I'm going to back up and try not to write the all-encompassing review article that was becoming too big for me and probably too boring for you. Let's consider another one of the most influential scholars in the field of temperament studies and talk a little about her classification system. It's quite different from the last ones we talked about. This work is by Mary Rothbart at the University of Oregon and I think her work is important to consider in the discussion of how
temperament can effect how we sleep train or whether we do so at all. Rothbart thinks about temperament on 2 broad dimensions: the degree of REACTIVITY (in other words, how quickly and intensely does a child react to certain challenges in her environment) and SELF-REGULATION (how quickly and easily does a child control her biological arousal levels and emotions when they're too distressing for her or others).
The extent to which your child is high or low on the REACTIVE dimension is thought to be largely biologically based — it's there at birth and you can see differences in reactivity in newborns. I certainly did with my boys, born 5 min apart. From day 1, if you clapped your hands or something dropped to the floor loudly, one wouldn't even notice, the other would flinch or downright freak out. There's nothing in those styles that I, as a parent, had anything to do with.
But SELF-REGULATION is thought to be more of a developmental acquisition; self-regulation or emotion-regulation skills develop over infancy, toddlerhood and early childhood. And one of the main things that is believed to be a huge part of self-regulation is ATTENTIONAL CONTROL (also called "effortful control"). What do I mean by attentional control? The ability to pay attention to certain aspects of your environment and ignore others; the ability to sustain attention when necessary (like when you need to keep working on a boring problem to solve it); and the ability to shift your attention, especially when frustrated (DUDE the MELTDOWNS we're getting in our house over
crashing leggo constructions that won't fit back together JUST SO is such a great example of this. JUST. BUILD. ANOTHER. BRIDGE! Hmmmm…
maybe I'll film it as a learning tool for the internet). Shifting attention and the control of that shifting is so crucial because the things we choose to attend to can either amplify or dampen our emotional experience (and there's fabulous neuroscientific evidence for the way that our attention amplifies or softens our emotional responses). As any experienced parent knows, it takes time for children to learn how to control what they will attend to or not, what they'll freak out about or not, how they will respond to an emotional challenge, and so on. And I think (along with many developmentalists) that these regulation skills are among the most critical "habits of mind" that parents (and teachers) can teach their children. We may not be able to do much about how these babies pop out of us in terms of their reactivity or sensitivity to new, challenging or threatening situations, but we CAN help our children learn to deal with the emotions that accompany these challenges.
If you'd like a more thorough review of the temperament literature and a good summary of some of the brain research that's starting to emerge in our field, check out this fairly accessible article in Pediatrics. It's by Nathan Fox, one of the most well-respected developmental neuroscientists. He's interested in emotional development and children's capacities to regulate their emotions. The article summarizes how researchers generally think about the biological
bases of temperament (and you can access the full article with that
link, btw). The paper is nice because he goes through a bit of a
review of how the original researchers (Thomas and Chess) came up with
their categories and then moves on to other considerations, including
Rothbart's research. He reviews what I have very quickly summarized here: that kids come into the world with
certain propensities to feel emotions either relatively mildly or
intensely (so those initial set points are relatively "inate").
However, the skill of REGULATING these emotions has a whole lot
to do with parenting practices and other "socialization" experiences
(like interactions with teachers and peers). But the article actually refers to studies and data that are too extensive for me to list here.
So… what do you think? Does this way of thinking about children's temperaments or personalities on more emotional dimensions jive with you better than the previous approach, based more on how kids behave? What's your child like? And if you're past MY children's stage of 3.5 crazies, I trust that you will tell me that my previously charming and sweet little boys will indeed learn how to control the OVER-THE-TOP weeping and wailing and HORROR when their blocks fall, they don't get a second ice cream cone, or, dare I say it, THEY. MUST. GO. TO. BED. NOW.
Sleeping issues specifically covered in next post. I promise. But please feel free to think aloud with all of us about how your child's temperament is effecting his sleep… and yours.
Well, you’ve met Frances–she’s very mellow, easy-going, almost unflappable. She is very sensitive/reactive, but my guess is that on self-regulation she’s off the charts.
