself. Personal care was handled without fuss. With her family and friends and in her activities she had a strong sense of her own identity, of being a person making her own decisions. To her the world was a fascinating place, and she tackled it with enthusiasm. I hope the short description of her given above conveys some of her eager interest as it shines through the records. Here was no dull conformist. Her family gave her a good deal of freedom, and survived—even enjoyed—the results. After all, under the recurrent alarums and pother she became a fairly selfcontrolled young person. We might use her words to sum up: "Everybody fights with people they love." The one danger signal is in the school area. This field would loom larger as Eve grew older, and already at ages nine and ten it was creating strain and anxiety. Eve's mother unconsciously had allowed her own ambition to replace respect for her daughter. Standing at the top of the class was her goal, not Eve's. Eve accepted this view to such an extent that anything less than first place was tantamount to failure, a failure that would lose her mother's good opinion and would spoil her own picture of herself. Granted her mother did help her (gave her care) in this area, yet this help was aimed at fulfilling the mother's expectations. To Eve the pressure to work hard must have seemed more like a lack of help; it was pressure to achieve high goals. I have somewhat exaggerated the situation toward the end of this period in order to point up the direction the relationship was taking; to show how lack of reliance caused anxiety. Eve could not rely comfortably on her mother's help because it did not come as an answer to her need. Eve's strengths in other fields could mitigate her anxiety in this one, and did prevent it from becoming generalized in other aspects of her life. In terms of our present way of looking at the parent-child relationship, the advice Eve's mother received from the interviewer was only partly good. She was advised to stop pressing for high scholastic standing and to interest Eve in non-competitive pursuits. Competitiveness was not, however, an overall trait of this child; it was her response to a particular situation

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and thus applied to only one area. Within the family, jealousy of her young brother was no problem. Socially she tended to be a leader, but she could also be a follower; and she still enjoyed playing by herself. All of which indicates she was already finding satisfaction in ways that were far from competitive. The remedy for the school difficulty would have had to be sought in that field, in a realistic attitude to success and failure there. Another aspect of the problem, for Eve, was the conflict in the values presented by her mother: competitiveness was deplorable, while standing first was good. Maybe Eve solved the dilemma by applying each value in a diiferent area. Several of the children we studied resolved a conflict of values in this way. As the main points in this story have already been stated, I shall sketch in the later stages only briefly, with the emphasis on crucial periods. The reader may want to make his own predictions about how Eve will fare in the various contingencies that lie ahead. As always, predictions about a child have to be qualified to allow for possible changes in circumstances: the kind of schools he goes to, whether family life remains stable—he might acquire more brothers and sisters, the family might move to a different kind of neighbourhood. Present strengths are weighed against possible challenges. For Eve there may be trouble ahead in the school area—how it will be handled is the question. Age Fourteen Personal Care [*+.] In early adolescence several changes occurred. Eve, always having been allowed to make decisions for herself, had steadily broadened her area of operations. However, as she grew up and moved away from her mother's influence, storms began to blow up, over clothes for one thing. Eve had her own ideas about how to dress; she wanted to be like her friends, and this brought criticism and disapproval at home. Her mother seemed unable to let her experiment, could not refrain from commenting adversely and urging her own ideas of what was suitable for a fourteen-year-old. Eve became hurt and resentful. She

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dramatized her injuries and began to see injustice and disapproval at every turn. Her mother, appreciating that some of this instability may have come from the physiological changes of puberty, urged her to get more sleep. This concern further irritated Eve. The behaviour arising out of her mother's partial insight only made matters worse. Family Living ['+.] Within the family, the two main characters in our story seemed now to be constantly pulling against each other, as the annoyance which used to centre on isolated events now jelled into a pervasive feeling. The bickering between them when they were at cross purposes lacked the bitterness of deep resentment, and one feels there were continuing good qualities in the total home situation which eased matters. Eve was feeling considerably less sure of herself than she pretended, and was all too aware of her inadequacies at this stage of growing up. But her chagrin at having her mistakes pointed out to her turned to annoyance with her mother, who stepped in with lectures and admonitions instead of leaving her to assess her own mistakes. Actually Eve would have liked to rely more on her mother; as it was, she got irritated and refused all suggestions. Her mother put it this way: "She never apologizes, is never wrong, gets angry and argues; we are discouraged because all our efforts seem futile." Eve said her mother told her she was "disagreeable" and "got angry often." Eve did not think it was often. She described herself as sensitive to disapproval—"but not from mother!" "We argue it out and I may get sent to my room, but it doesn't bother me much." Each one seems to have responded to what she expected to get from the other, rather than in accordance with what she herself wanted. Activities [:+:]

Social Life [:+:]

In the social and activities fields, things still went fairly smoothly as the parents' basic confidence in Eve continued. As Eve was taking large portions of these fields into her own hands, interaction with the family was reduced. Friends and interests

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were increasingly her own business. Emancipation proceeded as whole portions of these fields were taken right out of the parentchild relationship. Use of Money [:+:] Eve's use of money was also an area in which there was increasing growth. Money was important to Eve now; she had an allowance for her own use, and her parents believed she could handle it herself. Occasionally they tried docking it for misdemeanors, but this was chiefly an illogical consequence imposed for her misbehaviour in another field. It hardly reflected parental mistrust of her ability to handle money.

School ['+.] School had become more difficult. Now Eve was afraid she would not even pass into the next grade. She hardly remembered she used to stand first. She was a bright girl who had never failed a year and was ahead for her age. Yet she and her mother both came to feel school was a source of real difficulty. An air of pessimism prevailed. In the light of Eve's previous high standing, her mother now blamed the present slump on Eve's lack of interest, on her not caring enough to work hard. She urged Eve on. Along with criticizing her for not caring, she elaborated on how well Eve could do if she tried, and the help she offered consisted of telling Eve to get cracking. A teacher was quoted as saying "Eve is a good student, but doesn't care." I believe the exact reverse was true. Eve did care, but she was now a poor student, she worried a great deal and felt helpless to remedy things. We may not know all the contributing factors here, but some of them are evident. The help her mother was giving was not useful to Eve in any constructive way; it merely served as an irritant and as a reminder of her mother's loss of confidence in her. As confidence in herself dwindled the process was accelerated. From the past records we know she used to get her satisfaction from praise for her prowess, not from a feeling of personal accomplishment. Success was judged as being top of the heap; to fall from that peak was failure. The feeling of

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failure lingered, and we see Eve worrying about school, doing enough work for passing grades, and yet overcome by a sense of defeat. Assessing the effect mother and daughter had on each other in this field poses a problem. From Eve's point of view she received little of either care or respect. Care took the form of telling her to study. Respect was verbal too, telling her she was capable, if she would try. As both care and respect were negative we have to decide which was, for Eve, the more serious lack. Respect was what she was trying for, wanting her parents at least to have confidence in her ability to handle the situation. Or, stated the other way around, she was mainly resisting the nagging, controlling kind of care. She came down hard on the side of independence—not by doing effective school work, but primarily by avoiding her mother's domination. The goal of this kind of emergence was to escape, whereas fruitful emergence aims at personal fulfilment through external goals. Here the interaction with her mother intensified instead of abating as her mother tried to exert even more control and Eve tried harder to get free. In doing so she used up energies that otherwise might have been used more constructively. One could foresee continuing difficulty in this field unless the vicious circle was broken. Emancipation Summary Personal care ['+.] Use of money [!-K] School ['+.]

Family ['+.} Activities [!+'.] Social life [:+:]

Oppositional imbalances appear now. These danger spots should be considered in conjunction with the strengths in the picture. The use of money, activities, and social life ill continue as balanced areas, denoting progress in emancipation. These are fields of increasing importance to a teenager moving out into the world. We also know that the sparring between mother and daughter took place against an overall family background that had been solid and warm. What we do not know enough about is the father's influence. He seems somehow to have walked a

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careful line between his wife and daughter. The parents stood together on most issues, and in the records Eve's mother always says "we." At the same time Eve was sure she had a steady and trusting relationship with her father. Ideally we should have two profiles, one each for the mother-child and father-child relationships. The school situation was serious because it blocked Eve's development beyond the family. The conflict over this outside field came into the home by way of the daily homework chore, and it brought confusion with it. We sense, too, a definite reluctance on the mother's part to have her child grow away from her. Perhaps, because she disliked being left out of Eve's life, she saw the school area as a place where her daughter still needed her. Eve as a Young Adult, 17 to 19 Personal Care [Emancipated] The picture shifts again. Eve had now taken the personal care field entirely into her own competent hands. She bought her own clothes "invariably," and her mother had come to respect her judgment. One surmises that her friends' taste, and her own, had got closer to her mother's—or maybe her mother just gave way. Anyhow, putting Eve on a clothes allowance finally cleared this issue, an important one for girls. Family Living [:+'.] The family-living field had also improved. At no time had Eve's mother neglected to mention Eve's good qualities, not even when she was most vocal in her exasperation at Eve's "lack of appreciation of her home, her wild statements, and her ridiculous self-pity." The emphasis had shifted now, and we read even more often, "She is a wonderful companion when happy—fun-loving, interested in her parents' friends . . . shares their parties and activities." Eve's own comments tell the same story: "I have always been trusted. My general mood is happy. When I am angry I explode but it is over quickly. My parents

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get angry back and sometimes we all yell." Such shenanigans had become occasional episodes, and the underlying good feeling showed through. Eve felt respected again and appeared to accept with better grace the help she still needed from her parents. This area was now much reduced in extent as she was occupied more and more with her own interests and her own friends. Social Life [:+: -» Emancipated]

Eve continued to enjoy her social life and to have parental approval of her ability to handle it herself. Her mother's worry about her school progress had little effect in this area. Eve herself showed a new self-confidence as she began to question the values held by some of her friends. As she attempted to work out her own philosophy she sought new friends who thought more as she did. Her new and more serious view of life was, she thought, at odds with parental values, too. She felt they were indifferent to the ideals and causes which now fired her imagination. Such soul-searching is never easy, particularly when it takes a stand against the ideas held by friends and family. In this instance the "indifference" Eve complained of in her parents at least allowed her to go ahead and work out her own ideas. In doing so she reached a new level of maturity with a widening circle of stimulating friends. At the end of this period her mother remarked that "she can live with herself at last." One might add, too, that she and her mother could live with each other at last. School ['+.

-» Emancipated]

School frustration and fear of failure still brought worry and friction in these later years. Eve was still trapped between the nagging at home and her inability to cope with school and thus make her escape. School came to look like an insurmountable obstacle between her and freedom. She begged to stop school and get a job but her parents were adamant. A stormy period followed. Finally, with some counselling advice, her parents made concessions and special arrangements, and school days were left behind at last. The pleasant relationship with her family

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could then prevail. She had said earlier that she "looked forward to knowing her parents as people—not as someone who tells you to study." Eve Emancipated In spite of difficulties, or better still, because of the strengths in the relationship between Eve and her parents, she was over the hurdles of the growing-up years and had come through in fine shape. Her problems at school, the one really sore spot, assumed different forms at different stages. At fourteen, and for a few years after, her near failure seemed in danger of spilling discord into other fields, but in the main it was confined to the one area. This brief summary omits much of the evidence and many of the details which tell how much care and affection Eve's parents gave her, and how much respect for her intrinsic worth as a person. Her mother was a spontaneous and unrepressed person who admired her daughter's similar qualities— but sparks could and did fly on occasion. What made these flurries healthy was the underlying trust between Eve and her mother, which came in large measure from the mother's own strength, her easy control in an essentially orderly household. When Eve reached her early teens and began to move beyond the home boundaries, her mother seemed to lose her nerve. Instead of giving Eve more rope, she tightened her grip and Eve was pulled up sharply. For a few years the underlying trust was threatened and the frank expression of feelings began to hurt. What brought them through was Eve's already developed strength. She had social confidence and she could make good decisions. The family solidarity, plus the mother's honest admiration for Eve's good qualities, did the rest. Discussion Eve's history raises some questions that have a more general application. A single case proves nothing final about all children. Still, it gives clues to some of the assets and liabilities likely to be encountered. If Eve's difficulties are labelled "adolescent problems," then immediately we must qualify the label by pointing out that the

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school problem really began long before. That adolescent problems often have their roots in the past is no new idea. What is interesting here is that Eve's trouble began with her doing "too well" in school. Her parents praised her too much, set too high a value on her first-class achievement. Unfortunately, as a result, the goal Eve aimed for was never really her own. Instead of deriving satisfaction from the effort she made, she invested herself heavily in the outward symbols of success. When these collapsed something of herself was lost. The stage is set for such a fall when parents judge a child by what he can achieve; if he fails to produce he loses their support. And once he fails here, he never again feels quite the person he thought he was. The alternative possibility is for parents to have a sympathetic understanding of his hopes and his setbacks. Then he can fail and pick himself up again. Parental ambition (false respect) endangers a child's self-esteem: if he fails he loses too much. Even while he is still superficially successful the possibility of failure brings anxiety. Eve's typically adolescent difficulty over independence, as in choosing clothes, was the mother's problem more than the child's. For some very human reasons she back-tracked on allowing her daughter to make decisions. She hated to see her charming little girl growing up and away; and she found it more difficult to give freedom to an out-of-sight teenager than to a little girl near home. The range of choices now began to seem more drastic; a little girl may be happy to decide between a blue dress and a pink, but a day arrives for choosing between blue organdy and black satin. If the mother takes such matters too much to heart, then a teen-age problem is in the making. The next point concerns values. From the many that co-exist in our society, parents find it difficult not to select and set up conflicting standards for their children. The children themselves have to work their way through a lot of confusion before they finally, if ever, sort out their own ideas. I suspect they have a fairly shrewd notion of how highly their parents actually rate the various virtues they preach, a notion which may help or may compound the confusion. To Eve, opposing standards were largely presented as applying to different kinds of activity: she

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was to beat others scholastically, and in personal relations she was to be kind and considerate. When she went too far in beating others at school her mother changed her tack and decried competitiveness. Eve was expected to behave in two opposite ways at once. This conflict was more dramatic, but less damaging, than in some other cases. For Eve it was confined to one area, and it was so openly, even flagrantly, proposed that it had to be dealt with openly instead of being driven underground to become a feeling of guilt for not living up to parental ideals. I doubt that guilt had much to do with Eve's loss of confidence in her academic ability, but it is a possibility. The open expression of feelings in this family probably cushioned the effect of more major disagreements. Eve was used to outbursts. She would be less upset than a child used to calmness and control, who is suddenly faced with erupting feelings and conflicting ideas. In fields where her parents gave a balance of care and respect Eve developed personality strengths, and I am convinced that she was able to do so because she could both rely comfortably on her parents and emerge with their blessing and their respect. As this is the main point of my story I shall not labour it here except to make two further suggestions about "balance." Enough fields must be in balance to engender the strength to carry weak areas. Thus there is, in fact, a second level of balance where a number of factors combine to play a part in the total emancipation picture. The importance of each single area to the total constellation depends on various factors. The age of the child is one—family living and personal care predominate in the early years—money and social life later on. Also the child's competence or lack of it, his native abilities or lack of them, the intensity of his interests in a particular direction—all these may influence the importance he attaches to a particular field. In Eve's case there was balance and strength in areas that mattered greatly to her. Which was cause and which effect I cannot pretend to say, beyond the fact that a conjunction of ability and opportunity, as in the social field, gave to that field an added significance. So far we have only surmises about the effect of various emancipation patternings on personality.

8. Celias Story

Celia and Eve CELIA AND EVE present an interesting contrast. A comparison of some main points in their development can help us to understand each one better. Both girls started out well and appeared to be emerging from dependence on their parents. Then, at about age twelve, both ran into difficulties which ushered in periods of trouble and resistance between them and their parents. Here the similarity in the two cases ends; the outcomes of their stories are far apart. An overall view shows that the general source of difficulty in the middle years was to be found in the value systems held by their parents, in what they considered more important and what less. The two families wanted many of the same things for their children, but when it came to particulars, the values they stressed or ignored varied widely. Stronglyheld beliefs filtered down to the daily lives of the children and affected them deeply. The nature of the effect seemed to depend on three things: the belief itself, the personality of the child, and the congruence of these two. Parental values are one influence among many, but they come into prominence in a long view of the growth process. Celia's parents had an established position in the academicprofessional community. Firm believers in freedom and individuality, they upheld the right of the individual to make up his own mind, and they prided themselves on being rational. Eve's parents also had a secure position, but they were less seriousminded, more easy-going. As members of the business-social community of their city, they were inclined to accept their world as it was. Thus the two families, living near each other and

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doing many of the same things, did, in one sense, live in different worlds. Such differences become magnified when seen through the eyes of a child. Celia and Eve, in their early teens, each faced changing parental attitudes, and each was affected by the change. The parents themselves probably thought they were only reacting to changed circumstances, but the girls felt it as something deeper. Each one said, in effect, "You used to let me do things I wanted to and now you won't," or "You used to trust me and now you don't." Children in different circumstances might say to themselves, "Now she lets me do what I like," or, "Now she doesn't care any more," or, "Now I am on my own." Many kinds of changes may be upsetting, depending on what a child is used to. Eve was accustomed to her mother's mercurial temperament, so when unusual friction arose it was still like more of the same. Celia, on the other hand, found her calm, imperturbable mother becoming worried and frightened. Only a child knows what kind of parent he has. As Celia left nursery school she appeared to be off to a fine start. She was like Eve in being a cheery, active little girl, and at the same time she was very much herself. Busy and sociable, confident that the world was well worth investigating, she was full of fun and unexpected ideas. Adults enjoyed her forthrightness and her quick wit. Some of her remarks became nursery school legends. A gay little character. Now let us look at her at home with her family. Childhood, 5 to 10 Years Family Living ['.+'.] "Happy," "merry," "nice disposition," "sympathetic"—these were descriptions of Celia. Her mother's good opinion, and her own happy adjustment to society, school, and family, shine through the words of the records. The picture was not so good as to be suspect. Occasionally Celia had brief gusts of temper, sometimes she was fretful, sometimes she teased her brother.