I can’t help but compare this to the adult temperament/personality stuff, and wonder how “reactive” compares to the “extraverted/neurotic/agreeable” dimensions of the Big Five for big people. The idea being that extraverted captures how intensely you feel positive emotions, and neurotic captures how intensely you feel negative emotions–the two are not necessarily correlated. (And agreeable captures what you do with those emotions around other people.) When I look at Frances I don’t necessarily see someone who’s reactive or not reactive; I see someone who is prone to certain emotions and not prone to others. She has only just started getting angry sometimes this summer, and it’s still very mild. (She stamps her foot! It’s cute!) She doesn’t register rejection the way I would. At the same time, she reacts very strongly, very intensely, if someone she cares about is upset with her.
I know that when you’re looking at infants, the classification system necessarily is less fine-grained, but now that I’m looking at an older kid I see some of these distinctions and wonder how important they were.
My 22 month old son is very reactive, both negatively and positively. He is not shy or fearful, but either likes or dislikes a situation strongly. I like the description in the “Raising a Spirited Child” book that he has a hard time calming his body, and especially before sleep. Once calmed, he goes to sleep like a snap, but he wiggles and squirms until he gets there. This is not unlike the way my husband is. I definitely think the temperament that he shows while awake affects the sleep and getting to sleep. I like to read about regulation of reaction techniques. I know I myself need them as an adult
This post really resonated with me more than the previous description of temperament. I find myself actively trying to teach my 23 month old daughter how to deal with strong emotions. She is very reactive and certainly seems to lack self-regulation skills. I have a trick when she’s freaking out to ask her “Where’s Mama?” and “Where’s E?” repeatedly till she points to myself and herself, which seems to redirect her attention and help her get out of what sometimes seems like an emotional short-circuit or feedback loop. (ahem. screaming, maybe?)I think I started this as an unconscious reflection of my own years of undergoing cognitive behavioral therapy to treat depression and anxiety. I wonder now if the relative “reactivity” of a child is somehow connected to the wide range of experiences parents describe regarding teething-related symptoms and discomfort.
My personal experience with CBT also leads me to think about sleep training as teaching. I am trying to teach E how to calm herself down and go to sleep by telling her to close her eyes, be still, don’t play with the Teddy, etc. She does not get upset about me leaving the room or moving away from her per se…she is more upset that she is tired and she doesn’t know how to go to sleep without me. Sometimes she doesn’t know how to go to sleep WITH me, which is problematic. But, reading this, it makes me think that I might be on the right track. She has trouble self-regulating, AND she’s highly reactive. She needs to learn how to redirect her attention to the task at hand–falling asleep. Well, that’s my theory tonight, anyway. We’ll see what I think about that in the morning.
ok, I just put down my son at night, thinking about what I said in my comment. I had forgone the rocking in the rocking chair I used to do when I put him down in a crib. He would usually point to the bed, and I just thought he was done with rocking. Well tonight, he let me rock him and the whole process was so much smoother and nicer and quicker. His body calmed really nicely when I rocked him and he was just easier. May be just a fluke, but I’ll try it again tomorrow.
My son is only 14 months old, but he definitely has strong emotions. He has always been very active too, even at only a few weeks old. He will only rarely fall asleep in the car or in his stroller. People don’t understand that or think that it’s something that I caused by “spoiling” him, but after numerous times of trying to get him to sleep in the stroller, with him crying, I gave up. I’m not sure how this links in with his temperament though. He usually has a very sunny disposition – until he’s hungry or sleepy or gets frustrated – then all *&% breaks loose.
Hmmm… this idea of the self-regulation dimension of temperament is new to me, and I’m just not sure if I agree if it develops steadily throughout infancy/childhood.
After a noisy infancy (!), at about 15mths my DD became a dream to live with – she seemed to show a lot of self-regulation (ie kissing herself better when she fell over etc). At about 27mths, the frustration tantrums and general meltdowns started and seemed to have got gradually worse. Now, almost 3yo, she seems to be gaining control again. So on her graph, the progress line is more like a mountain range (up and down)
The funny thing is that since the first 4months, she has always been a good sleeper – minimum fuss at bedtime, and no problems overnight unless she is sick.
My 5yo DS on the other hand, is definitely on the low side with self-regulation. This inability to control himself (especially physically) makes me REALLY frustrated on a daily basis. However like DD, he is a brilliant sleeper.
I’m interested in your comments
Great post!