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Her mother insisted on the rules, used reasoning, or scolding, and on the whole found Celia easy to manage. She considered the shows of temper unimportant and usually ignored them. Mostly Celia was amusing and fun to have around. Celia had a few fears which she dramatized, almost as if she enjoyed them. Although generally co-operative, she was no goody-goody. She liked to experiment with her own ideas, and went from imaginative lying, at five, to being saucy and answering back before she would give in, at nine. She helped around the house, especially on the maid's day out. Her satisfaction with her family life appeared in her stated ambitions: to be "an ordinary everyday lady"; "to get married and live an ordinary life." This pleasant feeling continued until she was nine; then at ten came signs that she was less at ease. For the first time she was described as "very sensitive to disapproval"— which would seem to indicate that she was getting some disapproval. After an outburst of temper she would be "very sorry and feel badly." Anger was increasing, and was being treated differently. Celia's relationship with her older brother deserves separate consideration within this area. The two children played together a lot, sometimes happily, sometimes quarrelling. Temperamentally they were very different; he was quiet, cautious, and methodical, she was gay and outgoing, and as a consequence often took the lead with the neighbourhood children. She preferred to play with boys, liked their games: "I like to climb trees and get dirty." In fact she acted more like a boy than her brother did and was beginning to find his ways irritating. When she was nine and ten years old, her mother said "Celia's teasing is getting worse," and she saw the cause of this in the fact that "her brother is pght and accurate and always wins." Celia had another grievance: because of her brother's allergies she was not allowed to have a dog, which she wanted more than anything else in the world. However, the relationship between the children had a good side, too. Celia's most enjoyed memory, at age ten, was of a summer holiday camp which they made together. And when she got past the "ordinary lady" stage in her ambitions, she wanted to go ranching in the West with

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her brother. At the end of this period the rift between them was just beginning to widen. Personal Care [:+:] The personal area went smoothly. Celia's mother said she used "nursery school routines," which means that she set up schedules and procedures within which the child did as much as she could for herself. Celia raised no objections, and her mother was pleased with the way she got along; she said Celia, at age ten, was "responsible for personal habits." Once she mentioned that Celia sucked her thumb when going to sleep; another time she said there was "a little nail-biting." The nearest thing to a problem was eating. Celia had been a poor eater since weaning, and she still had a small appetite, so her mother gave her small servings, urged her occasionally, and tried to give her food she liked. By the time she was ten she was described as a fair eater, and that was the end of the matter. Celia looked after herself pretty well, and was co-operative about the rules set for her. Her mother both gave her help and admired her accomplishments. Use of Money ['+'] Celia's weekly allowance was one cent for every year she was old—a method of reckoning used by a number of parents back in the days when a cent would buy a little something. Celia was not much interested; there were no stores near so she put her money in a piggy bank. Later she said she was saving for a bike. One time her mother said she was supposed to get an allowance but she seldom asked for it. Though she had some freedom about spending her allowance if she got it, the entire matter was so casual that the money area could be considered wholly dependent. Activities [:+;] Many play opportunities were provided for Celia. She had toys and a place to use them, and she lived in a neighbourhood where she had freedom to roam. Her mother took her to the library and read to her. Otherwise she left her plenty of free time

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to do as she liked. Little detail was supplied about her solitary play, but she never seemed to be bored, although at nine she did complain of "nothing to do on Sundays." What she liked best were the active outdoor games with other children—to be on the go, doing the things the boys did. It seems there were few girls around to stimulate domestic play, and anyway it would have been difficult to visualize Celia playing anything as tame as "house." She called herself a "tomboy," loved imagining and having adventures. With active body, quick mind, and quick wit, she wanted lots of scope and social stimulation—she liked her interests and her friends combined. In this balanced area she received a good deal of support from her parents and went forth gaily on her own and with her friends. School [:+:] "Above average" was the typical comment on Celia's school reports. Colds and mild illnesses kept her home frequently, but she worked hard enough, and was bright enough, to do well. She got a few A's and once in a while headed the class, though she was not a studious type. She said, "I get on O.K.—I talk most of the time, but I don't get into trouble much." Her mother seems to have been satisfied with her progress, and in spite of her own intellectual interests she exerted none of the pressure on Celia to stand first which we saw in Eve's early years. During this period Celia's interaction with her mother in the school area was balanced; then toward the very end there were signs of a coming change. Celia was not doing well in mathematics, and her mother worried and began to take a hand. She wondered if Celia should repeat her year, even though her other subjects were excellent. Her respect for Celia was not so strong as it had seemed; at the first hint of failure she felt she must come in and handle the situation. So far, this was not enough to upset the balance, but it was a harbinger of what was to come. At this time Celia merely remarked, "I dislike arithmetic—naturally." Social Life [:+: -* .+!] Celia was a very sociable child; she and her mother both

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told us that she would rather be with others than alone. Children were in and out of the house. She got along well with them, was popular on the street. This was a good picture except that Celia appeared to be overdoing it. A group was more important to her than any special friend; she tended to dominate younger children. At eight the interviewer had this to say about her: "A rather self-conscious assurance, expresses herself quickly, decisively, and in extreme terms." Sociability was somehow overemphasized, and one wonders if she was making a big eifort to live up to a certain picture of herself. Family and friends may have given her special recognition as the outgoing one, the social success. We would need more information to know just how much her mother contributed to this trend. From what we have seen here, the interaction with her mother can be called balanced: she was receiving both support and respect. There was no doubt about Celia's independence, and she also relied on her mother until the very end of the period. Later she tried to cope alone with the difficulties that began to crop up. As she grew older she found herself in a new situation. Boys and girls no longer played together as casually as in the past, and in an all-girl group Celia lacked experience. She stopped calling herself a tomboy, and her mother said she was "a little repressed at school"; "She has no special school friends because the other girls are older and have rather different interests." Probably they had more usual feminine interests. She retained her popularity with a gang of younger children on the street, and when asked about friends at age ten, she said "I have millions but I don't play with them much"—an odd mixture of bravado and honesty. The relationship between mother and child now threatened to move to a transitional imbalance, with some needed parental care lacking. Her mother saw that Celia had trouble fitting in with other girls, but attributed it to an age difference—which was actually not very great. What Celia had missed was the littlegirl interests which would have helped her establish her feminine role. Individuality had been emphasized at the expense of learning to be like other girls. Here Celia needed help. She needed to shift her picture of herself a bit: from being an

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independent "character" to being an appreciated female. This need came more into prominence as time went by. Emancipation Summary Personal care [:+:] Family [:+:] Use of money ['+'] Activities [:+:] School [:+:] Social life [:+: -> .+:] This is an almost ideal picture of parent-child interaction. Yet, toward the end of the period, signs of difficulty in three areas lead us to qualify our assessment. In the activities area there was some lack of depth; the social side overshadowed Celia's personal satisfaction from her own efforts. School was never taken very seriously; here too she preferred the social side. Then three changes came together: the social side was suffering a setback, Celia's mother was becoming concerned about her school work, and the relationship with her brother was deteriorating. As one explores what happened in later years, one wonders what could have been done if the danger signals had been picked up at that early stage. In the early years the parents' objectives were clear and admirable. They wanted their children to be independent people who could think for themselves, not dull conformists. They set out to foster originality and individuality, but certain difficulties arose in the pursuit of this goal. A study of these difficulties, in even one case, may be useful. The Middle Period, 11 to 13 Years This period only extends to age thirteen because records are missing for the years fourteen to sixteen. Personal Care [:+:] This area continued to be in balance, although Celia was not as advanced in looking after herself as some girls her age. However, her mother did not make too much of it: she went on calling her in the morning, sending her to bed at night,

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keeping a supervisory eye on routines. Celia sometimes dawdled, or slipped out without washing; she was a bit slipshod, but she did take care of herself. She relied on her mother to comfort her when she had bad dreams, to reassure her when she worried about her health, to defer to her food dislikes. Never a robust child, Celia caught colds and infections easily, as we learned from school reports; her mother always optimistically said her health was "better." The illnesses kept her close to her mother, so home influence may have been stronger than for some children. Since not much fuss was made about the illnesses themselves, the effects would only appear in other areas, such as interruptions in school or social life. Family Living ["+.] Within the family Celia was coming to have a chip on her shoulder, yet her mother described her from time to time as being "enthusiastic," "merry," "very entertaining," and having a "happy nature." There is no reason to doubt this picture. The defensive side only showed up when Celia tried to avoid some of her mother's controls, when she shied away from dependence. She was no longer easy to handle, and her mother used persuasion: "I have to get her co-operation to get anywhere"; "I have to keep calm and explain the reasons"; "Reminders have to be good natured because any other kind won't work." Celia was becoming touchy; she kept trying to justify herself; she was quick to answer back. She had a sharp tongue and would say what she thought. She could hold her own verbally. At thirteen she said, "I dislike being told to do what I was just going to do ... people taking advantage of me ... unfairness." This was quite a change from the happy little member of the family who went along with the rules and wanted to grow up to be an ordinary lady. Her quick temper was now mentioned regularly. It mostly consisted of angry words, though at thirteen it sometimes included hitting. Her mother said the anger occurred when Celia was tired or not feeling well, and that she ignored the outbursts. Apparently Celia recognized the ignoring as a mark of disapproval, for her mother said, "She feels so badly afterwards, is

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so sorry." Behind the mother's attempts to ignore or rationalize the angry outbursts, there seemed to be a real dislike—or fear— of emotional display. The angry child intimidated her, and she tried hard not to antagonize her. Because she could not accept the validity of Celia's angry feelings, she attempted to reason them out of existence. At eleven Celia related a dream which the reader is free to interpret or ignore: "I was locked up by an insane doctor, in a castle, and I ran away. A big gorilla chased me ... and then it turned into a snake . . . and then the snake turned into mother and I woke up." The deterioration in the mother-child interaction has to be seen within the total family picture. As mentioned, this family believed in being rational, in taking an intellectual, well-thoughtout approach to life. Their goal of individuality was conceived within these bounds. To one with Celia's temperament their ways could be irksome. However, they were the only example before her, and she adjusted as best she could. She gained approval by her quick wit, her imagination, and her verbal agility. Now we must look at her brother again for the part he played with his very different personality. A cautious person, he liked to plan ahead, and he applied his good mental ability to the serious business of school. In other words, he fitted right in with his parents' major values and received a large share of approval and understanding. His parents, having great confidence in him, felt he needed little supervision. Not so the gay little sister —with her emotional, impulsive ways she seemed quite unpredictable. I think they were frankly puzzled by her. Celia was finding herself in an anomalous position, one defined largely in negative terms. Not that her parents made direct derogatory comparisons, but if we look at the world through Celia's eyes we see some of her trouble. Her brother got increasing attention and approval for being methodical and hardworking, the very things that had made it possible, in the past, for her to outshine him with her daring and sparkle. As she got older her special qualities were not only less valued, they caused her to be treated as childish and irresponsible. I think this treatment was in the whole atmosphere rather than in specific words or actions. Her parents professed the belief that

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children should be allowed to make their own decisions—but they took for granted that these would be made thoughtfully on rational grounds. When they tried to keep Celia in the fold, she found her growing space desperately restricted. Originality had been encouraged before; now it was out of favour. Being daughter of the family seldom brought status to Celia. At thirteen she found that many new domestic tasks were expected of her, since there was no longer a maid and the family had taken in a young cousin to stay with them. Celia co-operated and enjoyed some of the work, but it was looked on as a proper contribution to the family rather than as a valuable feminine accomplishment. This particular emphasis was a small thing in itself, but to Celia it indicated family attitudes. Another clue to family attitudes is that clothes were never mentioned; an odd omission for a girl her age. Finally, her father, who might have been expected to enhance her status as daughter, was not mentioned either, and we can only draw the tentative conclusion that he was providing her with neither warmth nor appreciation. This is a partial picture which needs to be taken in conjunction with the social and school areas, and with her brother's influence in those areas. Use of Money ['+'] Celia's dependence on her parents continued in the money area. At eleven she was given a fifteen-cent allowance but was reported as showing little interest in money. She had "little idea of the value of money," and her parents gave her no realistic opportunity to learn. Celia said, "If I save $10 in a year mother will give me ten per cent"—an impractical offer when she received only $7.80 a year. When she was twelve her allowance was irregular: "she spends it right away"; "she does not ask for much." At thirteen she got twenty-five cents a week for carfare and haircuts, but still did not get it regularly. Small wonder she had little idea of the value of money. Activities [.+.] No difficulties were mentioned in this area, so on the surface it appeared balanced. Actually Celia's mother said little about it at all, in otherwise full records. Celia was provided with

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equipment and then was left to her own devices. There were none of the family games, sports, and hobbies found in many families. This area was left up to the children, with little help or encouragement given. However, Celia kept herself busy, preferring the social and active to the solitary and concentrated. An imaginative child, she had some exotic ambitions: to breed horses, to be an engine driver, an orthodontist, a nursery-school teacher, a gas-station attendant. Sometimes she played with her brother. Her mother said, "They play ball and fool around." Mostly, now, his ways were quite different from hers. He was a solitary hard worker, and she behaved as if she wanted to be just the opposite. Her active sociability may have been a way of asserting her differentness. At least it was a way to avoid playing second fiddle to her brother. Celia was definitely running her own affairs, and as she was clearly not emancipated in this area. We have to call it an imbalance on the side of too much independence—or lack of parental care, with a corresponding lack of childish reliance. School ['+.] This period saw a marked change in Celia's school life. Performance, as reflected in school reports, dropped steadily from "above average" at eleven, to below average (57%) at thirteen, when she was in danger of failing her year. This shift was not due to lack of ability, for Celia was a bright little girl ahead of her age group. Nor did it seem to be solely a school problem, as the teacher found her co-operative, industrious, and fairly responsible. She missed a good deal of time, but this was not new. At eleven Celia said, "I like school pretty well. I dislike arithmetic but I work at it because I want to get through." At twelve her most enjoyed memory was of getting high enough marks that she did not have to write her final examinations. By thirteen her confidence was waning—this was before the poor marks noted above, but some time after her mother had begun to worry. When Celia was twelve her mother had stated, "She does not do well because she does not put any effort into it, and

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is satisfied with that"; "She only likes the social end." Her mother's dissatisfaction grew—and we know that at this time Celia was sensitive to disapproval and disliked being pushed around. Yet neither her missing a lot of school, nor her mother's worry, nor both together, seems an adequate explanation for the change in Celia. As the later records show this to be the beginning of a new trend, rather than a temporary setback, it is worth exploring further. The crisis in the making was related to family values: the parents' belief in individuality and self-determination had come into direct conflict with their belief in the academic road to the good life. And the academic had won, hands down. To Celia this narrowed the field most uncomfortably. She did not want to bend all her efforts in this one direction, and anyway, her family now seemed to think she was not up to it. School was her brother's chosen field of endeavour, and she suffered by comparison; she was outclassed and felt it deeply. What could she do? What badge of recognition could she find? The school years were inescapable, and she had been cast as second best—so she repudiated the family goals. If you could not do well you could always do badly, gain distinction by refusing to be an intellectual. This attitude certainly marked her as different from her brother, and it had the advantage of gaining attention from the family. Attention can be a substitute for care, because it makes you feel that you are cared about. Attention came to be the only kind of care Celia could accept. A true reliance on her parents was beginning to mean submitting to their domination, doing what they wanted. On their side, as their faith in her lessened, they felt they must take charge. Her own faith in herself lessened too, but she would show them: she would go her own way, be aggressively non-intellectual. Here began the imbalance of parental care without respect, and with the child being too independent, refusing the preferred help. Her brother joined the parents in trying to control her—for her own good. And Celia was determined to avoid his interference —as well as her parents'. This assessment of the parent-child relationship refers to the end of the period, and it also applies in the succeeding years.

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Social Life [:+:] Toward the end of the previous period came hints that all was not well with Celia's social life. Below the good surface she lacked one aspect of care, namely help in finding rewarding feminine interests. She seldom felt that it was good to be a girl. In the years from deven to thirteen Celia still liked to be on the go, loved dogs and horses, and showed little interest in feminine occupations. It is an open question whether this lack was sufficient to unbalance the relationship between mother and daughter in the social area. As there was so much that was good I prefer to call it balanced still. Celia's social abilitites were recognized, and she received support for what she wanted to do. Her friends still came to the house, she went to dancing class and Sunday School, she had a party. Sometimes her mother said Celia had lots of friends, at other times she said she had only one or two. Though she felt Celia got on better with younger friends than with her classmates, she sounded generally approving. Early in this period Celia and her brother were still in the same gang, and their closeness tended to aggravate the growing friction between them. At times her mother reported, "she teases him unmercifully, finding it easy to get under his skin." Perhaps this was to prove that she was in with the gang. The excitement of this battle, where she got even with him for his superiority in other ways, may have been a factor in keeping her out of the typical girls' groups which would have separated them. And her own preferences still leaned toward the boys' world. If, as her mother said, Celia did feel "inferior because she is small and wears glasses," she did not let it hold her back. Friendly, witty, responsive, she loved to be with her friends. She made a big effort and found satisfaction in being with people. Confidence was increased because her brother could not follow her here. Shy and gauche, he turned to solitary pursuits and left the field to her as they outgrew their joint gangs. School reports confirmed the picture of good social adjustment: "good rapport with the children"; "co-operativeness and leadership qualities." Then less glowing reports began to appear

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at thirteen, and doubts were raised again about the social picture. Celia said thkt what made her angry was "people trying to take advantage of me—trying to take my friends away." And descriptions of her as witty, given to the quick retort, holding her own with her tongue, may suggest a rather immature level of sociability, one that depended on immediate gratification instead of deepening into sympathy and mutual interests. She may have been overcompensating in this area for inadequacies elsewhere; she may have been showing her brother and her parents what she could do; she may have been living up to a certain picture of herself. Probably she was doing all three. With more systematic information, which would enable several assessments of this area, Celia would doubtless show some balanced interactions and some unbalanced ones. As it is, I have taken the optimistic view and called the area balanced thus far; Celia was emerging, and she did seem to feel supported by her mother. Emancipation Summary Personal care ['.+*.] Family ['+.] Use of money ["+'] Activities [.+.] School ['+.] Social life [:+:] A radical change in the emancipation picture has taken place within a couple of years, and this diagram refers to the end of the period. In two areas—family living and school—Celia was reacting against what she felt to be too much control. These are highly important parts of a thirteen-year-old's life, and in them she was trying to do without the help and support she surely needed. Doing without help is an anxious business; running counter to your parents makes it doubly so. Then why did she do it? One answer lies in her parents' lack of respect for her, in their inability to accept and approve of Celia as she was, to have faith in her. But their lack of faith was not so very great; perhaps to her it seemed disproportionately large because of their previous wholehearted acceptance. They used to think she was fine the way she was; now they wanted to change her. This was the sort of help they offered, and she resisted it.

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Behind the parents' shift in attitude was the split, or the inconsistency, in their own strongly held values. They did believe in independence, they liked originality, but they had naturally assumed that these values applied within the realm of the intellectual, that originality would be governed by reason and knowledge—not by emotion. Now, from their point of view, book learning was the sine qua non, so Celia's casual attitude to school alarmed them. Her casualness was accentuated by her brother, who accorded so well with their ideal. He and his parents became a group, and Celia was left outside. She found it difficult to belong, and still be diiferent from her brother. Celia began to slide into the role of rebel. Family and school were the two strategic imbalances. Her dependence in the money area was unimportant as yet. Her mother looked on her activities as still childish play and said little about that area, so it may have been more nearly in balance than the records indicated. Overshadowed as it was by the trouble spots, it seemed to add little to the strengths which were mainly provided by the personal-care and social areas. Confusion, bewilderment, and fluctuating attitudes are the keynotes. To her family Celia appeared edgy and on the defensive. They appreciated her when she was co-operative and showed a "nice disposition"—rather uninspiring goals to a girl like Celia. The contrast of her brother's personality coloured her picture of herself as she tried to adjust to new levels of maturity. His personality and her parents' expectations were the background against which she had to find her "self." Young Adult, 17 to 22 Years When we last saw Celia she was nearly fourteen, now she is over sixteen, and we have to guess at what has been happening in the interval. Also, seventeen to twenty-two is a long period to consider as a unit, but her emancipation patterns changed slowly, and where necessary two assessments will be made. Personal Care ['+.] 17 years, [:+:] 20-22 years At seventeen, Celia resented her mother's efforts to control her and was constantly braced for adverse criticism. Her mother,

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worried about her health, prodded her to go to bed early, to get more rest, to improve her eating habits. She was still getting her up in the morning. Both parents thought Celia should be home by ten o'clock, and her father got her to stop smoking for health reasons. Celia said, "Father thinks smoking is degrading ... but I am going to start again. The family are annoyed if I stay out late. I don't drink, I loathe it, but my parents like a cocktail." She made no counterbalancing comments about looking after herself; antagonism held the centre of the stage. In her twenties Celia was still not emancipated in the personalcare area, though she had come closer to a balanced relationship with her mother, who found her more responsible. The help she offered Celia was now accepted, and the supervision she offered was still resented. Celia was supposed to be on a clothes allowance, yet not until the end of the period did she buy her own clothes without her mother's help. Celia said, "There are no rules now—it is up to me," though other comments suggested this was not entirely so. "Drinking is permitted but profoundly disapproved"; "My health is excellent but mother thinks I need a lot of sleep because I am so thin." Yet, on the whole, the relationship was going more smoothly, and Celia seems to have enjoyed being watched over by her mother. As we shall see there was a good deal of strain in her life, so she still needed this reliance on her mother. Family Living [.+.] The family picture was complicated by having two quite distinct aspects. Celia was definitely odd-man-out in the group; she felt rejected and "different." Yet in her twenties she turned more and more to her mother for support and affection—in the social area as well as in others. It was as if mother-alone and mother-in-the-group were two different people; one she could rely on, and one she could not. In the past her mother had been matter-of-fact, unemotional, and had rationalized Celia's difficulties away; now she accepted them as real and responded with more warmth and sympathy. Father and brother —the group—"treat her with reserve," her mother said, and added "we tend to talk to her brother, as if she will not understand." This was at seventeen. Later, Celia said, "The family

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think I am an intellectual because they are," and she tried to prove them wrong. She was antagonistic toward her brother who joined with the parents in trying to bring her into line. That the parents had accepted him as an adult made their treating her as a child all the more galling. Mother in this context was resented. Mother alone, as Celia saw her in the personal-care area, was relied on. Celia's resentment of criticism and sensitivity to disapproval continued to be mentioned by her mother. Unfortunately, difficulties in other areas threw Celia back on life with the family, at the same time she felt rejected by them. They seemed unaware of her feeling of being left out. They did not exclude her deliberately—it was just that the three of them were so congenial. And Celia, hurt or proud or insecure, or all three, made no effort to enlist their sympathy or to be admitted. She stood aloof, resenting their criticism, imagining more than there was, quick to think she was being manipulated. Her comments about her family ran like this: "I get a meal occasionally, don't do dishes unless requested, and then I prefer to do them alone. No activities with the family outside the home; family festivities discouraged. I would like to get away; the family see too much of each other and get on each other's nerves. . . . My ambition is to be my own boss." Her father's part in this tight little group must have been highly significant, yet he was hardly mentioned. Impersonal and remote, his influence on his daughter appears to have been negative. Her' spontaneity, humour, and emotionalism brought his disapproval; she was unpredictable. On the other hand, father and son talked together, man to man, sensibly and seriously, about important matters. Celia's few references to her father were just as antagonistic as her remarks about "the family," a family dominated by the male half. We never see her and her mother standing together to champion the feminine world; rather her mother joined the men on the side of intellectual achievement. In her lonely effort to be something, Celia flouted the family's values and ended up with nothing more constructive than a sharp wit and a reputation for being different. The final assessment of the interaction in this area is all on the side of rejection

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deeply felt. The parents said in effect, "Our way is the only way —take it or leave it." And Celia chose to leave it. The other side, mentioned above, which showed her mother being much more sympathetic when alone with her daughter, is probably indicated well enough by the balance score in the personal-care area. In the family area Celia's main concern was to stand aloof and rely on no one—certainly not on "the family." Use of Money ["+.] Handling money, in this family, was still casual and unsystematic. At seventeen Celia's allowance of $1.25 a week was "not very methodical" on her mother's part; she was "going to put her on a clothes allowance," but Celia was "not very good at managing money." Perhaps she was never given a chance to learn. Again, too, there was a contrast with her brother, who was a careful planner. Celia said her allowance was "theoretical," that she now used her own money from a summer job and from baby-sitting, and had "spent it all." She had neither a secure reliance on her parents nor much satisfaction from her own efforts. Her independence was more apparent than real, her main idea being to refuse help from parents who thought she was irresponsible. Both they and she played down the money area, devaluing the things that money could buy. Nevertheless, one suspects that to Celia it may have been a sore spot: the reluctant allowance showed their lack of care for her; thriftiness was the admired virtue, and Celia showed little of that. Their lack of respect for her she felt deeply; their help she pretended she could do without. To ask for help not freely given would have hurt her fragile pride, so by disdaining the whole area she was able both to agree with them and to ignore them. When Celia was in her twenties, money still represented an area in which she was quite dependent. Her school difficulties kept her in this frustrating situation from which she seemed unable to get free; but she could avoid the appearance of submission by making gestures of defiance. Her allowance of five dollars a week was to cover all but major items; yet most clothes-buying was supervised by her mother until she was over twenty-one. Then she got a summer job, one her parents considered quite unsuitable but which she said she enjoyed very

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much, and she paid them five dollars a week board while she was earning. One wonders who was fooled by this fancy bookkeeping: when she went back to school she got her allowance again. In spite of pretenses and manoeuvres this interaction kept Celia dependent, and feeling it, and quite definitely fighting against it. Activities ['+.] The activities area seems to have been completely swamped by the battle over school and can hardly be understood alone. Celia's parents showed little concern with her outside interests. Their great complaint was that she wasted her time, was not methodical. They urged her to put her work first, to wave aside other activities. Other interests received less than no encouragement, and Celia's emancipation was hindered, not by too much care or supervision, but by barriers put in her way; the effect was the same. She fought the barriers in the same way she fought the care that dominated because respect was lacking. Celia's expressed hope was to save enough money to travel, to work at anything that would allow her to escape to another world. School ['+.] Certainly Celia had lost confidence in her ability to pass examinations, but one surmises that the big difficulty during this period was that she used up her energy resisting and resenting family pushing, until one wonders how she had any at all left for studying. She wanted to get away and yet was caught in her dependence and in her antagonism. Her successful brother joined the family in urging her to change her ways, so he was included in her feeling about them—they were all against her. Having built few personal strengths in all these years of being the rebel, she was too insecure to become really emancipated. She had denied her need for reliance because her parents had stopped trusting her. She sought recognition as a nonconformist, but her nonconformity had no basis in positive beliefs. She believed only in being different. Celia's academic failures had no single cause, nor even a

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collection of separate causes. They were part of a complex system of interaction within her family. And failures themselves became a trouble centre which spread its influence to other areas. For the sake of better work, health must be safeguarded, so Celia must not be out late. She must save time and energy for studying, so activities and social life must be curtailed. Her mother said, "She is always worried about her work because she is always behind schedule with it. I reason with her and try to calm her." She could never show confidence in Celia by leaving her work up to her. Here was Celia's own view of the situation: "I am wasting my time at college, I have always hated school, ever since kindergarten [see School, age 5-10]. I enjoyed my summer job [non-academic] and educating myself. . . . I enjoyed the same books when they were not thrown at me"; "I want to save up and travel, but this is not considered a praiseworthy ambition." To complete the story of this area: Celia finally did get through her "education," took a non-academic job, and achieved some of her ambition by moving away. Social Life ['+.] 17 years, ['.+'.] 22 years

Celia's social life suffered during these turbulent times. Though neither can be labelled as the cause of the other, school and social life went down together. And either one would have been helped by improvement in the other. At the end of the previous period Celia's social assurance was seen to be lessening. She did not like "people who take my friends away," and she was developing a sharp tongue. Even when Celia was twelve and thirteen years old, her mother was less impressed with her sociability than she had been. At the same time, Celia had seemed to be over-valuing it, over-stressing it, as if hanging onto it rather desperately. These clues assume importance in the light of later events; at the time they appeared less significant. In the missing years, fourteen to sixteen, important changes took place. Social life no longer filled much of Celia's time. Her mother saw deficiencies in this area at seventeen: "She should have more friends; her brother's friends find her good company but do not date her. . . . Her friend Peggy is becoming very

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popular, and Celia may be a bit jealous. . . . Their group tends to break up into two's, and Celia is not attractive to boys." It is hard to tell whether her mother disapproved of the other young people or of Celia's unattractiveness to boys. According to Celia "There is too much mixing into my affairs by the family. Everyone has views on my club." Her brother thought she should drop it, and he disliked some of her friends. Celia said, "He tries to run my life." Apparently she retaliated. She listed "annoying my brother" as a favourite indoor recreation. Celia, who could be good company, amusing and full of fun, had several girl friends. Her desire to keep her social life away from family interference could be called a move toward emancipation in this area. Evidence against this conclusion was her inability to brush off the family fussing—her own insecurity made her susceptible to it. This was in marked contrast to Eve, whose social assurance enabled her to overlook her mother's criticisms. For Celia, lack of parental respect for her efforts coincided with real social difficulties. By the time she was in her twenties the relationship with her mother in the social area had moved toward a balanced state. Because the family interfered less in her affairs she was able to turn to them for some companionship—but the social difficulties themselves had not disappeared. Her mother described her this way: "She enjoys social gatherings but is quite reserved with people she does not care for"; "She tends to gravitate toward home"; "She needs to broaden her outside interest." This was a changed Celia who leaned on the family and reduced her outside efforts. In view of the tensions in the family circle the change is unexpected, and yet it may be that these very tensions were absorbing her energies and thereby blocking her emergence. She was accepting the lesser evil of dependence on her mother. She still had the girl friends and was "exuberant and full of gay chatter with a familiar group." Beyond this only a couple of formal organizations are mentioned as playing a part in her social life. Celia herself referred to a "pronounced lack of marks, money, men," but did little about changing the situation. Her mother's remark "gravitates toward home" sums up Celia in this area; for a girl in her twenties she seems to have

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been very dependent on home. She was far from being an emancipated person, and she needed to lean on something— the gay outgoing child had vanished indeed. Emancipation Summary, 17-22 Years Family [.+.] Use o] money ['+.] Activities ['+.] School ['+.] Personal care ['+.] 17 years, [!+'.] 20-22 years Social life ['+.] 17 years, [:+:] 22 years How much could this pattern of interaction between child and parent tell us if all we know is that the child is a woman of twenty-two? Obviously emancipation is not going smoothly. In no area is it complete, so this is a rather immature young woman. In areas where she should be going out into the world her mother is trying to keep control, and the girl to get free. The first question would be: Has trouble in one area spread to others? Since money, activities, and school all show the same kind of imbalance, one might guess that school is the central problem. This would explain a continued dependence on the family for financial support, and perhaps a curtailing of recreational activity. The next peculiarity in this summary of relationships is the balance in personal care, and the lack of parental care and child reliance in the family area. Apparently the relationship between mother and daughter is one thing in the more private area of personal care, and something else in the wider realm of the total family. The girl is resisting control in so many areas that one could assume her desire to go her own way carries over into the home. The difference here is that her mother is, in effect, saying "All right, go your own way at home." To the girl this could seem like rejection; her mother only cares what she does in certain outside matters—and there she cares too much. The balanced relationship in the social field shows Celia is relying on her family here and receiving some support. In itself this is all to the good except that she is late in becoming

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emancipated in her social life. Even more disturbing is the picture of a girl relying for social life on a family by whom she feels rejected. Nevertheless, the increase in trust in two areas in the last few years is a positive gain. The above exercise in deduction from an emancipation outline is included to show the assets, and the limitations, in such a summary of parent-child interaction. Such an outline gives a general picture, and in so doing it raises pertinent questions. The Years to Come Now that the reader knows something of Celia's past and present situation, we can speculate on what the future holds for her. One would predict that the emancipation process can only end with a sudden break. Parent and child are too much embroiled with one another for the relationship to outgrow its usefulness peacefully. The alternative to a complete separation is for them to continue together in an uneasy and potentially conflicting relationship. The Thematic Apperception Test administered at age twenty described Celia as "evading the emotional implications of family life, and as extremely sensitive to family disapproval." It also suggested, "She has as yet no consistent self-picture by which to guide herself." If she goes away from her family, one can surmise that she will carry her feelings of insecurity with her, and remnants of resentment will trouble her relations with other people. Without a good deal of further growing and changing she will likely be uneasy and distant with men. On the positive side, the T.A.T. sees her as a "warm and vital person who is functioning well below capacity, but who has a positive outlook which enables her to cope with considerable deep-rooted anxiety." She had, too, intellectual ability which, her comments to the contrary, she enjoyed using. The little girl we saw at the beginning of this story was not entirely lost, nor were some of her early strengths, though some of her assets had been blocked in later years. For a long time her chief goal had been to be "different." The goal had led her

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nowhere in particular; she used nonconformity as a shield. Underneath she was sensitive and strong-minded; though she fought so hard against her parents, she did not escape the family values. And she still had wit and charm when she was not afraid to show them.

9. Twins as Foils for Each Other

TWINS are popularly supposed to be alike, yet in some cases, being a twin can foster difference rather than similarity. Harris and Garry were fraternal twins who did not look alike. Harris, dark-haired and sturdy, faced the world confidently; Garry, slim and blond, hung back. Their differentness was constantly brought to our attention, and presumably to theirs, by their mother. Doubtless many people commented on it—we can hear "But how different they are!" echoing down the years. All children hear this to some extent, but for these boys their unlikeness could not be attributed to age or sex differences. Added to this was the fact that, at least in their early years, they did everything together, were constant companions. Being unlike and yet so close, their relationship is an extreme example which may shed light on what goes on between brothers or sisters who are not twins. If we, the onlookers, judge that individuality and a sense of one's own identity are highly desirable, then this is a test case illustrating how to be both close and unique. The twins' mother was the third member of this close-knit group. Her feeling about their being so different was never quite clear. As twins, it made them unusual; on the other hand she saw only one kind of personality as the desirable goal, and thus tended to measure both boys by one standard. This was fair enough in that she wanted both boys to have a "good life." She wanted them to fit in when they grew up; when they were young they should be just like other children—perhaps even more so. As she saw it, the way to get on in the world was to be assertive and popular, to stand up to people. This was for the outside world. At home she admired another kind of per-

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sonality: co-operative, amenable, kind, and helpful. She valued conformity; assertiveness, in her view, was never to be confused with too much originality, with getting off the beaten path. Stated this way her goals are not uncommon, but the way the message came through to the twins was not so simple: they were to go out in the world and assert themselves, and at home be submissive and responsible. Translating these goals into the emancipation terms used here, one sees that the twins were expected to be obedient and dependent at home, and to behave independently in the outside world. The fallacy is obvious. No one short of a Jekyll and Hyde could manage such a duality. Harris and Garry behaved as children often do in such a situation: they sought out various ways of dealing with their dilemma. The boys' mother verbalized her hopes for them fairly specifically. Although she did not put all her ideas together systematically, her views came out clearly in her handling of the children and in her appraisals of them. She tried to treat them alike, and she tried to be fair in her descriptions. Her records in the early years (ages 5-7) were a sort of balance sheet: "Harris is better at dressing and washing; Garry is more co-operative and tidies better; Harris adjusts well with a group; Garry is better at music, gets a better school report." From such detail one might be lulled into thinking the boys lived in rather similar worlds, each excelling in some areas. On a deeper level their worlds could not have been more dissimilar—the tone of their two sets of records was so different they were hardly recognizable as applying to the same family. (I checked this by a careful comparison of the actual words used to describe each boy.) Harris's records shone with his mother's approval, while poor Garry was a source of frustration and defeat. He "improved," but seldom enough. In their mother's eyes Harris appeared to be succeeding, Garry to be failing. In spite of her efforts to treat them fairly and equally, one big difference in their worlds lay here. Emancipation appraisals can be used to analyse the two stories in terms of the care and respect offered by the mother and the reliance and emergence of the two children. They give a means of comparing two courses of development, a framework

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for arranging details in order. The details themselves, of word and action, give us the people. First we examine the mother's methods of looking after her two boys; then we must look at each boy to find out how he felt about it all. The twins' mother was very concerned about their up-bringing and gave them a lot of time and attention. She made many plans for them—nursery school was one, and later on she added art classes, music, the library, a college education. She started early to read to them and to take them on trips. To train them at home she set up schedules of what they were to do; she set up rules and limits. As she told it, her emphasis was on how much they did, or did not do, for themselves; undoubtedly she did many things for them, but this aspect of care seemed overshadowed by her expectation of high performance from them. Rules are in themselves a form of care; they let children know where the boundaries are—at least they do if the consequences of infringement are clear. This was where the twins' mother was less effective. Not having thought through consistent ways of seeing that they followed the rules, she relied on telling, scolding, and spur-of-the-moment penalties. So many orders and so much talk were also a sort of care—so there were indications both ways, for a plus or a minus on care. As for respect, her stress on obedience and doing things correctly (her way) looked like the opposite of respect. At the same time she expected the boys to rely on themselves a great deal. This skeleton, bare and incomplete, shows some lack of both care and respect, which leaves us puzzled until we look through each boy's eyes. Harris: Emancipation Summary, 5 to 7 years Personal care [.+.] Family [.+.] Use of money ['.+'.] Activities ["+!] School [:+:] Social life [.+.] Harris, with the happier records, seemed to feel he was a pretty fine fellow; he was active and outgoing, fairly assertive. His mother called him cheerful and happy, said he tried to drive a bargain, indulged in some imaginative lying. At times he argued and refused discipline, so the picture was not all rosy,

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and he caused his mother some bother. When with his brother he was the leader: "His brother tags around after him." When children came to play he was in the thick of things and his brother was on the outside. Harris was moderately venturesome physically and was willing to try new things. Now this was a fairly good picture until two things raised a question about his reliance on his mother (his independence was never in doubt). First, he was doing very much what his mother expected, or hoped, he would do. He had taken on her goals, at least to some extent. Second, if his refusals were efforts to do things in his own way, they would have meant bona fide emergence. But his independence appeared to be largely a refusal of care on principle—he was not simply saying "I can do that myself." Such a generalized refusal of care takes on a meaning quite different from a gradual growth of selfconfidence. Harris was protecting his feeling of superiority by refusing to admit any inabilities. A fragile superiority, it needed constant recognition from others. And Harris was a cute little chap with a bit of a swagger who counted on lots of family praise as a substitute for a more solid reliance on parental care. The catch was that he had to continue doing well in his parents' eyes—and their expectations were high. I have discussed elsewhere the implications of this type of imbalance, short on parental care and short on childish reliance. Parent and child are over-balanced in the same direction and may for a time be pleased with the situation, but it is an uneasy child who has to keep winning approval, who feels that if he relaxes into reliance he loses both his hold on his parent and his picture of himself as "the one who can do things." For Harris this same unbalanced relationship held in several fields: personal care, family living, and the social area. Undoubtedly he enjoyed social life for its own sake, and his mother did provide him with social opportunities (care) which he was outgoing enough to use. She also had confidence in him, so this field was nearly in balance. The evidence that it was not quite so came from his brother's side of the picture, and was corroborated by Harris's own later loss of social interest. His early social success was large, by contrast with the shyness of his

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brother, and Harris undoubtedly heard a great deal of the talk directed at his brother, talk about the importance of "standing up for yourself," and of getting along with the kids. These parental goals were constantly before him. His twin might fail here, but he, Harris, would succeed. There was great pressure to live up to family values. The final judgment of imbalance in the social area is based on the total family setting, although there is still some element of doubt in this assessment. For the brighter side of Harris's emancipation picture, see the other three fields. He did well in school right from the start; his parents gave him some help and they respected his ability to handle his work himself. In the activities field he had toys to play with and was active and busy. This may not have been a very big field in the face of all the other things he did with his family and his friends, but at this stage he was well able to be busy on his own, and the field was balanced. The use of money, a minor matter at his age, also constituted a balanced area. Garry: Emancipation Summary, 5-9 Years Personal care [.+*] Family [.+*] Use of money [:+;] Activities [!+:] School [:+' -» !+:] Social life [.+'] Now we must look for Garry's trouble, try to find the source of the note of failure in his mother's early records. He was a timid little fellow, clinging and demanding; even when he got a lot of attention he seemed to want still more. For him something was amiss. By constant reminding and supervising, his mother managed to get him to do things. He washed and dressed and tidied up, though seldom willingly. His complaints, evasions, and demands for attention succeeded, not unnaturally, in frustrating his mother. She felt that he never came up to her standard and that she ought to try even harder to make him do better. Her urging only made him increasingly aware of his inadequacies, so he worked desperately to get more help, to be looked after. One can see how this, quite unintentionally, became a sort of merry-go-round. Garry's feeling of falling short of the mark came, in part, from seldom being allowed to carry through on

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his own and get credit for his efforts. The constant correction and fault-finding that fell on his ears was a running testament of failure. Looking at the mother's side only, we can see that both the boys needed more of both care and respect. However, Garry left no doubt about what he wanted more of; he asked quite directly for care. Garry did refuse some things too; Harris was not the only one who said no. Garry sometimes refused to comply because he preferred to do something else; his real resistance occurred when he was pushed into doing something new, such as joining a group of children or walking to school alone. Then he became really upset; his mother said, "He sobs and pleads." He occasionally objected to being dominated; he actively refused to do things on his own. His tearful and panicky behaviour could be called regressive because he had in some ways reached a higher level of adjustment. But instead of thinking of him as moving backward, one can say that he refused to move forward when to do so meant to leave home and mother. He was "emotionally upset after discipline," unable to accept consequences, "afraid to try new things." That his mother's understandable concern over his "lack of aggressiveness" made a lasting impression on him is confirmed when, in his teens, he used her very words to describe his social difficulties. The theme of lack of aggressiveness kept recurring. The image, always before him, of a brother more competent and brave, must have reinforced Garry's poor view of himself. However, there was a positive element, too, in his relationship with Harris. He found comfort in having a brother who could take the lead, who walked with him to school. They liked to play together, and Garry called Harris his best friend—to a timid child this meant a lot. Nor was Garry's life all failure, his family gave him praise and recognition for things he did well, especially his good school work. Yet, for all that, and including the good companionship with his twin, in this family it was assurance that counted. Let us follow Garry a little further than we did Harris— on up to eight and nine years, and then go back to Harris at eight and nine years.

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When Garry was eight his mother was emphatic about the improvement in his behaviour. Apparently he was less timid, was getting over some of his fears, and he only cried "sometimes." Along with this improvement in behaviour had come a deterioration in his general health which brought him special consideration. Allergies, aches and pains, and tiredness all were mentioned, and one is tempted to explain them as a new phase of his longing for secure reliance. Whether this was the case we do not know; we are on firmer ground when we look for the effect of the poor health on him. Granted that age had increased his confidence, and many things that had been difficult were now easy, still, the extra care he received owing to his allergies brought him something he had been missing. He was relieved of some of the burden of working for care and attention; and the demands made on him were reduced. Less was expected of a sickly child, and perhaps he could expect less of himself. The records told little about how his mother handled his health troubles, though she described the troubles in detail. "He lacks vitamins because he dislikes vegetables" (he was allergic to fruit) and "He tries to have a pain to avoid school —was allowed to stay home once"; these were typical comments. Although the regular attendance noted on school reports confirmed that his suspected malingering seldom worked, his mother did fuss over his diet and urge him to get extra rest. The surface picture changed during childhood, yet Garry continued to have deep feelings of insecurity and lack of trust. He gave up his babyish clinging and crying to assure care, and instead, to win a place for himself in the family, he would run errands and be a willing helper. To bolster his feeling of competence he became tidy and conforming, and relied heavily on doing things correctly. This more mature behaviour still aimed at being safe rather than independent—he was being autonomous without risk. In other fields of his life things had begun to go better. The pressure for sociability was less, possibly because of his poor health. Perhaps when he became a pleasanter character at home his mother made fewer demands; or perhaps she had more pressing matters to contend with. The money area, though still

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of minor importance, was still in balance, with Garry receiving a small allowance for his own use. His parents gave him some help with school work and also showed their confidence in him. In spite of a timid start, his self-reliance was growing. Activities were his greatest strength. His parents did not rate this field very high, but nevertheless they provided time and materials which he used with satisfaction. Harris: Emancipation Changes Personal care Family Use of money Activities &A00/ Social #/e

5-7 5-7 5-7 5-7 5-7 5-7

years [.+.] years [.+.] years [:+:] years [:+:] years1 [:+:] years [.+.]

8 years [.+.] 8 years [.+.|] 8 years [:+:] 8 years [:+:] 8 years [:+:] 5 years [:+']

9 years [.+.] 9 years ['+'] 9 years [:+:] 9 years [:+:] 9 years {:+:] 9 years [*+']

Now to see how Harris was getting on in the eight-to-nine year period, and whether he was affected by Garry's increasing conformity and attention-getting through sickliness. Harris's pseudo-independence still marked him off from his brother. He continued to be the active one, the leader. But a new stage appeared; Garry began to take a stand. He said, "It makes me mad when Harris acts silly on the street, or in front of people." No longer the humble follower who begged Harris to wait for him, Garry was finding a new role. Though he urged conformity rather than adventure, this, nevertheless, put his brother in a new light. Harris's sense of self-assertion had rested in part on his ascendency over his brother—on being more daring—and in part on his refusals of parental domination (care). Now, perhaps he was left with only the latter. This would help to explain why, when he was eight, his refusals took on quite dramatic proportions. His mother described every detail. So much so that she made it clear Harris was receiving emphatic proof of her care and protection. This was what he wanted. He was not really rebelling—he ran away and then stayed in sight, he moved into dangerous situations at times when he was sure of being stopped. He did get the whole family in an uproar, however, and by using his old "refusing'* pattern he got a lively

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demonstration of their care for him. At first glance this behaviour looks like a continuation of earlier evasions and minor disobediences, but the results Harris achieved belie this conclusion. Presumably he got what he wanted in the way of reassurance. But the method he was using would not continue to work. His mother became outraged and frightened by what she considered wild behaviour. She took drastic and forceful measures to repress it. Her measures, which were more like reprisals, must have brought Harris both guilt and fear at having so incensed his protector. In actual fact the rebellious episodes were rather isolated events, a few desperate attempts to gain something he must have wanted badly. Harris's general mood was called cheerful and even-tempered, so there were two sides to his nature. In many ways he was becoming more amenable, and this was the side that prevailed in the ensuing years, as if the "rebellions" marked a turning point, a change of direction. In the past one might have said, according to one's bias, either that his spirit was broken, or that he had been licked (figuratively) into shape. Neither answer makes much sense. His "spirit," or his emerging self, as I call it, was never soundly based on trust in his parents and on confidence in what he himself could do. Being "licked into shape" was his own adoption of the conformity that brought the secure care he needed; and he continued to conform in order to retain the care. Risking care in order to test its existence had, in the end, endangered it too severely—now he seemed to be saying "I won't try that again." Further evidence of his retreat from independence showed itself in his changing attitude toward children his own age. He used to be the sociable twin; then, when he was eight, his mother said, "He gets on better with the boys at Sunday school, the ones whose mothers I know." By nine the interviewer noted, "He has few friends and little interest in them." It seems safe to say his changing behaviour was bound up with his changing view of himself in relation to his brother. I say bound up with, not caused by. Harris became the less dominant one. His changed status in relation to his twin, the fragility of his

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earlier self-confidence, and his family's treatment of his rebellions all combined as sources of his later attitude, described by the words easy-going, co-operative, submissive. The change pleased his mother. This was what she had always wanted the boys to be like at home. So Harris came again into the safe haven of her approval. In bringing Harris's emancipation picture up to age nine, we have to add changes in two fields. In the social area he has moved through a transitional stage of imbalance as he lost confidence with his friends, and then finally he fell back on the family for social life. In the family area his false emergence first turned to rebellion, which was in fact a means of getting care. This was a face-saving way of shifting from false independence to being a child who needs looking after. To his mother his seeming independence went too far, so she suppressed it. In other words she changed from giving too little care and began to give too much. Having clamped down, she found before long that she had a co-operative and easy-going son, and she settled down to enjoy his company on this basis. As Harris accepted this easier role, the imbalanced relationship between him and his mother became weighted on the side of maternal care and childish reliance. This complete shift in the type of imbalance is no less startling than was the reversal in the boys' behaviour. Their exchange of behaviour patterns was so marked that, at one point, I thought a mistake had been made in the research numbers assigned when the twins' names were removed from original records. A study of internal evidence in each record made it clear that the changes in behaviour actually had occurred. Garry and Harris in Their Teens Looking at Garry and Harris together, as we must with twins, and probably should with all siblings, one is impressed first with the support and companionship they gave each other, next with the interlocking aspect of their relationship: each was what he was by virtue of the contrast he made with his brother.

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At first Harris was the adventurous one, Garry the timid one. Then both began to shift as Harris became more passive and Garry more energetic and determined. As we have seen, other factors entered into these changes, an important one being their different ways of responding to their mother's expectation of assertive behaviour. Harris had gone along with the expectation, Garry had declined. Finally, one suspects that changes were accelerated by each boy's tendency, or need, to see himself as characteristically different from his close brother. If his brother became like him, then he must change. This becomes clearer as the story develops. In the twins' records there is a blank for the years ten to twelve when the remarkable switch in their roles occurred. However, the switch became increasingly pronounced through their teens. Garry became the leader and Harris the follower, particularly in affairs outside the home. With visitors at home Garry, at thirteen, "overdid it" in an effort to be sociable; Harris was shy. With his mother Harris was pleasant, appreciative, and co-operative, while Garry was irritable, unfriendly, and no longer helpful. As their mother mentioned so often, they were very different—only they had somehow traded certain characteristics. But Harris still had a corner on her approval, while Garry only won it spasmodically. One is tempted to say that each boy strove for half of her ideal: one was submissive at home, the other was assertive outside. Garry: 13 to 20 Years Emancipation Summary at Age Personal care [Emancipated] Use of money [:+:] School [:+:]

20 Family [.+'] Activities [Emancipated] Social life ['+.]

Garry, with great effort and perseverance, found a way to be accepted by his peers. Always better with things than with people, he developed a skill which he was able to use as a social lever. By means of it he gained prestige and family acclaim. As his twin did not participate, there was no question of competition between them, and their close friendship

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remained intact. One must admire the determination and singlemindedness with which Garry, once so shy and timid, perfected his skill and set himself worlds to conquer. Deploring his "lack of aggressiveness/' he set out to use his skill as a means of proving himself—to himself, his family, and his peers. So he had to do better, and then better still, and he had a fair measure of success. Finally the strain of competition became too much and the joy went out of it, so he decided to relegate this activity to a lesser spot in his life. Undaunted, he found a new absorption, another activity with social possibilities, and threw himself into that. To see Garry's social behaviour through his mother's eyes, we have to take a rather long view in order to share in the ambivalence of her feelings. Over and over she was proud of him, and then, each time, she came to deplore the intensity of his preoccupation. Perhaps his social efforts puzzled her because her ideal envisioned a more generalized kind of sociability, one which included time for "family socials." Garry gave one picture of his life at home during the teen period, and his mother gave another. He described in great detail all the chores he did .around the house, while she called him unco-operative, unwilling, hard to please. One gathers that he irked his mother chiefly by his attitude and manner; in fact they irked each other. Later on, in the course of trying to understand his situation and evaluate himself, he remarked, "There has been conflict between my mother and myself for a number of years now." Garry strove to make a life of his own outside the family circle; he felt he was making progress and was anxious to leave home. At nineteen he said, "Many internal resistances are being overcome slowly"; "I have a close friend. . . . This is important." His mother, too, saw improvement, but felt he had a long way to go before he would be "at ease with people," though one is not too sure what people she meant. At home she said he showed "antagonism and lack of respect." The report (age 20) from the home records, combined with Thematic Apperception Test findings, sums the situation up this way: "Though emancipation appears to be complete, it is accompanied by bitterness toward his mother. . . . His very bitterness

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still renders him vulnerable to her. She is a stable element in his environment. . . . He still counts on her to continue watching over him. His emancipation is therefore not as complete as would appear; he is struggling against a continuing tendency to be dependent." Harris Emancipation Summary at Age 20 Personal care [Emancipated] Use of money [!+!] School [:+:]

Family [:+:] Activities ['+"] Social life ['+']

Harris was the home boy. At thirteen his mother commented that he "rarely says no"; at seventeen he said, "I get along well at home . . . am easy to get along with, have quiet and passive interests, am not aggressive"; at eighteen he defined himself as "Quiet, reserved, relatively inactive socially." His reward was the approval, sympathy, and affectionate interest of his family, but it was gained at the expense of practice in self-determination. Under his mother's general approval of his "talkative, humourous, happy disposition," worry cropped up over his difficulty at seventeen in making decisions about trivial matters, and over "his lack of interest in his university course, lack of energy and ambition" at nineteen. At sixteen and seventeen the matter of his future occupation came much to the fore. His family did not push him unwillingly to a decision; rather his mother entered closely into many discussions and considerations of the problem. It was a bond between them. And his inability to decide was a sign of continuing dependency on his part. His social life was limited by his own lack of interest, so he usually followed Garry's lead rather than step out on his own. As he did not share in Garry's main recreations, this did not take him very far. His mother worried about the state of affairs, and as early as fifteen he reflected her concern: "I have a general feeling I should take more part in social activities." None of this cut very deeply, as his mother was well content with his friendliness at home, and he shared some friends with his brother. His close tie with his brother held through all the differences in

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their interests and in the way they behaved and were treated at home. After outlining Harris's emancipation picture at age twenty, I shall return to the relationship between the two. Harris was a cheerful, easy-going lad basking in the affectionate appreciation of his family. One can say he found dependence on the family so satisfying to his passive nature that he hesitated to emancipate himself beyond it. Or perhaps he was soaking up the secure reliance he had missed earlier, marshalling his forces for independent effort. Or it may be that the reliance on his family had come too late and was now too enveloping. The report from the home records and from the Thematic Apperception Test administered at age twenty had this to say: "Socially he feels he should have wider interests, but he lacks the motivation to develop them. He is pleasant to meet and to talk to, but he keeps people at a distance. He has defined himself as 'quiet and reserved, relatively inactive socially,' and this definition permits him to go on as he is. Vocationally he is paying the penalty for his continued dependence, in the form of dissatisfaction and indecision. He has never developed any independent interests which could be extended into a job or profession, and this lack of interests handicaps his performance at college." I would also add that the disparity between his high intelligence and his low performance level was due to low confidence as well as to low interest. His recreation, being largely within the family circle, was so limited in scope that it added little to his self-picture. In looking at his emancipation profile, it should be noted that, at his age, reliance without emergence in the social and activities fields indicates that the family field, though in balance, is disproportionately large. In this case there was, perhaps, too much of a good thing. Garry and Harris Together Both boys remained close friends still, their most conspicuous contrast being Garry's striving and Harris's passivity. One feels that all along they had been counterparts of one another. Even when they changed roles each seemed to slip into the other's

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place and thus maintain a sort of balance between them. Beginning in his teens Garry strove to make himself a place in the world, and he struggled against his dependence on his mother. He accepted some dependence on his brother; but while never opposing him directly, he yet managed to emphasize his differentness from Harris. When he was a little boy his mother had told us, and him, that he lacked aggressiveness. In the terms of this study, he avoided emergence. She almost persuaded the research team that he was the withdrawing one, whereas from his point of view he was actively pursuing what he wanted at that time—her care. And he got it by direct means. Meanwhile, Harris was striving for what at least looked like independence, and he was esteemed for it by the family. They missed the falseness in his efforts, efforts triggered by their high expectations and sustained by their approval. Because Harris got his feeling of being cared for in this roundabout way, in the form of approval, he missed out on a sense of personal accomplishment. He was doing things for the wrong reasons. Though Garry never seemed to feel he had enough reliance on his mother, he probably was made to feel closer to the family as a result of Harris's rebellious episodes. At that time he learned, too, to use rules and conformity as a defence against feelings of inadequacy. And he began to fight his way in the outside world. As he moved out, his mother, in spite of moments of pride in him, still tried to make him over into a different kind of person. She still presented him with expectations he could not live up to. At home he was unwilling, perhaps unable, to knuckle under and behave as she wanted him to, and his contrariness drew him lots of attention. Perhaps it helped him to feel that he was somebody. So instead of saying simply, as the report did above, that when he was twenty his very bitterness kept him tied to his mother, we could say he maintained his tight interaction with her to ensure the care he was unable to do without. The bitterness resulted from his being tied tight in a galling and unrewarding relationship. Because his mother seemed unable to accept him as he was, he felt rejected, though he pretended not to care and treated her rudely. Both were frustrated; neither could let go. Nor was either one able to give what the other wanted. This picture is too raw as I have painted

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it. In seeking the core beneath the surface, it ignores the more pleasant times the family spent together. When Garry grew up he used his good intelligence in an attempt to comprehend his situation. He tried very hard to think it through, and he made progress, though by the end of this study he had not yet grasped the nature of his dependent ties to his mother, nor had he come to terms with the emotions involved. If Harris ever speculated about himself and his personality, as Garry did so often, he gave no sign in the records. There was no wrestling with his own dissatisfactions, no groping for answers. At eighteen he noted that he had difficulty in settling down to study but passed it off as something he had always had, although a year or so earlier he had said he did well in school in all subjects. Having labelled himself as "not highly emotional, an easy person to get along with," he apparently preferred to leave it at that. Harris was the more pliable of the brothers, the willingminded. As a child he had acquiesced in his mother's values, being temperamentally better able to do so than his brother. What originally set the boys' feet on the particular paths they were to follow, what mixture of inheritance and early handling, I cannot pretend to say. Certainly we know that, at five, it was easier for Harris to be the friendly, outgoing lad his parents desired. On the whole he took things more easily; Garry took things to heart, was more often upset and jumped to defend himself. Differences between the boys were much remarked on because they were twins, and this undoubtedly accentuated each one's use of the other to define his own individuality: I am a leader because you are a follower; you are cautious, I am adventurous; you are prickly, I am good-tempered; you want recognition in the world, I am the one the family loves. As already mentioned, though there are no means of weighing each influence on the twins' lives, one can be sure that being a twin had a strong effect. Certainly the boys influenced each other through their mutual affection; which was strengthened by the way they complemented each other. I have called them counterparts, as well as foils for each other, because even when they appeared to exchange roles in late childhood, they still

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complemented one another. Though some of the evidence for that period is missing, the long view of the boys' development suggests that there was less real personality change at that time than their surface behaviour indicated. Rather their directions altered: Garry moved from a somewhat precarious over-reliance on his mother to a self-assertion beyond the home; Harris moved from his false independence back into a reliance on his family. Garry asserted himself outside; Harris became firmly entrenched at home. In following the main course of the twins' development I have left many lesser influences out. The most serious omission is that of any specific mention of their father. In the early years their mother was the more dominant figure in their lives. Later, when more information about their father was available, he seemed to be reinforcing the stand she took. The one exception is his more understanding and supportive attitude to Garry in his late teens. This support at home probably made it easier for Garry to assert himself in his outside activities. Discussion A number of points are highlighted by looking at both boys at once. At five they were responding very differently to superficially similar treatment. However, as the boys were watched through the years it became increasingly evident that, on a deeper level, their treatment was far from similar in its impact on each of them. One boy was being asked to behave in a way that came easily for him; the other to behave in a way that was, for him, almost impossible. There was little similarity in the worlds the two faced. To the family, watching, one boy appeared to be successful and the other a worrisome problem, with the result that they treated the boys ever more differently. The general expectation would be that Harris, the "successful boy," would make greater progress in emancipation. The fact that this turned out not to be the case calls for an explanation which can only be found by examining many aspects of the boys' lives. Single explanations, no matter how dramatic, seldom tell a whole story. The repressive handling of Harris's rebellions, at age eight, was insufficient, in the light of overall family acceptance of the child, to account for his delayed emancipation. The real significance of the rebellious episodes

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was that they marked the end of the false emergence of his childhood, and it was these years of inflated independence which lay back of the later slowdown. Garry, in contrast to Harris, shifted from over-dependence to a tremendous output of energy in several directions. Again there is no simple explanation. Many influences combined: Garry's own interests, his successful application of a skill, his brother's affection for him, his brother's passivity as a foil for his own activity, his early absorption of the parental stress on assertiveness, and finally—perhaps most important—Garry's own inner courage and determination. He appeared to lift himself by his bootstraps. Was competition the incentive? If so, it was not competition with his brother. Or was he compensating for a feeling of rejection by striving to gain his mother's approval, by showing her what he could do? None of the externally engendered pressures provide as convincing an explanation of his great energy as do the many small strengths he had been able to build up along the way. And these, in turn, rested on his reliance on his parents, some of which he had managed to retain. His early struggle to hold this dependence made it harder to get free of in the end, but in the meantime he was actively working at growing up. The contrast presented by these two boys suggests some general statements about the parent-child relationship as it affects emancipation. Early independence, if not accompanied by a comfortable reliance on parents, may hinder rather than promote emancipation. Early dependence provides a better start, and one may surmise that if a child's over-dependence were readily accepted, the start would be better still. The contrast between the boys also raised questions about the degree to which personality structure is shaped very early in a child's life. Perhaps it is shaped early when there is continuing trust between parent and child, and the child does not have to shift with every wind that blows. The lack of fit between Garry's potentialities and his family's hopes presented him with constantly changing demands as he grew up. And finally, the twins' almost complete exchange of roles in their early teens emphasizes not only the degree of change possible, but also the influence which siblings can have on each other.

10. Bert's Story

IN READING Bert's story you will be reminded of the twin called Garry. His personality and his intellectual ability are not unlike Bert's; thus the effect of different family circumstances on the two boys forms an interesting basis for comparison. Bert's pattern of emancipation was an unusual one. The combination of his own capacities and his family circumstances worked out well for him in spite of a rather one-sided course of development. As a small boy, Bert was a thin, solemn lad who stood aloof from the rough and tumble of the other five-year-olds. He preferred to use his head and think things out. His mother called him happy and good, serious-minded but with a good sense of humour. Each year she expressed her admiration for him; and Bert was lucky to have a family that found him so satisfactory while he was growing in his individual way. The stability of his environment was another asset. He spent all the years of his growing-up in the same comfortable house on a good middle-class street. His parents were educated, intelligent people who enjoyed an established position in the community and who prided themselves on taking a reasonable and liberal approach to life. Keenly interested in Bert and his little sister, they took it for granted the children would grow up to be responsible, thinking citizens like themselves. Bert's delicate health presented problems, but they handled them calmly, assuming they need not interfere with a good life. Childhood, 5 to 11 Years Personal Care [:+:] Bert's mother was a well-organized person who set up consistent household routines. As orderly ways appealed to Bert, too, she found him a "very reasonable child." Occasionally she

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scolded him, but usually "just a word" was enough. He showed independence in looking after himself, and by eleven, was "very good about personal habits." He took care of himself comfortably. His mother liked to do things for him at the same time that she admired him for being the fine fellow that he was. Family Living [".+!] The same kind of interaction between mother and son appeared in the family field, with complications. The smooth surface was ruffled by signs of strain. His mother said, "He is sometimes irritable, he flies off." She minimized this as being due to physical causes: tiredness or hunger. Her attitude was fair enough, but in a way it was looking for special causes other than his immaturity. A very high degree of self-control was expected of Bert, and he came close to living up to expectations. He handled timidity by being cautious and careful, by being conforming and orderly. He thus gained a sense of being selfdirected as well as sure of the approval of his parents. However, a residue of insecurity remained—a nervous tic at this time gave a clue to his feeling of strain. The picture thus far is one of imbalance, of parental expectations too high—a false respect; and of little acceptance of immaturity—too little care. The relationship came into balance through Bert's poor health which called for extra care and to which his mother responded with affection and attention. One gained the impression, though the evidence was nebulous, that his mother was glad of an excuse for relaxing into a more mothering role, glad to put less stress on independence. Her extra care and companionship helped to compensate for his difficulties and allowed him to lean on her. She avoided the pitfall of over-indulgence by her matter-of-fact acceptance of his recurring ill health. Though it limited his activity, there was still plenty he could do for himself, even in bed: reading, school work, pursuing intellectual interests, and playing various games. Each year during this period his mother optimistically stated that Bert's health was improving; it was more a measure of her attitude than a reflection of the facts. No chores were imposed, but Bert volunteered to help, and he loved to take part in family picnics or outings. Within the family he felt both protected and a contributor.

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Use of Money ['+*] Bert's family had financial security, though they were far from rich. They considered ideas far more important than things, but still thought it wise to handle money carefully. In practice they worried about money and ignored it; they were careful and vague. Bert was given a small allowance for his own use. His orderliness, plus the absence of any stores nearby to tempt him, earned him a reputation as a saver, he was called "Scotch with his money." Money did not interest him very much at all. If anything, Bert soon seemed more methodical than his mother, although at first his fine reputation was based on nothing more than his dropping some pennies in his bank. Activities [:+:] Bert's health and physique influenced him toward the quieter activities. He collected stamps; played table games and chess, read a great deal, and liked to use his imagination. He kept busy alone for long periods. His mother provided him with a variety of materials, sometimes played with him, often left him to his own devices. The interaction between the two was balanced, though the range of his activities was one-sided, since he shied away from boisterous play: "I don't belong to teams because I am not a strong build." In solitary or intellectual occupations he felt competent. His timidity showed up in this area; as late as ten he expressed a dislike of movies after seeing a frightening one. His father seems to have contributed to Bert's cautiousness, by his own attitude and by the things he would not let Bert do. At nine Bert said, "Dad says bikes are dangerous, and I thoroughly believe him." His father's attitude included within it a way of dealing with timidity which was reflected in Bert's answer when asked about fears: "I can't say that I have any. I don't do rash things." It is easy to see why Bert was respected as a "good" kind of person in this family. One can imagine the difference if father had wanted a football hero. The activities field showed positive development, but did not yet take Bert beyond the household. Although he was becoming steadily more emancipated, he still had not gone as far afield as one would expect for his age.

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School [!+:] In his school life, Bert advanced more successfully into the outside world. He was a bright boy and not only kept up, but did well even when he missed a third or more of the school year. His mother gave him help and encouraged him with her interest, yet Bert never seemed to feel pushed beyond what he wanted to do. He enjoyed school work, felt it was important and that he was good at it. The impetus to work hard came from himself. Doubtless it was, in part, a compensation for his social inadequacies. At nine he said, "I would rather go to school than play. It's more interesting." This remark has a priggish sound, but somehow with his gentleness and charm it was not so—at least to adults.

Social Life ['+'] With other children Bert had a rough time. His virtues were not the ones valued by his age group. When he was younger he had not got on too badly. Later the games got boisterous; sports and daring were the order of the day for boys. He played with younger children whom he bossed, and he was continually in trouble with the older ones who picked on him because he was no fighter. There was a "bully on the street," he said. He preferred to "play with a few because a lot get rowdy." These were his comments, but they echoed his mother, who said it was the other boys who lacked appreciation. She felt strongly about Bert's good qualities, and the points she made about his social difficulties had enough reason in them to provide excellent alibis —he was small and undoubtedly had become the one who was picked on. When he was ten his least pleasant memory was of being shut up in an old chicken coop for an hour by his "friends." All of this tended to keep him dependent on his mother, instead of helping him to be more realistic and tolerant of others. It tended to turn him away from facing the problem. On the other hand this reliance on his mother may have been what he needed most just then. The influence of Bert's active, outgoing young sister was at this time greatest in the social area. For a while they got along quite well, playing together, sharing imaginative games. His caution and her daring seemed to complement each other. Then

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later these characteristics began to take them in opposite directions. More and more Bert saw himself as one who planned ahead and behaved sensibly, who had serious interests. His sister liked to run with the gang, and they all took a poor view of his type. They sometimes teased him cruelly about his "sissy" ways. His mother became increasingly aware of what was going on, and could not help feeling that Bert was suffering for his virtues. Unable to remedy the situation, she tried to support him indirectly by playing up his good points. To complete the picture it should be added that he and his sister continued to have some happy times together. Also each one used teasing to define and confirm his own picture of himself. One was serious, the other frivolous; one was cautious, the other gay. During these years Bert had some friends and some social life. However, emancipation was not progressing. His social efforts were lessening, and he relied heavily on his mother's companionship. She supported him as well as she could, but her excuses and alibis had the effect of a lack of respect for his social competence. As we have seen, her rationalizing was by no means a main reason for his social troubles, nor did it help him solve his problems. At this stage there was little his mother could do directly to help him in his relations with other boys. What she could and did do was admire him as a person, and let him lean on her for companionship and comfort. Emancipation Summary Personal care ['.+'.] Use of money ["+'] School [:+:]

Family [!+.'] Activities ['.+'.] Social life ['+']

Bert's development was not a usual one, but in terms of emancipation he was building strengths in his particular way. Growing away from the family by means of his own efforts, rather than by transferring some reliance to others, suggests a rather solitary path ahead. How did Bert feel as he moved into his early teens? How did he see himself? He was a planner who avoided doing rash things. School was a serious business and a place where he could shine. He had an affectionate,

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companionable feeling about his mother, who talked to him "almost as if he were grown-up." Big boys were frightening. The world was a rather dangerous place. He "disliked the feel" of going on a streetcar alone. Still there were many things to be done—one just needed to be careful. The Middle Period, 12 to 15 Years Personal Care [:+:] Emancipation continued in this balanced area. Bert did more for himself, yet he still accepted help. His mother was well satisfied. She said he was "businesslike" and did not "dawdle." Neither of them found this field important; they passed over it in a casual way, and by fifteen Bert was close to being emancipated here. Family Living [!+!] "We treat him almost like a grown-up" was a frequent statement now. His mother continued to be pleased with him, with his even, quiet disposition. Her descriptions called him fairly placid, serene, with a sense of humour and a sense of justice. On account of his poor health she made few demands on him, but he was pleasant and co-operative about taking on some of the chores and odd jobs. Family outings were rare now except for the summer holiday. The big joint occupation was "talk." Bert joined in with full status as a member of the group; his ways and ideas very much in line with the family's. Not completely secure in his role, he disliked attention and resented prying into his affairs. His mother respected his desire for privacy, so friction was largely avoided. She was seldom the cause of his anger, which ranged from irritability to shouting and stamping out of the room. Changes of plans, "needless troubles that could have been avoided by foresight on anyone's part," "silliness as opposed to humour" annoyed him. To be angered by unreasonableness was to compound the unreason, so, although anger sometimes flared up, he more often turned it into righteous indignation, often at his sister. "Happy-go-lucky" to her was "irresponsible" to him. Several times a week he got "stern and cross" with her silliness, thus putting himself on the side of the grown-ups. This role was not easy to maintain when

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his sister used her quick tongue to annoy him, but he stuck with it, saw it as his way. Did his mother expect too much of him for the relationship to be a balanced interaction? In the main, she was following his lead, although the direction he took was much influenced by family values and family approval of him. She accepted, or did nothing about, his displays of temper, and his poor health still brought him the motherly attention he liked, though he rejected "prying" help. The seeming difficulty of the role he chose is no reason for supposing that he was pushed into it. How he felt about it is the test, and Bert approved of himself and of the road he was taking. The timidity which he carried with him in the guise of caution came more from the past and from the social field than from the family relationship. The staff member who interviewed him at fourteen said, "One feels he has everything figured out and knows just where he wants to go. ... He has a great sense of responsibility where home and family are concerned." Use of Money [.+:] "Money doesn't figure largely although he knows the value well"—his mother's view. His small allowance was entirely for his own use, and she trusted him to keep track of what he was owed. According to her, he did some long-range saving for big projects. However, in one case, a little mental arithmetic shows he saved more than he got, in allowances at any rate. The family vagueness about money, so apparent in the records, perhaps led Bert to take the management of his money into his own orderly hands. Activities ['.+'.] The activities field was being relegated to a secondary place as Bert became more absorbed in school work. His parents still provided opportunities, but Bert decided what he could, or would do. Reading, music, and swimming gave variety to this field. All were activities he could indulge in alone, and none were intense interests. His parents arranged for him to go to dancing class, but he dropped it after a bit, saying, "Late hours are bad for me."

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The interaction here was a balanced one; his parents provided for him and respected him but did not push him beyond his mild interests. Although he accepted help, he mostly kept busy his own way and made his own choices. School [:+:] Bert's greatest satisfactions came from his school achievements. This was the area he liked, this was where he could excel. Having academic interests themselves, his parents showed their approval by their appreciative interest. They helped him, too, but the help and respect were mingled in what the parents referred to as treating him like a grown-up—never with condescension. At fifteen Bert was planning his future courses and deciding on the area in which he intended to find a career. Though his plans were laid in a field valued by his parents, he made his own decisions. He may have appeared cautious, but he was developing a mind of his own. Occasionally his remarks sounded arrogant or intolerant, but he was finding his way. Social Life ['+'] Life with his friends grew less stormy as Bert grew older. He found his main solution to the problem of social relationships in withdrawal. By seeing his own ways as superior he felt he need not care too much about his lack of a social life. This negative attitude to other boys threw him back on the family, particularly his mother, for companionship. She showed her respect for him by enjoying his company, and by positive comments such as, "He has a few real friends. His good friends appreciate him." At the same time she still protected him with alibis about being "teased for his high marks." She saw the defect as being in the friends, and if the fault was not due to lack of effort on Bert's part, then he need not feel pushed to correct it. His sister's personality continued to affect Bert's social development. In contrast to her spirit of fun and nonsense, his was reasonable and logical; he criticized her to cover the jealousy he admitted feeling. Instead of becoming more like her, he was confirmed in his own direction, not a popular one with young teenagers. Their mother saw the situation the other way

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around: it was the sister who was jealous because Bert was reasonable and got attention for it; the sister should develop good qualities like his. The mother's point of view increased resistance and jealousy between the children, for Bert was, in effect, the one more protected and valued. The records fail to give enough information here. On the basis of what there is, the parents appear to have contributed to over-dependence. They approved of the situation, but it was still a dependent one. Bert put forth some effort but relied heavily on parental standards of how to behave, and on parental approval. Emancipation Summary Personal care [!+*.] Use of money [.+:] School [:+:]

Family [:+:] Activities [:+:] Social life ['+']

By the age of fifteen, Bert was feeling more confident than ever before. He could cope with school, which was most important to him. His future vocation would mean plenty of hard work, but he looked forward to the challenge. More mundane matters, such as personal care and the handling of money, would be taken care of by rational planning. In these three fields he was well on his way toward running his own life. Where he was less sure of himself, he could rely on his mother, trust her help. In fact he passed over the social area as non-essential. He had a few friends. His frail build and poor health made the usual masculine activities difficult for him, so he turned to intellectual or solitary recreations and to his family. In spite of the narrow range of his interests and his backward sociability, I do not believe he was in a blind alley; he had room to grow. This may be partly hindsight, but it is also based on a judgment of the quality of the relationship he had with his mother. She respected him as a person, and she took for granted that he would grow away from her. More evidence of what Bert was like at this time is the staff interviewer's comment: "Reserved, thoughtful, charming (I liked him very much!)." The parentheses are hers, as if she felt the remark uncalled-for but could not resist it.

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Young Adult, 18 to 21 Years A gap came in Bert's records when he was sixteen and seventeen. When we picked him up, after the interval, he was a serious-minded young man, going steadily forward in his own directions. His health had improved. He said he was careful if he caught anything, otherwise he considered his health average. Emotional stability had increased; his mother said he was occasionally irritable, but was seldom angry any more. Personal Care [!+! —» Emancipated] Personal care was hardly mentioned now. Bert looked after himself and his own things. At eighteen there were "no rules," his mother said. "He does what he likes." And his mother thought he had excellent judgment. Emancipation was as complete here as it could be while he still lived at home. Family Living [:+'.] In the family, too, Bert carried on in a fairly adult way. No duties were assigned, but he pitched in and helped with chores indoors and out. He estimated matter-of-factly that this took a few hours a week. His mother found him helpful, considerate, affectionate. During the school year he was home a lot, usually occupied with his studies, but companionable in his leisure time. Though time spent together grew less, the family bond was still close. Talk, covering many interests, was their main activity; music, bridge, and entertaining friends were the lesser occupations. Finding this pleasant, Bert participated as he could while giving first place to his work. Now he was spending several months away on summer jobs, so not only was family life reduced but he felt quite able to do without it. When he came home he enjoyed being back, he enjoyed his mother's support and the respect and approval he received as a contributing member of the family. Although not yet wholly emancipated, he was well on his way. Use of Money [!+'.] Bert looked forward to financial independence and made an early start in that direction. We saw him handling his allowance

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competently in the middle period. His next move was a parttime winter job which earned him pocket money and replaced the allowance from the family. From the age of eighteen on, his summer job paid for all personal and school expenditures, the family providing room and board. This was a high degree of independence, compared with the level reached by some of the children in our study. Activities [Emancipated] Studies and work left little time for other activities, but Bert's intellectual interests were broadening. Though he was content enough for the time being, he looked forward to having time for other things in the future. This field seems narrow, but in terms of emancipation it was in his own hands. The few recreations he shared with the family did not alter the fact that he made his own decisions and arrangements. Scornful of team sports, he enjoyed being an "intellectual cynic." School [Emancipated] The school area now included training for the career he had chosen, and was the all-absorbing feature of his life. He still had the support of his parents' whole-hearted approval as background for his own decisions. Making his way into the adult world with neither pressure nor help from them, he proceeded with confidence and enjoyment. Although it is impossible to pick the exact moment, emancipation in this field was completed by the age of twenty-one. Social Life [:+:] Social development was slower. Still needing family sympathy and understanding, still seeing purely social relationships as something that could be left for later, Bert gained friendships through his work. He valued people with similar interests, and he had many contacts on his summer job and in his college course. By the time he was twenty-one he saw himself fairly clearly: "Not enough dates, but this is not serious." As he put it, he liked to think of himself as "leading a balanced life," and "taking steps to avoid becoming a hermit. . . parties, jokes, dates."

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Although he was looking outward confidently, his mother saw him as still socially dependent on the family, and believed it was time he left home for broader experiences. She acknowledged her regret at seeing him go, while she accepted it as inevitable and right. Emancipation was close; until it came, the interaction was in balance, with help and respect from Bert's mother, and with Bert both relying on his family and emerging. Emancipation Summary Personal care ['.+!] Use of money [:+:] School [Emancipated]

Family [:+*.] Activities [Emancipated] Social life [*.+'.]

Bert's mother summed up his progress during these years: "He has no petty worries, acts independently, is in command of himself, and is directing his life suitably." Except for his work, however, his home still was more important to him than life outside. The saving factor was the size of the work area, which took him out into the world. Highlights This is a good emancipation pattern, although development beyond the family was uneven. In the first instance, Bert was lucky to have the parents he did, intelligent, good people. Luckiest of all was that they suited each other so well; with his high intelligence and cautious-careful nature, he fitted into their orderly, intellectual lives. Granted that Bert had been considerably influenced by the time we met him at five, that does not disprove the lucky fit. Luck ended there. Ill health, a major problem for a good many years, was surmounted by the positive efforts of Bert and his mother. She gave extra help without babying him, affection without dominating. Respect, humour, and the expectation that he would grow away can be taken as crucial ingredients. There were dangers in the alibis which she provided and Bert took over; sports were held in low esteem, and Bert's social failures were blamed on the other boys, who were called bullies, or jealous. These rationalizations could have turned Bert from further effort, or could have been used to hold him close to her.

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This did not happen, and the best reason I can see that it did not is that these were not his mother's real values. She thought them up to defend her child; he used them and then saw beyond them. Consideration and trust were the true human qualities, not bullying and jealousy. Good friends came to be highly prized. So Bert chose from what his world offered him. He chose in terms of his own competence; he learned the satisfaction of doing by his own efforts—even in the days when he was so cautiously planning and figuring and avoiding rash things. He narrowed his world for a while but came to see this narrowing as entirely of his own choosing; he recognized it as to some extent making a virtue of necessity. This was his way and he liked it well enough. At twenty-one: "I look at others the same age and feel I have every reason to be happy." And as we look at Bert growing up, we judge his definition of happiness to be a fairly mature one. The lingering doubt is about his ability for social relationships. A Thematic Apperception Test, given at age twenty, confirmed that Bert emphasized an intellectual approach to life, and that he was functioning at a high level of efficiency. On the other hand it suggested a more "rigid division between intellect and emotion" than appeared in the emancipation history. It suggested also that "people might find him cool and aloof." And at that stage in his development they might have; in fact his manner might have continued to appear cool and aloof to others. But this is not to call him cold and distant; there is quite a body of evidence against such a conclusion. There was his increasing tolerance as he grew in confidence; there was his honest effort to appraise himself, and there was his expressed desire for closer friendships. Surely, too, the charm that impressed the interviewer had not all vanished. Above all, the reciprocal warmth of his relationship with his mother was a preparation for other close relationships. There was mutual respect and concern between Bert and his mother, but he was not tied to her apron strings.

PART THREE

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11. The Method of Assessing Reciprocal Trust and Emancipation

THE CHILDREN described in the foregoing stories are not strange, peculiar people, nor did they lead adventurous lives in exotic circumstances. Nevertheless, they illustrate how varied can be the paths from childhood to the adult state. Everyone who knows even a few children is aware of their variety, and the deeper one looks into their lives the more puzzles and contradictions one finds. And then, when their growing up is interpreted as the outcome of a two-person relationship, that between parent and child, the complications are increased again. The method of assessing reciprocal trust and emancipation in terms of balance is suggested as a way of finding meaning and order in the variety of behaviour and events in which parent and child are enmeshed. The focus is on the presence or absence of reciprocal trust between the two. The child trusts his parent —but this is not the abject dependence of the child who cannot trust himself. Because his parent trusts him as well as cares for him, he also trusts himself. One can call this a simple formula or a deep truth, and it has been stated many times in many ways. To put these ideas to use calls for a working definition of two-sided trust. We must be able to recognize trust when we see it in action. Then we will be able to identify the child who is becoming emancipated, who is on his way to a truly adult state, measured in terms of maturity, not just of years lived through. "Balance," as used in the stories, provides a working definition of reciprocal trust. Wherever one can watch the back-and-forth flow of interaction between parent and child it is possible to

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assess balance or imbalance in their behaviour patterns. Balance, as the indicator of trust, denotes the relationship that is beneficial to the child. Trust fosters both his dependent actions and his independent actions. In spite of the gaps in each child's records, the method developed in the first chapters made possible a fairly coherent view of each one's progress. The absence of records for some strategic periods is one annoying deficiency. An even greater difficulty in building up the emancipation pictures stemmed from the fact that the information about the children was not collected with this purpose in mind. In a plan for selecting the detail on which to base a judgment of the presence or absence of reciprocal trust, two matters have to be decided. The first decision has to do with the size of the sample of behaviour needed to make one judgment about reciprocal trust, in whatever field of parent-child interaction. The second decision has to do with the number of samples required for a true, overall picture of the relationship between child and parent—or child and any adult. A final answer to this latter question will require a great deal of research. I can only suggest a starting point. Regarding the first matter, the size of a single sample, we are on much firmer ground. A sufficient, or usable, sample must include a certain amount of behaviour, must be more than a simple "mother says don't and the child stops." To include enough, one can take as a sample the behaviour that centres around a usual feature of the child's life. There are a number of these features, or life areas, such as school, play, brothers and sisters, friendships, which continue to be significant through the growing years. Each of these is an arena for several circular parent-child interactions. As a child grows there is a progression in these circular interactions: one drops behind and a new one takes its place. When a child learns to travel alone on buses, and does it, he is emancipated there, so that he no longer needs his parent in that portion of his life. A new circular interaction may then develop around learning to drive a car. The locale shifts, and parent-child interaction continues around a new centre. Each successive circle of interaction shows its own pattern—a balance or an imbalance.

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A usable sample of interaction must show what is actually happening between a parent and a child, not just what a parent thinks is happening to the child. Instead of relying on a parent's interpretation, an appraiser must know what each person does, how each reacts to the other; and must then make his own judgment. Usable samples of behaviour should also represent what usually happens; the spectacular can be important, but only when weighed against the usual. Harris's episodes of rebellion are a case in point. A usable sample of interaction involves activity meaningful to the child when and where the events occur. For instance, if a child is doing something now, such as taking piano lessons, for the sake of future benefit, does he appreciate this value now? Or is it currently meaningless to him? A child may be required to learn social manners in order to go into polite society later on, but the requirements may be meaningless to him at the time unless they make him socially acceptable then. A usable sample must include behaviour in context, and the child's view decides what is in context. Amy wanted help dressing; her mother, thinking she was jealous of the baby, read her extra stories after supper. It was the mother who saw the stories as a form of extra help—not Amy. She was refused help when she asked for it. These are requirements for judging balance in a single sample of parent-child behaviour. The "balance" guide for assessing reciprocal trust can be applied to many kinds of situations because the requirements are flexible. But although this simple balance device is easy to understand, it can be difficult to adhere to in practice. One all too readily slips into the old single view of the parent or the child, and fails to apply the four-way test. The balancing of four variables at once takes practice. The second question—how many samples are needed for an overall appraisal of each child—is not so easily answered. However, a useful beginning is suggested by the life stories: each story could be divided into life areas which are distinct aspects of any child's daily life. As there may be both balances and imbalances within any one area, the next requirement is a system for choosing samples within each area. From the

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analysis of the life stories and of other "emancipation histories," I have concluded that the various areas show similar basic aspects, or levels, of interaction. Consequently the same criteria could be used in sampling all areas. The sampling procedure can be demonstrated by starting with the "care" feature of a parent's relationship to a child. Every child needs several kinds of care, and similar kinds of care in every area. He must have care that provides for his needs, for the actual physical things he is unable to provide for himself. He requires care that assists him in doing what he is unable to do, and that teaches him how to do these things for himself. He requires care that sets limits to his world, sets up boundaries to keep him safe, and rules to guide his behaviour. Only with a young child is it possible to make a wall so high he cannot get over it; more usually each limit is a rule which includes a consequence for overstepping the line. In order to function as a limit, each rule must incorporate a consequence which the child knows is there. These are the first three kinds of care, concrete and definite, which a child needs to grow on. Each one is accompanied by a corresponding respect for the child, a respect which allows him to do his own growing. For the moment that is another part of the story. A child needs further kinds of care: he needs someone to make sure he has room to be himself. Here the parent's respect is of foremost importance. Respect animates the care which protects the child's freedom. Although the parent still stands by if the child wants to come for special help, or for sympathy, his main function is to ensure the child some room for selfdirection. The parent protects him from too many pressures and requirements. The final kind of care is even further removed from the concrete and specific: it provides the child with values relative to each life area. The parent presents to the child some consistent attitudes, ideals, standards. This aspect of care is the most difficult to describe and yet is of utmost importance to a child. It reaches him as parental example, as parental comments with reference to the particular area of life, and as direct instruction. When there is disparity between the values he is exposed to in various ways, he is confused rather than cared for. I have

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called this area of sampling "parental values and attitudes"— it needs a more exact definition—and have interpreted it rather freely in order to fit it into different life areas. My use of care as the basis for subdividing each life area for sampling purposes does not mean that parental care has suddenly become more important to the child than parental respect. The following discussion of the child's emergence as a confident individual should make this clear. The first levels of a child's growth toward maturity are linked to the first three kinds of parental care—the concrete and definite. Here the child is learning how to sustain himself in the world he was born into; he is taking over the satisfying of his own basic needs. As this is never entirely possible for an individual in our society, it is implied that the child is becoming the active agent. He feels himself to be the director and controller as he copes with the real world, with its demands and with his own needs. His first step is to find comfort in what his parents provide. Then he signals his independence as he feels free to accept or refuse what is provided, and as he actively participates by indicating his needs and preferences. His second way of coping with the world is by learning the skills which enable him to look after himself. Even though he relies on some help and appreciates being shown how to do things, he enjoys a feeling of independence as he exercises new skills. His third way of coping with the world is in the realm of rules and limits. He generally conforms because he finds it comfortable to rely on the protection of known limits set by his parents. He shows his self-reliance when he follows these rules without the need of a policeman. He no longer needs constant reminders, and, too, he is prepared at times to be a non-conformist and take the consequences. If limits become too confining he calls on parental respect to widen them. He is becoming a responsible member of society capable of providing his own controls. The fourth level of becoming a person requires the broader freedom which allows a child to choose his own goals and directions. He can be effortful, curious, inventive, self-contained; the possibilities can only be summed up in the comprehensive word "individuality." A child relies on his parents

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to guard his free living space. And the parents have not yet entirely withdrawn from the child's world; they are still standby helpers if the child calls on them. The final level of becoming a person is in the realm of values, which in its highest form includes ethics and religion. The selfdirected person makes his own decisions about which of two choices is more important. Parents have given him a starting point in the clear statement of their own values, and their respect has encouraged him to evaluate for himself. If this seems far beyond the life of a small child, then listen to some of them evaluating the behaviour of their friends, or of themselves, or assessing the relative merits of all manner of knotty problems. The five kinds of parental care and the five levels of personal growth are combined with the reliance of the child on his parents and with their respect for him. The five levels all come together in every major area of a child's life. In each area the assessment of reciprocal trust and emancipation is made five times, as described in the outlines below. Each of the five separate assessments calls for a forced decision about balance or imbalance, based on circumstantial evidence. To achieve comparable results appraisers must follow carefully planned "rules of evidence." These have been described in a general way, now they must be worked out in detail. The Balance Guide to Reciprocal Trust and Emancipation The assessment of reciprocal trust in action makes use of the balance-imbalance plan for evaluating parent-child interaction. It can be adapted to the particular circumstances of each major area of a child's life. The method as a whole is designed to be suitable for a wide age range, from preschool until emancipation is complete. Because of this wide applicability, an appraiser requires a background knowledge of child development as well as a practical experience with children in order to interpret their behaviour. Parents find a "self-appraisal" enlightening. They make up in detailed knowledge of their child for any lack of psychological background, and, without trying to give them-

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selves a "score," can take a new look at their relations with their own children. The "balance" concept can probably be applied even more widely, to take a closer look at any adultchild relationship in which the adult—teacher, doctor, policeman—has some responsibility for the child. When we put on this particular pair of spectacles, the pair that gives the double view of adult and child together, a contradiction immediately appears. This double vision for a single image puts together two divergent kinds of behaviour on the part of the adult, and two divergent kinds of behaviour on the part of the child. Each person goes in two directions at once. The adult takes care of the child and leaves him alone; the child gets help and he does for himself. A Method of Assessing Reciprocal Trust and Emancipation 1. Material Provision PARENT'S SIDE

CHILD'S SIDE

Care

Reliance

The parent ... provides for the child: material and arrangements, suitable and satisfying ... protects the child's belongings

The child ... relies on the satisfactions provided ... takes these provisions for granted

Respect

Emergence

The parent ... considers that provisions are made as the child's right — not as favours ... considers the child's wishes where feasible ... considers the child's belongings are the child's own property

The child ... makes active use of what is provided ... selects and chooses from what is available ... says what he wants, is attracted to the new ... begins to make some provision for himself

Care in the form of food, shelter, clothing, and play materials is a large part of the parents' task—or pleasure. At first they

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not only provide, they also decide what is necessary for their child's welfare. The child is on the receiving end, he feels assured of being looked after as he accepts what comes. Then he begins to take a hand, by making active use of what is offered, and by making his own selection from what is offered. Later he indicates his preferences, his own view of what is suitable for him at this time. His mother respects his preferences in so far as this is compatible with what she knows is necessary for his well-being. The child feels comfortably looked after, and he also feels that he is an active participant in this realm of "things in his world." And he likes new things, anything from growing into bigger clothes to the challenge of riding a two-wheeled bike. As the child sees it, being looked after probably lumps together being given things and being helped. However, "provides for" and "assists" are treated'separately because it has been found that the parent-child relationship can be balanced in one of these aspects and not in the other. For instance, a parent may give a child many toys and never think of teaching him about their uses or how to look after them. When an imbalance occurs around one aspect and not the other, the child's behaviour may show that he no longer lumps the two together. Every aspect of respect could be described by the words "parent approves of this child." Here a mother shows her approval of him as a worthwhile person (at all ages) by deferring to his wishes whenever possibl^. She tries to understand, to co-operate, to let him have a say in what he needs just now. More and more she adjusts what is provided to suit his indicated wants. For instance, in the personal-care field she may insist only that his clothes be warm enough, and beyond that let him choose. Finally, a child feels he is provided for because he is an important member of the family; things he is given are not rewards for good behaviour, nor are they gifts to prove the love of bounteous parents. His share is his by right. A mother shows respect by what she does not do. She lets the child have his own ideas and his own possessions; these are important because they are his. She helps him protect his belongings, and shows friendly interest, yet in doing so she stays

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on the outside, as it were, never intruding and trying to influence everything. Though the emphasis here is on providing for the child, respect is still a vital part of the relationship between him and his parents. They give much, but once something is given it is his. They resist the temptation to say "Here is a nice electric train for you, but you can't use it unless I am around." Better be honest and say, "this is our new toy." 2. Assistance and Teaching PARENT'S SIDE

CHILD'S SIDE

Care

Reliance

The parent ... enjoys helping and teaching ... does things for the child ... helps the child do things ...teaches the child how

The child ... enjoys being looked after ... enjoys being helped to do things ... likes his parent to teach him ... thinks his parent is a good authority

Respect

Emergence

The parent ... keeps hands off to let the child try ... appreciates the child's efforts — not just the accomplishments ... is unperturbed by the child's immaturity and mistakes

The child ... likes to carry on without help ... enjoys his increasing skills ... makes mistakes and tries again ... may think he can do better than his parent

Doing things for their child often seems to be what parents are for—they are always helping. They look after his comfort and well-being, and on the psychic level give him love and affection. By combining the two a mother demonstrates her good will; she likes to look after children. She finds babies and grubby small boys and giggling school girls equally charming, each in his own way. Although children need progressively less help, their parents' feeling about doing things for them maintains the same

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characteristic quaUty. In the balanced relationship helping the child is a pleasure, not a worry or a martyrdom. Easy and matterof-fact, this mother assumes that her child likes her help and relies on it. The proof of her assumption is that the child counts on being looked after, he rather takes it for granted. In fact he may appear callously unconcerned; his parents' help and affecr tion are a part of him and he need not worry. His affection for them is his appreciation, even though he may only show it now and then. Young Eve who just wanted "to go on walking around and helping Mummy like I do now," conveyed her feeling of being loved and wanted for herself. The very tone of "Mummy says," or of "we do" can reflect a secure feeling about home. The beginning of self-identity comes with reliance on consistent care. In early days, as the centre of a constant and stable world, a world predictable and meaningful, a child finds himself and begins to step out. Emerging into self-reliance does not necessarily mean going beyond the front door. Much is done at home as the child says "I can do it." In different fields he does different things: in personal care he does prescribed and often routine things such as dressing and looking after clothes and possessions. In family life he is a participant in work and in play, and in the mutual considerations of living together. Whatever the area, the crux of the matter is that he is doing without help. This negative definition tells only half the story. The final clue is his enjoyment of his own growing competence. His mother is still there; he can turn back for help or an explanation. If she gears her assistance to his age and ability, he finds her a good authority; then he has a firm base to step out from. After accepting help he is happily ready to emerge again. His mother believes in his emergence, she knows he wants to manage by himself and that it is good for him to struggle. She keeps hands off even when itching to reach out and poke the button through the hole for him. She appreciates the effort he makes just as much as the final result. His mistakes do not upset her because his satisfaction is the goal; his fumbling and errors are part of the process, and soon to be forgotten. One can say that his mother is a "good teacher."

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3. Rules and Limits PARENT'S SIDE

CHILD'S SIDE

Care

Reliance

The parent

... sets limits for safety ... sets limits to the size of the child's world ... provides an orderly world ... establishes rules of behaviour ... sets suitable consequences for infractions

The child ... is generally conforming ... finds the limits are a

protection ... accepts reminders about rules ... may "grumble and do it"

Respect

Emergence

The parent ... expects the child will follow the rules, not just "obey orders" ...lets the child take the

The child ... abides by the rules without supervision ... accepts the consequences of non-conformity ... sees rules as man-made and for a purpose, and hence revisable

consequences

... stops acting as a policeman .. .widens the limits as the child grows ... considers the child's ideas for changes in the

rules

Every mother sets up rules and limits to protect her child's safety and welfare; this is an essential part of taking care of him. She sets these limits as wide as possible in order to leave room for his own adventuring and learning. The delicate placing of boundaries presents a problem familiar to every parent seeking a balance between controlling and freeing the child. In assessing parent-child relationships I have separated these two functions because the child's use of freedom is one thing, and his learning to control himself is another. Under rules and limits we are dealing with controls. Here the parental objective is to keep the child sufficiently safe and at the same time to give him opportunities to grow in responsibility

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and good judgment. Limits serve this double purpose: they protect, and they provide a world the child can learn to handle because it is orderly and predictable. Care here means definiteness as opposed to indecision or erratic changes. A child has no reliance without clear limits; nor can he take over responsibility for himself in an ever-shifting world. In such a situation he has two choices; his first alternative is to be overly dependent, and he can show this by slavishly following his mother, or by raising such hell he keeps her ever-watchful. His other alternative is to try to make his own rules, to be too independent. This leaves him insecure, and his parents with a willful, headstrong child. The early limits set up by parents are actual physical barriers like a playpen or a garden fence—they are definite, unless the child finds that crying removes them. As a child grows, limits must take the form of rules and regulations and family customs. Limits for adults are the laws and social customs of their society, and a child comes only gradually to accept them. In the meantime his parents make rules in line with his maturity, and if they make good rules the child realizes that rules can protect as well as thwart. A penalty for infringement is incorporated in every rule: late for lunch, you miss it; not coming in when called, you are house-bound for a while; anti-social, leave the group; overspend your allowance, do without. Thus the parent takes the role of law-enforcement officer instead of despot. Carrying out rules, though it may require force, is impersonal rather than a battle of wills; it is quite unlike "You do it because / want you to." Rules include not only prohibitions but also certain kinds of required behaviour from the child, things he must do, and do in a certain way because "that is the way they are done." You not only wash your hands, you get them clean. Much is known about what can be expected of children at different ages. My concern here is less general, it focuses on suiting the rules to the individual. A child's comfortable acceptance of rules tells us two things: he knows what the rules are, and he finds them approximately suitable to him at this time. Once again, his reliance on his parents is the proof of their care. In talking with parents I have found that questions about "rules" sometimes puzzle them. They are inclined to say they have none. Further discussion usually reveals that many rules

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have been so long established that they are taken for granted without fuss. Because they are working well parent and child hardly notice them. Another funny thing happens. Suggest to a mother that she make a rule such as: if the children fight they will be sent to play alone. She is very doubtful that she could make this stick. Yet this same mother has a "rule" that every Saturday the children tidy and vacuum their own rooms. "Does this work?" "Oh yes, there is no nonsense about that. They know I mean it." Clear definite rules are a comfort to a child. He knows what is expected and how far he can go. He knows that up to a certain point matters are up to him, and beyond that he is still being looked after. He does not have to decide everything for himself, in fact he prefers not to; it is reassuring to conform to the ways one knows. At other times the rules thwart him and his parents are not surprised that he rebels against them. The test of the suitability of his limits is still that he accepts them easily— most of the time. This also is a test of his parents' ability to be consistent—they have not taught him to be a lawbreaker by letting him escape the consequences when he breaks the rules. The child with a comfortable reliance on his parents and their rules is not simply an obedient child—far from it. He appreciates the freedom that rules give him; he has a positive attitude to the rules themselves, which he demonstrates by his readiness to take over responsibility for carrying them out. They are his guidelines in controlling his own behaviour: he can conform or he can break the rules and take the consequences. Either way the rules help him grow in self-control. Parental respect widens the limits. Danger is inherent in freedom, just as safety is the purpose for which the rules are made. Safety is never completely possible: even the child kept in his bed may suffocate; certainly too much trying to keep him safe will suffocate him figuratively. So a mother accepts the fact thai when she widens the limits some danger is involved. Every child may make mistakes, but she demonstrates her respect for her child by sticking to the rules she has set out. She respects him enough to let him take the consequences of his own behaviour. This is part of freeing him. Rules and requirements are no strait-jacket; they should be part of the background. The

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foreground is the wide space in which the child decides for himself, and his mother trusts him and keeps out of the way. This is fine for the moment, but it may come to an abrupt end unless limits are widened as the child grows. Some of the children in this study ran into difficulties in their early teens because parents stopped widening limits. Children who had been encouraged to be independent were pulled up short when their activities began to take them beyond home ground. When mother could no longer keep an eye on things she lost her nerve. Other children continued to be trusted and behaved accordingly; with their experience of being responsible for their own actions they were ready for larger freedoms. The knowledge that one is on one's own is a great bar to foolhardiness. The positive value of rules and limits is to foster the child's confidence in himself. Limits have protected him from tackling too much, and his mother's non-interference has shown she has confidence in him. The results of his mistakes fall on him, and his mother (bless her) seldom adds irrelevant results by fussing or scolding or blaming. When he has to go short because his allowance is gone, he gets neither a homily on thrift nor a listing of his foolish expenditures, so his disgust is at his own foolishness, not at his mother. Similarly, when his efforts are successful, he enjoys the full sense of his own accomplishment. His selfreliance and good judgment increase; and when he wants wider limits his mother is justified in feeling he has had enough practical experience to be ready for them. He is becoming "a responsible child," and they both know it. 4. Freedom and Initiative Parents ensure for their child freedom to develop initiative, they protect his free space within the limits. Here he finds his own goals, makes his own decisions, learns to trust his own judgment. Because his parents consider his ideas are worthwhile, and feel that to be different is legitimate, he is not too bound by what other people think and is free to study decisions from all angles. If questioning and examining are encouraged by his parents, he can count on their willingness to let him make his own decisions, instead of having to waste his talents fighting

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PARENT'S SIDE

CHILD'S SIDE

Care

Reliance

The parent ... guards the child's freedom ... ensures the child time and opportunity for his own affairs ... is only a "stand-by" helper ... is a sympathetic listener ... "understands" when no help is possible

The child ... knows where his freedom lies ... counts on his parent to protect his freedom of action ... goes to his parent with special difficulties . . . counts on parental "understanding"

Respect

Emergence

The parent ... keeps out of child's affairs, stops influencing ... appreciates what is different and individual ... admires the child and his desire to do well

The child ... sets his own goals ... makes his own plans and arrangements . . . likes to try new things ... listens to parental ideas but does not necessarily follow them ... has a real area for personal growth

for the right to do so. The signs of his emergence are his lively curiosity, his decision-making, his readiness to admit his mistakes, and his experiments with non-conformity. He knows his parents will trust him even when they do not see things his way. A child becomes dependable through experiencing the failures and successes resulting from his own decisions. And his trustworthiness has a second and deeper source. Every child is a social creature who likes to be with others of his kind. As he grows, his trusting relationship with his parents sets the tone of his attitude to other people. Mutual respect and consideration will decide his choice of social goals and means. The child who has known a relationship of trust can never be wholly selfcentred.

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Ensuring the child freedom to proceed in his own directions reaches into a deeper and more varied level of the parent-child relationship. The child truly asserts a personality of his own; he builds his own unique picture of himself. As he moves further from family influences, more and more possibilities open up before him. It is difficult to make general statements about his ways of being different, yet this is what one must try to do. The emerging child can be described as the active creator who invents his own uses for material available and for skills he has acquired. He reconstructs, rearranges, reshapes, reforms, and the results are new for him. Choosing his own goals and means is his way of emancipating. This description is not meant to deny his continuing need for parental support. Until emancipation is complete he needs his parents. Their non-intervention in his affairs can imply trust, not indifference. Although this may seem a subtle distinction, it is readily recognized by both child and parent, and it can be observed by an outsider. The parents' attitude here is such a blend of care and respect that the two seem inseparable. They keep out and they still care. When asked for help, they give it if they can. On the many occasions when no actual help is possible, they give sympathy and understanding. When misfortune befalls him, a child most needs confidence and trust. A trust that is true does not play down the seriousness of the problem as he sees it, does not offer the sop of false optimism. A parent is required to be both a listening ear and a sounding-board on which the child can try out his ideas and feelings. Parents do not always find this double role an easy one—the parents of the children in the stories found it more difficult in some areas than in others. Children seem to accept the fact that some subjects are better discussed with someone other than parents. So they go beyond the family, most often to their peers. If this turning away grows out of a trusting relationship at home, then it is true emancipation. If the turning away is part of a massive reaction against parents, that is another matter. The final proof of parental careplus-respect is the child who is determining his own rate of emancipation, neither fighting for his freedom nor evading independent action.

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Guarding a child's freedom begins in small ways. With a baby it may be letting him experiment and struggle with his playthings in his own way. Guarding a child's freedom moves in ever widening circles until he chooses his own life style, and finally chooses himself a career and a wife. 5. Values and Attitudes PARENT'S SIDE

CHILD'S SIDE

Care

Reliance

The parent ... makes clear his own values ...demonstrates and interprets appropriate values ... helps with ideas and relationships ... opens doors to new possibilities

The child ... accepts parental values ... finds his parent a dependable authority . . . likes to try out his ideas on his parent

Respect

Emergence

The parent ...listens ... admits his own inadequacies ... is fallible; admits other people have good ideas ... likes to see the child think for himself, can accept his criticisms ... enjoys the child's ideas

The child ... likes to work out his own ideas ... recognizes parental limitations ... criticizes parental ideas, values, behaviour

... likes to make up his own mind

... likes to promote his own ideas

This level of parent-child relations first stood out in the stories in its negative form, as a clash of values. The clashes drew attention to the matter of values in the cases which went smoothly. The contrast between the two types of relationship leads to some general hypotheses about the role of values in building trust between parent and child. Every mother in the study held certain beliefs about "what is right" and had certain hopes for her children, whether or not

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they were clearly articulated. Such beliefs and hopes, which I call values, were part of what every child learned at home. He might find them congenial, or he might react against them. In terms of emancipation, he either found them reliable and grew from them, or found them impossible. In the latter case he lacked usable parental care. If he tried to live up to impossible goals his was a false emergence; if he rejected the parental ideas and struck out entirely on his own, this was also a false emergence. Either way he was doing without the help he needed. He covered his insecurity with a false show of independence. In the stories, values which established a trusting relationship with the child were clearly thought out by the parent. Because these values had a central core of respect for individuality they placed no binding restrictions on the child. Amy, for example, knew what her parents believed, and at the same time felt encouraged to be the kind of person she could be. She had a starting point and went on from there to puzzle out her own views of life. Some parents, with the best of intentions, left their children to flounder without guidelines. They were so anXious to let their children make up their own minds that they gave them nothing definite to start from. This was too much freedom. Parents with rigid value systems did the reverse: they left the child no room to explore. Their children could either follow them or react against them. Another approach, one which confuses any child, is to preach one thing and practise another. He may surmise which matters more to his parents, and still be caught in the conflict of right and wrong which they have handed on to him. Though he may work his way out of such a confusion, he has been given a poor start. A child needs a clear and understandable set of values, and to be understandable they must be suited to his age. They begin on a practical level. The word "please" is socially correct, but is it more or less important than consideration for the other person's convenience and feelings? When consideration for others is taken to be the basic value then, obviously, it can only be learned by practical example. As the child is treated, so will

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he treat others. Care and respect in human relations now become values in themselves. A child makes a good start if he absorbs them first at home. However, this is only the beginning—he still is faced with the problem of applying the values in all the complicated situations that will arise. He needs freedom to work out his own solutions; he will have to challenge and question and disagree. He is helped by parents who enjoy discussion and take seriously his halting efforts to establish his own perspective, who admit that they are fallible and that many other people have good ideas too. It is respectable to differ. The trusting child, progressing toward true independence, thinks his parents are good authorities, but he does not confuse them with God. He thinks he has some good ideas of his own; he likes to talk about them as a way of seeing them more clearly.

12. Failures in Reciprocal Trust

The Imbalances IN EVERY PARENT-CHILD RELATIONSHIP some areas are not in balance from time to time. The various imbalances which may occur have been indicated in the discussions of reciprocal trust and in the stories. The imbalances show where trouble spots are and indicate the nature of the difficulty. Now, instead of simply saying there is something wrong with this child, one begins to see what is blocking him. The type of blocking depends on which aspect is missing from the interaction between him and his parent. A deficiency in one aspect may be caused by too much stress on its counterpart—too much care can overshadow respect for the child himself. Or a deficiency may be simply too little care, or too little respect, without any corresponding overemphasis. Since two people are reacting to each other, one must look at both of them to understand what is missing or what is over-stressed, to see why each behaves and feels as he does. The imbalances are a search for missing parts. This chapter outlines the various patterns of imbalance. It describes some of the influences which may have brought them about and some of the consequences that may be expected if the imbalance persists. Four general types of imbalance are possible. In them something is lacking on each side: the diagrams on pages 60 and 61 combine the imbalances on the parent's side with the imbalances on the child's side to give the possible interaction patterns. In the second and fourth types of imbalance, parent and child are pulling against each other, so the likelihood of open

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friction is greater than in the first and third, where the imbalances are in the same direction. In the latter types, tension may be present but less obvious. In extreme cases where the parent may seem to give little of either care or respect, it is necessary to decide which is less; the child's feeling about the matter is the deciding factor. The four transition imbalances show a part missing from only one side of the interaction. Because we are seeing action pictures of a relationship, there is always a time dimension. Patterns of interaction shift from one to another, probably rather slowly. A relation may go along steadily, following one pattern of balance or imbalance, or it can shift back and forth through transition periods which are, by their very nature, temporary. These represent changes which began on either the parent's side or the child's side, and which the other may follow gradually. If the other does not follow, the originator will change again, and a different shift occurs. For instance, if an over-solicitous mother with a dependent child begins to give him room for independence, then either the child will start to show emergent behaviour, or the mother will give up too soon and start controlling again. The transition stages will be discussed along with the imbalances; they are set out separately in the diagrams for the sake of completeness. Their main use is to show that a relationship is changing. The Dependent Child: Imbalance 1 ['+'] In this form of imbalance the parent is providing care for the child without sufficiently respecting him. The care may be either kind and solicitous or bossy and nagging; in either case the child's living space is cramped and he is not learning to stand on his own feet. He makes no progress in emancipating himself. A mother may do too much for her child, or she may supervise his every move. In this unbalanced relationship the child's response is to go along with the excessive care in docile fashion, probably agreeable and conforming, certainly timid. Overwhelmed with attention, he may let his mother think and talk for him, or he may simply feel she will look after him, will always bail him out when he gets into difficulty. He finds some

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security in this relationship and may get so caught up in it that it becomes exceedingly difficult to break away. Such an imbalance could be traced right back to the days of infantile dependency: development has stopped there, either because his mother enjoyed that stage, or because she failed to recognize her child's potentialities. Such a relation cotild have arisen later because of a serious illness or physical disability which turned the child back from independent effort to reliance on his mother. She responded to his obvious need and held him dependent. Alternatively, a temporary need for more parental care, owing to difficult circumstances in the home or beyond, appears as a transition imbalance [."+"] if a mother keeps the way open for her child to stand on his own feet again. The source of a dependent imbalance may lie within the mother: she may be easing her own frustrations or loneliness by building her life around her child. She may be a timid person, embarrassed if her child steps out of line. Either way she stifles his emergence, gives him too little room. If many of these dependent imbalances appear after the preschool years, it would be a cause for concern. With an older child they are most apt to occur in only one or two areas, the most likely being personal care, family living, or money. A child's school life, or activities, or social life is less likely to be dominated or over-protected, though it can be. The very fact that a child's abilities are increasing and new challenges are presenting themselves encourages him to take steps on his own. It is almost easier to imagine a so-called adult who has never emancipated settling back into complete dependence on another person. A rapidly growing child will surely break out somewhere. When he begins to assert himself in a previously dependent area the interaction with his parent moves to a transition stage ["+!]. If his parent appreciates his efforts and shows respect for him, the interaction becomes balanced [.'+!]. If, instead, the parent tries harder than ever to hold him on a tight reign, he may fight for his freedom. As he resists and his parent tries to continue the old controls, the interaction moves to a new imbalance ["+.]. A parent can be the one to change the care-reliance imbalance ['+*] by offering the child more scope for his own efforts.

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The relationship moves to the transition stage [:+"] which appears like the temporary need for more care, described above. If the parent has the patience to let the child start slowly, the interaction will become balanced [I-K]. The Child Resists Dependence: Imbalance 2 ['+.] When a mother over-protects or dominates her child, two possible courses are open to him. He can accept dependence and make little effort, as shown in the dependence imbalance. Or he can resist parental control. We think of this as a common form of imbalance, perhaps because parents complain of it and the friction between parent and child is obvious. In this latter case the child feels it is a slur on his competence to be always told what to do. No matter whether the telling is kindly or stern, his confidence is hard put to grow in such a climate. If his parents cannot count on him, who will? Moreover, the restrictions they put around him, in so far as they are successful, cut down his opportunities to learn for himself, and thus that road to building confidence is closed. The impact on the child of being too rigidly controlled may affect him in a variety of ways. If he has too much done for him he may find being cared for more irksome than enjoyable, and may concentrate on avoiding the care. Or if his efforts only please when he does things exactly his mother's way, then they are hardly his own at all. His criterion of what is "his own" comes to be: doing the opposite of what he is told. This extreme form of rebellion may only crop up in certain places, but his mother may panic. She sees her child getting out of control and tries to curb his negativism, or peculiar behaviour, or wildness, or irresponsibility—whatever she calls it. Although, being a child, he still accepts some of her help, his resistance gives the relationship its dominant quality. A child in this unbalanced relationship may show his resistance quietly. He may simply avoid coming to his mother for help or advice because this represents a return to bondage; he may tell little about his affairs, take no chance on being told what to do. Such a child hates criticism; not only does he get too much of it, it aims to control him. For him criticism is not balanced by respect for himself and his efforts. A more secure

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child can accept criticism, even though he dislikes it and says so, because he knows his parents have faith in his good intentions. They are only commenting on some of his actions. When they are not undercutting him he is able to admit to himself that he does some stupid things. This imbalance, with parent and child pulling against each other, often centres around limits or their absence. Half the purpose of limits is to ensure freedom for the child, to prevent his feeling confined and stifled. Sometimes the limits themselves appear reasonable enough, but an over-anxious mother is unable to abide by them, and constantly infringes on the child's area. She is afraid of his mistakes, or she may be sure that mother always knows best. On the other hand she may be a parent who never even pretends to set limits, this may never have occurred to her, so she just tries to keep one jump ahead of her child, keep an eye on everything. Having set herself a hopeless task, it is small wonder she appears erratic. She is bound to pounce on some things and miss others—and do it differently the next time. It is hardly surprising that her child is never sure where he is at and feels his only hope is to resist, just as does the child with too rigid rules. Constant supervision and tight limits are both forms of excessive care, and when the child resists the imbalance goes this way [*+.]. Resisting authority may have an additional value for a child: it may be his bid for respect. When his mother is dictatorial, sets herself up as the final authority, he may try to undermine her in order to assert himself. He seeks her respect by proving her wrong. This method is like walking in quicksand—the more you struggle the tighter you are caught. Although a child may appear cocksure as he goes against his mother, underneath is the anxiety of going against the most potent authority he knows. He goes against his protector. He rejects his mother though he cannot be free of her. Parents can reject their child, or their child can reject them; in either case the bond between them grows tighter. The anxiety of mistrust comes to both the rejected and the rejecter. Tension mounts in this imbalance. The child appears to be "seeking independence," yet emancipation is not taking place.

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The interaction with his parent absorbs much of his energy. The future of this imbalance, if it is extensive, requires a planned change if it is to be interrupted and reversed. Put in its simplest terms, a parent must learn to decrease controls and increase respect—an assignment difficult to work out. The "Hidden" Imbalance: Imbalance 3 [.+.] This imbalance can be all on the side of ambition and high aspirations. On the surface it looks very good, and if it signified emancipation it would be. But this is a child who still needs care, although he has gone too far too fast. His false emergence is a response to his parent's expectations rather than a sign of his own readiness. He finds his goals in his mother's high hopes and he works to reach them. All his efforts may go into school work, while his parents smile and boast and lavish praise. Or he may shine as the responsible member of the family, looking after others, never needing help, never careless or stupid. From a parent's point of view he may be an admirable child—that is why I call this the hidden imbalance. The child may be under a real strain, yet if he is clever or competent he may maintain his position for a long time. All the while he is living up to an unrealistic picture of himself, afraid of mistakes, unwilling to ask for help. We recognize such children by their anxiety to succeed, their fear of showing any weakness, their refusal of help, and their denial that they need any. An over-reaching child is not always a high achiever; he may work diligently but below capacity because his goals are so high he is never at ease. This imbalance sometimes arises in a relationship with a good many balances, one in which the child has developed some confidence. Then somehow the situation gets out of hand. Undoubtedly a mother finds her child's achievements highly satisfactory, and as she encourages him to do well for himself she may go too far, expect too much [.+!]. What happens to the child is even clearer. His ability in a particular field brings such praise and recognition that his reputation here becomes a major feature of his picture of himself. And if, at the same time, care is underemphasized and immaturity seen as unacceptable,

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he may even feel that being loved depends on being successful or good [.+.]. A quite dissimilar attitude on the part of parents can produce the same type of imbalance. If they are neglectful of their child's continuing need for care, either througih disinterest or ignorance, he has perforce to do much for himself. The "permissiveness" that used to be advocated tended in this same dkection; it left so many decisions up to the child that it was equivalent to stressing self-reliance. (Demonstrations of "love" were expected to be the counterbalancing factor.) Whenever a child is forced or persuaded to grow too fast, care is denied. Leaving too many decisions for him to make also places a burden he is unready for. The typically "spoiled child" is a bit of a puzzle. His mother's over-indulgence lavishes care and attention, her side of the interaction looks like this [*H ]. Another look at the relationship may show that the child's every whim is catered to, that he decides what he should have or do, and his mother's side looks like this [H ]. Sometimes he demands care [ K], sometimes he insists on doing as he likes [ K]. Certainly these cannot be combined and called a balance. The answer seems to lie in taking smaller samples of parent-child interaction, as previously described. Then two imbalances show up: [.+'] and ["+.]. A confusing picture results—and the child's life is equally confusing. A single piece of advice will not help his mother straighten out this situation; one cannot, say, give him more love (care) or more freedom (fewer controls). To say give him more controls (care) and more freedom (respect) would come closer to a helpful answer. It could be the basis for a practical plan suited to the details of the situation. A simple score of [.+.] may indicate an over-indulgent parent or an over-ambitious parent, a rejecting parent or a neglectful parent. In every case it indicates a child trying to do without care. It points to what is deeply wrong with his situation. To remedy the deficiencies in the relationship it is necessary to go from this clue to a more comprehensive understanding of both parent and child. The imbalance score is only the beginning. If this hidden imbalance is not detected it may persist for a long time with the child apparently doing well, but I would predict that he will eventually change. His position is uncom-

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fortable, or even untenable. Either he will be unable to live up to his reputation, or to do so will be fraught with too much strain. Whichever direction the change takes, when it comes it will be a blow to his ego. This assumes, of course, that the area of the imbalance has, for various reasons, been important to him. When he finally fails or gives up he may relieve his sense of defeat with alibis; or he may go from caring too much to caring not at all about this particular area; or he may slip into the role of the complete failure who is never any good at anything. (Two children in our study, their excellent beginnings forgotten, claimed they had always hated school, never done well.) A child may save part of his success picture of himself by giving up other activities in order to concentrate in one direction, perhaps choosing one small part and being terribly good at it— a wizard at math or the hundred-yard dash. This more constructive way still places limits on self-growth. How does a mother react when she sees her once successful child begin to fail? Her response to his need for more reliance and less ambition can determine the future. She may see his trouble as discouragement or laziness and try to persuade him back to his old ways. The more she tells him how wonderful he can be if he only tries, the more discouraged he is by his present failures. He grows more tense and the gap widens between goal and accomplishment. If her ambition is in the saddle, then her pushing may become unbearable, and he may feel that he is not only a failure, but unloved on account of it. He may try, by whatever means come to hand, to gain her care and attention, and the imbalance takes a new form [.+"]. The neglected child may also give up his false emergence and seek reliance on his mother [.+"]. In either case the child's new plea for support may take many forms, anything from conformity to outlandish behaviour designed to force a parent to come to the rescue, to pay attention and at least worry about him. He can be a "problem child," or incompetent, or accident-prone; anything to ensure being looked after. A child who seeks reliance on an adult [.+'] is easier to deal with than the one who shuns dependence and tries to get along without it. He can be given what he needs, perhaps more care than is usual at his age, and be allowed to begin again to build

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self-confidence. Clinical practice with disturbed children does the same sort of thing when the child is encouraged to revert to infantile behaviour and start again. The difference here is a theoretical one: instead of seeing the child as needing to proceed through psycho-sexual stages in order to mature, we focus on his need for a secure reliance in order to emerge with confidence. A good reliance on an adult need never hold a child dependent; on the contrary it makes his personality growth possible. This belief in him is our respect. The Child Resists Independence: Imbalance 4 [.+'] In this form of imbalance the parent is like the ones described above. The mother expects too much—either a high level of performance or a high degree of independence—or she provides insufficient care for the child at this time. The child does not strive to measure up; he feels unprotected and pushed out before he is ready, so he seeks care instead of independence. In the "hidden imbalance" the child, for a time, suppressed his feelings of inadequacy and tried to measure up—he might later shift to this fourth type of imbalance. Too little care and too much pseudo-respect are opposite sides of the same coin. To distinguish between them may be a matter of adult sophistication; to a child they very likely feel the same. They can be manifested in a variety of ways, of which I shall only cite a couple of further examples: A mother may deplore immaturity and childish ways and urge on her child a self-control quite beyond him. Or she may talk to him in such a grown-up manner that his level of conversation far outstrips his experience. He displays a glib chatter and may, at the same time, find ways of clinging to dependence. The talk itself can become a way of keeping mother's attention: the compulsive talker has found his attention-getting device. Being non-verbal or just not learning are other good ways of ensuring lots of concern. A child's fiat refusal of independence is a direct way of seeking parental care, a way easier to recognize than are his evasions, his procrastinations, or his constantly changing his mind. Many kinds of behaviour can appear on both sides of this interaction, but a study of the pattern of interacting usually reveals what the child feels is missing.

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Possible sources of this imbalance on the parent's side have already been mentioned. That the child responds in this way instead of attempting to live up to expectations may be due to a generally resistant attitude built up in response to parental methods. Or he may show a general lack of confidence, or a special inability in a particular area. As to the future, if this imbalance only appears in one or two places, places not too important to either child or parent at the time, the pattern may be easily changed to one of balance. For instance, if a five-year-old is refusing to be as sociable as his mother would like, she may recognize that he needs more time, or she may learn to give him help that he can use at his present stage. If her confidence in him takes the form of letting him choose his own social goals he can begin to move ahead— in his own time. The longer this imbalance goes on the more difficult it is to change it. The child is building no self-confidence through his own efforts, and he is soaking up his mother's feeling that he fails to come up to expectations. Imbalances only point up trouble spots. To comprehend what a child is missing requires a thorough investigation of the total situation. Overt behaviour never has a specific meaning, it means different things according to the purpose it serves and the results it achieves. Also, a child can use a particular kind of behaviour to achieve several different purposes simultaneously. When he resists parental dictates he may be avoiding independent effort, he may be getting at least some form of the care he wants, and he may be getting a spurious respect as the great "resister." To understand an imbalance it is wise to take into account all the reasons served by a child's behaviour. A single reason is seldom adequate, and often misleading. Single or scattered imbalances of the types described here are usually less serious than I have made them sound and should be considered as warning signals. When there are many imbalances, or even many in one area, then the process of emancipation is considered to be seriously impeded. This aspect of imbalance is discussed further in the next chapter.

13. Observations and Conclusions

MY CONCERN has been with the individual child, with the recognition and appraisal of his growing strengths, with the whole person he is becoming. Since we have, as yet, no way of encompassing all that he is,* all of his uniqueness, I have had to be content with a partial view, but a partial view which is still large enough to show a child functioning as a whole person in one major relationship of his life—that with his mother. Unlike any other, this is a relationship to be outgrown; ideally it sets a child free to become himself beyond the parental purview. Still, he carries with him his mother's influence as the basis of all his future growing. I am convinced that a long slow starvation in his relationship with his mother would be far more damaging than brief traumatic experiences. Maslow (16) calls neurosis a "deficiency disease." Certain tentative conclusions about the way a child becomes emancipated from dependence on his parents seem to make good psychological sense. They provide a starting place for further research. For our present use, observation of the long challenge of growing up, with its successes and failures, brings a number of valuable insights. First let us be clear about the end result of the emancipation '"Longitudinal studies now make use of computers to store and combine available information about individual children. When salient information is available about the same children over a period of years, then a new kind of total picture will emerge—a picture which will show individual patterns of development and the influences thereon. It is hoped that the child's relationship with his parent, as I have presented it here, can take its place as one among the many influences on the complex growing child.

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process. When I speak of the emancipated child I do not mean that he and his parent must become strangers to one another; I mean only that their early roles are to be outgrown and discarded. One would hope that they would have an abiding concern for each other. Emancipated children can associate freely with the family on the basis of a shared past and shared interests. A family of adults can still be a warm and supportive group if the integrity of each individual is respected and never threatened. The poorly emancipated child is the one who cannot come home again to parents who do not respect him. The way a child becomes emancipated seems to be this: as he gains in competence and confidence he takes whole portions of his life into his own hands. In early days the portions may be small: feeding himself, walking to school alone. As he takes over one part, another part comes into the centre of his interaction with his parents. For instance, doing homework may be entirely up to him, yet in his school life generally his relationships may still be childish. Parents pay the bills and they decide on the schools he attends. As he gets older they consult his wishes where possible, and he continues to emerge but is still unemancipated. Choosing courses of study may be his next level of decision-making, and when he takes over this responsibility another portion of his school life is said to be emancipated. Emancipation in any one portion comes when a child is able to drop his reliance on his parents because he has confidence in his own abilities, or because he has shifted some reliance to friends or to "authorities" of his own choosing. If parents do not clearly recognize these areas of emancipation, they may retract the freedom the child has come to expect; then they have a rebel on their hands. When we look at a child who is becoming emancipated, he always appears to be something of a contradiction. He is both a conformist and a nonconformist; he likes to learn from his parents and he likes to find out for himself. This does not mean that he is all mixed up—he is very much all of a piece, this emergent-reliant child. The child with the unbalanced relationship to his parents is the confused one, tied to them by his unsatisfied needs and by his deficiencies. Even a child struggling

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to be free is caught in a web of friction and bad feeling which stands in the way of his self-reliance. When the essentials of trust are lacking, his relationship with his parents may very well increase in intensity. Hostility as well as dependence can bind these people together. Not only is a relationship based on trust a smoother, more harmonious one through the years, but the outcome for the child is a truer independence. Ends achieved by his own efforts have a special quality for him, and decisions based on his own figuring bring him confidence. Through his own patterns of coping with life he becomes an individual. While his smoothflowing life story may intrigue us less than some others, he is likely to be a more fascinating person than the one with all the problems. If we have eyes to see, the success story can intrigue us too; it is the story of problems overcome by the child, with appropriate assistance from his parents. I doubt that there could ever be a story without unbalanced interactions and some failure of trust from time to time. No parent is perfect and children grow and change. Success comes through recognizing and filling in the lacks, through re-establishing trust. All the parents in our study did this to a greater or lesser degree. And all the children worked through difficulties, but none found rebellion a satisfactory road to freedom. The rate of a child's emancipation varies from one field of his life to another. This is a matter of common observation. Certainly his own competence is a factor, but it seems likely that parental attitudes and reciprocal trust play even bigger parts. Variation between fields is more noticeable as a child grows older and branches out in many directions. The possibilities increase for a difference of opinion about how much independence is desirable. Parents can be quite surprised by some of the directions their child is taking; the child, on his side, may find himself suddenly blocked in one field and given the go-ahead in others. His progress can be looked at in two ways: what is happening in single fields, and how his life fields influence each other in the total relationship. A troubled, unbalanced area can remain an isolated difficulty. There was Ivan, whose mother raised a tremendous fuss during

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his early teens over his dirty, untidy appearance. He evaded and ignored her. She respected him in other areas, the ones that were important to him, so these things went smoothly, and the overall relationship was a trusting one. On the other hand, a difficulty can spread until it colours the whole relationship between parents and child, as witness Celia's school failure. Fields can influence each other in another way. Strong fields can carry a weak one. Bert's social inadequacies were less disturbing to him because of his strengths in the family and vocational areas. His overall confidence grew, and as a young adult he tackled the social side of life in a positive way. Such factors as these raise big questions. Can we learn to predict whether a particular child has enough strengths in enough areas to help him over the difficult spots? In other words, can we evaluate his relative strengths and weaknesses? Also, to what extent is it healthy to concentrate on one field while ignoring another? The overly-social and the wholly academic child are everyday examples of one-sided development. Viewing a child's life as composed of several distinct spheres of activity can guide us in keeping our treatment of him in a context that is meaningful to him. I suggest that to help a child, a parent should treat his difficulty in the context in which it occurs. I have used the example of Amy's mother, who refused to give the help Amy asked for in dressing, and instead gave her a special time for stories and games. This was nice, but it did not reassure Amy that she could count on help when she felt anxious and insecure. It did not satisfy the need where it was felt. This is no plea for helping every time a child asks, but in Amy's case her anxiety was clear. Her mother attributed the trouble to the arrival of the new baby, but she did not mend the situation where it was breaking down. She shared the common fear that a child given extra help will always want it. Fletcher (10) presents convincing evidence that this is not the case. For one thing the child will get bored and want a change; as long as the way is left open he will want to grow again. Irrelevant punishments—deprivations in one area for faults in another—interfere with trust. For instance, Eve had her allowance docked for rudeness. The rudeness was to her parents

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and had nothing to do with money; in that direction she knew she was trusted. The use of this weapon in the area of family living was an act of outright domination, a lack of respect which Eve bitterly resented. In every field a child needs more than one kind of care. I have described his need for a parent who is a caretaker, a decisionmaker, a setter of limits, a standby helper, and a teacher. And for every kind of care there is a corresponding respect for his right to do his own growing. These phases, or levels, of the trust relationship are to some extent artificial divisions; in daily life they intermingle and overlap. Yet in practice it is possible to assess them separately, giving a more exact picture of trust in action, and showing whether all parts are present, or which ones are missing. It is useful to know what is missing because different deficiencies have different effects on a child. Lack of limits is one thing; lack of help is another, though both help and limits are included in parental care. Frank was a child who had plenty of help and affection but no consistent limits. He tried to establish his own limits—first by fighting the world and later by withdrawing from it. The whole matter of variations of trust within a single area needs further study, but a first step is the recognition of the variations. In the matter of predicting a child's future development on the basis of his present interactions with his parents, it is of considerable interest that several of our small number of cases changed course rather dramatically. Reciprocal trust, as indicated by a large number of balances, could decrease; or trust could grow. It could be lost or it could be regained. And certainly what had happened in the child's early life could not support the full weight of the whole later structure. Even a good beginning could run into trouble if trust was not fostered and maintained. Going beyond specific causes, we find some general factors that play a part in the growth or maintenance of trust. A mother's attitude to a child's increasing maturity could work in one of two ways. Eve's and Celia's mothers had both enjoyed their little girls, but they found their teenagers considerably less satisfactory. Individuality and self-direction no longer seemed

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so admirable, and conformity would have been welcomed. So the parents changed their methods and curtailed the previous freedoms, with the result that the girls began to resent every hint or sign of being dominated. They became antagonistic and unco-operative and thus lowered their parents' confidence in them still further. The children, on their side, were upset by the sudden lack of parental respect. It made them feel insecure, but they refused to give in. Instead they tried to show even more independence, and thus further increased their own uneasiness. Lack of trust was reinforced on both sides of the interaction. Amy's relationship with her mother also changed in late childhood, but in her case the change was toward more trust, more balanced areas. Her mother, who truly valued independence and self-reliance, found it easier to see that an older child was moving in that direction. Once she was sure Amy was really growing up, she seemed to relax. She could appreciate the child's difficulties, and help her instead of always urging independence. One feels that the mother had grown too. Her preoccupation with problems gave way to optimism, she no longer worried guiltily for fear of doing the wrong thing. Perhaps she was one of the people who are confused or a bit frightened by very young children, or perhaps outside worries had piled up. In any case her increasing trust was a major influence on Amy's development. Full trust came late, but it came, and with it came Amy's emancipation. A parent's attitude toward a child's growing up is only one influence among many, but it seems to be one around which others cluster. It seems likely that it is at the root of some socalled adolescent problems because it comes to the fore in adolescence. It is also interesting that in the few cases described here such a change in attitude affected the girls and not the boys. Parental "values" constitute another general factor which can be either a source of difficulty or a support to the child's effort to find himself. All the parents in this study wanted, in a general way, the same kind of things for their children, but when it came down to cases they showed considerable variation in the value they placed on their goals. Tidiness or a good appearance

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could go right to the top of the list. Celia suddenly found that originality and independence were to be subordinated to academic success. Garry found the parental goal of being an assertive go-getter quite beyond him, and yet he took over this ideal. In doing so he accentuated the gap between what he was and what he thought he should be. Bert's parents wanted a student and rather scorned athletics, so he found himself in a highly congenial atmosphere, one which supported him on a road he could travel successfully. The twins were given an impossible task—to behave one way at home and another way outside. Although I have not included the life stories of Daisy and Ivan, both of them found that though their parents had definite ideas, the ideas were sufficiently liberal to allow much freedom of choice. Their parents made their trust quite clear, and they showed in both word and deed that they valued individuality. Frank's mother admired him, which is part of trust, but she admired indiscriminately, rather than on the basis of a steady set of values. She confused him further by continually finding something new that he must be or do. Finally Frank protected himself from her shifting values by refusing nearly everything. Every child probably needs some clearly stated values to steer by. To be clear to a child, values need to be sufficiently longrange that they need not constantly change. Or sometimes a child is given two very different sets of values to choose from: the ones his parents preach and the ones they practise. Such confusion can be avoided if parents give the matter some thought, and are honest enough to admit their own failures. If parental values are narrow and rigid, if only one kind of person is a good kind of person, then a child only feels free when he happens to fit the ideal easily. When rigid values are not congenial, then instead of trust there is coercion—either subtle or overt. A child may rebel, or, feeling defeated, he may look for a second-best road to family acceptance or respect. Perhaps this is what Harris did. When he could not be assertive outside the home he became a pleasant helpful fellow around the house. Best and safest for the child, in my opinion, is a broad and liberal value system which can approve and respect him for

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what he is, and for what he will become. This is belief in individuality and faith in the child, faith that he will find "individuality" in constructive ways, not by riding roughshod over others—unless we teach him to do so. The influence of siblings on each other seems to go far beyond rivalry for parental affection. The term "sibling rivalry" may obscure more than it explains. In all of our cases we knew a good deal about the siblings, and an analysis of the children's relationships through the years showed up their tendency to differ (6, 7). "Differing" here does not mean "disagreeing," though they did that too; it means being different kinds of people. They developed in different directions, followed different interests. When children are the same sex and close in age they lack these obvious sources of distinction and look for other ways of differing. A detailed study of these children and their siblings suggests that each one tends to view himself in relation to his sister or brother, to use the other as a gauge of his own uniqueness, as an aid to his own self-definition. At first, watching brothers and sisters grow up, it seemed as if some were deliberately avoiding rivalry and competition by striving in divergent directions. But then, looking deeper than the activities or interests, one sees that the real differing is in personality and character type. How often one hears, in the clinic or in casual conversation, "But his brother is so different!" The young child who hero-worships an older brother may seem to disprove my contention. However, he imitates superficial characteristics which are easily over-estimated, rather than a basic personality type. The real difference between such a pair is age, which leaves the younger free to develop his own style, and imitate his hero at the same time. We expect children to be different without questioning the meaning "difference" has for them. I suspect their difference seldom results wholly from circumstances, either inherited or environmental. Children work at it—being different is necessary to each one; all along the way they separate self from other. It seems as if each is constantly checking up, using the other occupants of his small family world to assess himself. "My brother and I are alike, and yet we are different. Being alike is

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reassuring, but being different makes me somebody. Many of the remarks made to my brother have a reverse implication for me—if my brother is called generous, does that mean that I am selfish? If my brother is unco-operative does that imply that I am helpful?" Each child compares the treatment he receives with that accorded to his brother. His picture of himself builds up bit by bit, and is made of more complex parts than adult praise for what adults want to encourage and punishment for what they dislike. A child learns what he is like by the way people respond to him—and to his brother. His brother or sister is a continuing influence year after year. It is commonplace in clinics that as one child in a family improves, his sibling may begin to run into difficulty. We say the balance within the family has been upset. Perhaps we should also realize that the sibling is having to alter his image of himself as his brother changes. Sibling influence and the ways it is mediated through the parents is a whole study in itself. Here I have only touched the surface, as my main concern is with its effect on emancipation —an effect which is seldom negligible. A child can influence the rate or the direction of his brother's emancipation. Sometimes we see a brother and sister helping each other define their sex roles; sometimes children help each other go the different ways suitable to each; sometimes an older child is helped by a younger to see himself as growing up, competent. Another child compensates for his feelings of inadequacy by over-stressing differentness for its own sake. One child is gay and venturesome because a brother can be counted on to apply the brakes: each thus contributes to a partnership. The examples are endless; a number have been discussed in detail in the stories. Sibling influence aids or blocks emancipation through its direct effect on the child's sense of self, something closely tied up with his self-confidence. Thus we can never really isolate a simple onechild-to-one-parent relationship; we must take into account the whole complex of two parents and several children. It has simplified our problem to deal with one child and one parent, but the result is a lopsided picture. I am assuming that the father-child relationship has the same basic trust components

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as the mother-child relationship, and that what we are learning applies to both. Eventually we may be able to put the whole family together and learn more about the ways parents can share in bringing up their children. Perhaps the much advocated practice of "stand-together-and-present-a-united-front" serves only to draw a battle line between parents and children. Perhaps the two parents would do better to assume their roles in different fields of the child's life. Relating to one parent at a time may be easier for a child, just as a one-to-one relationship is easier than a threesome. When two parents are involved, then the "limiting" aspect of care is probably crucial. Rules and limits are a compromise agreement for living together, and clearly defined areas of decision make clear to the child where his areas of freedom lie. Both his autonomy and his secure reliance on his parents depend on how well and consistently such arrangements are worked out. Finally, each parent establishes his own personal trust relationship with his child. All care from his mother and all respect from his father would hardly combine to give a child a sense of reciprocal trust with his two adults. Finally we come back to the conviction that the child belongs to himself. His parents only have him "on trust," with the privilege of caring for him and of discharging their trust by freeing him. Parent and child participate together in this freeing process which I have called emancipation, and which I take to be one necessary foundation for mental health. By mental health I mean continuing growth, a life with zest and enthusiasm, and inner serenity. To promote this ideal requires a deeper understanding than we now have of the lively, intense maze of a child's relationship with his parents. The purpose of the behavioural definition of reciprocal trust is to make a start at untangling this ongoing process as it involves two people. The long-range goal is to discover and learn to recognize dynamic general principles which will never merely label or classify. Our concern must be with the growth of individuality. My contention has been that individuality and emancipation are inseparable, and that one source from which they spring is a trusting parent-child relationship. There are other sources: sibling relationships have been mentioned, but the influence of

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contemporaries, of schools, of recreations has not been touched on at all. Further investigations of the subject will need to take simultaneous account of the influences we now study one by one. In preparation, we proceed as methodically and honestly as possible to refine our methods of judging parent-child behaviour. This examination of reciprocal trust is one step in that process, and it reaches some conclusions that I believe are important: that growth is continually shaped by active, changing forces, that the relationship which fosters growth is a twosided one, and that as a child's hopes and capacities alter, parental response too must alter, to preserve the balance of the relationship and to increase its freedom.

References

1. AINSWORTH, MARY D. "Patterns of Attachment Behavior Shown by the Infant in Interaction with His Mother." Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, vol. 10, no. 1, January 1964. 2. ALLPORT, GORDON W. Becoming: Basic Considerations for a Psychology of Personality. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955 (Yale Paperbound, 1960). 3. BLATZ, WILLIAM E. Understanding the Young Child. Toronto: Clarke, Irwin, 1944. 4. Human Security. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1966. 5. BRONFENBRENNER, URIE. "Toward a Theoretical Model for the Analysis of Parent-Child Relationships in a Social Context." Parent Attitudes and Child Behavior, John C. Glidewell, ed. Springfield, 111.: Charles C. Thomas, 1961. 6. DAVIS, CARROLL, & NORTHWAY, MARY L. "Siblings: Rivalry or Relationship." Bulletin of the Institute of Child Study, no. 74, September 1957. 7. DAVIS, CARROLL. "Quarrelling Can Help Your Child." Chatelaine, March 1959. 8. ELLENBERGER, HENRY F. "A Clinical Introduction to Psychological Phenomenology and Existential Analysis." Existence: A New Dimension in Psychiatry and Psychology, Rollo May, ed. New York: Basic Books, 1958. 9. ERIKSON, ERIK H. Identity and the Life Cycle. Psychological Issues, vol. 1, no. 1. New York: International University Press, 1959. 10. FLETCHER, MARGARET L. The Adult and the Nursery School Child. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1958. 11. FLINT, BETTY M. The Security of Infants. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1950. 12. The Child and The Institution. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1966. 13. Institute of Child Study (Staff). Twenty-five Years of Child Study. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1951.

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14. JAHODA, MARIE. "Toward a Psychology of Mental Health." Symposium on the Healthy Personality, M. J. E. Senn, ed. New York: Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation, 1950. 15. KAGAN, JEROME, & Moss, HOWARD A. Birth to Maturity. Salt Lake City: J. Wiley, 1962. 16. MASLOW, A. H. Toward a Psychology of Being. New York: D. Van Nostrand Co. (Insight Book), 1958. 17. MILLIGRAM?, DOROTHY A. "The Child and His Adults." Bulletin of Institute of Child Study, no. 75, December 1957. 18. SCHACTEL, ERNEST G. Metamorphosis: New Light on the Conflict of Human Development and the Psychology of Creativity. New York: Basic Books, 1959. 19. SCHAEFFER, EARL S. "Converging Conceptual Models for Maternal Behavior and for Child Behavior." Parent Attitudes and Child Behavior, John C. Glidewell, ed. Springfield, 111.: Charles C. Thomas, 1961.