I prefer the reactivity/self-regulation classification as it was difficult to ‘label’ my daughter with the easy/difficult/slow to warm up classification (although a sinch for my son)
Under ‘normal’ circumstances ( not tired or hungry, or in a fussy or transition period) both my kids are fairly low on the reactivity scale. They don’t really react negatively to new scenarios. However my son (4.5)is much better at self regulating than my daughter (2.5). And always has been, even when tired/hungry/fussy etc. He may get angry/fearful/frustrated momentarily, but calms down immediately.
My daughter is not a ‘spirited’ child, but her reactions are stronger and last longer and generally she needs ME to comfort and help her calm down, whereas my son, can calm himself down.
Needless to say, my son has always been an excellent sleeper, and my daughter(although not the worst sleeper in the world) ain’t that great.
BTW, the block towers do in my son every.single. time. they fall. He wails for a moment. Then goes back and rebuilds (although using the same architectual techniques that are doomed to collapse a second and third time).
Wow! Really thoughtful comments.
@Andrea:I love your brain, you know that? Interestingly, there is SO very little that takes a developmental approach to the Big Five. Indeed, extroversion and neuroticism are NOT correlated (none of the 5 dimensions are, that’s why they think of them as distinct personality factors). I think along these lines (similar to what you mention) — these little being come into the world as relatively diffuse, undifferentiated organisms with certain biologically-based arousal levels as “set points”. Then, through experience with the world, these basic propensities (like how easily they’re over-aroused, how much they like novelty, how much stimulation they need to feel engaged, etc.) get molded into particular styles of reacting and processing information in the world. And here’s where your ideas, I think, are bang-on with where I usually come from (and a few other emotional developmentalists): these styles are organized around BASIC EMOTIONS (usually anger, sadness, fear, joy, interest, and sometimes shame and guilt are thrown in the mix). According to this type of personality development approach, people tend to react to the world in such a way that one or two main emotions are triggered (these emotions, of course, both activate and are activated by, compatible interpretations of the world — so, anger if a whole lot seems to be blocking your goals, sadness if you experience a whole lot of loss around you, etc.) It gets much more complicated, of course, because once we have some of these basic emotion styles in place, they dictate the KIND of information we perceive in the world and how we attend to that info… OK, I’ll stop. I’m rambling and this could be a post in itself (if it was written better). But yeah, I think you’re absolutely right that by about 5 is when I’d start thinking less about temperament dimensions and more about personality styles that are dominated by one or two main emotions (which doesn’t mean one doesn’t feel the range of them, but just that there are some that dominate). Even now, at 3.5, one of my kids is MUCH more anxiety-prone and the other MUCH more anger-prone. But both are learning to cope with shame, given that this age ushers in a whole new cognitive ability to appreciate social relations… and how painful they can really be. Which leads me to Penny’s comment…
@Penny: You’re dead right, I don’t think that the ability to regulate effectively develops in a continuous fashion over time. It is EXACTLY as you say — more like a mountain range. The reason I’m so obsessed with these developmental transition periods in terms of sleep training is precisely what you describe: kids don’t just get better and better at regulating, at transition periods, they melt down and seem completely unable to cope anymore with their emotions. At 9 months, the infant suddenly can’t sit alone without being overwhelmed by separation anxiety (whereas at 6 months, he was doing just fine when left alone for a little while); at 14 months, most kids are happy to toddle around without much intervention and when they fall, they get right back up and try again, but these same kids at 18 months will dissolve into a pool of despairing tears when they fall. I think it’s because at these transition periods, kids are learning to deal with a whole new set of interpretations of the world (i.e., cognitive development) around them and they come on suddenly and are accompanied by a whole lot of intense anxiety that requires a whole new arsenal of coping/regulation skills. It’s not that they’ve made NO progress in how well they can regulate (although it’s hard to remember sometimes) — they’re not balling their eyes out anymore when they need to burp or when they’re hungry or thirsty — they HAVE learned how to regulate those distress levels by asking for food, waiting patiently to be given milk, distracting themselves with a toy. But at each stage transition, they’re given another whole set of cognitive abilities that challenge their emotion-regulation capabilities.
@Shelby: Yes, I like that book’s description of the physiological arousal some kids find overwhelming. We so often forget how much these little bodies are going through and how much our bodies in general are the vessel of our emotions — for all of us. We emphasize the brain so much that sometimes we forget that it’s attached to this big, buzzing thing underneath it that sometimes wants us to shut up and just give it a nice massage, a warm bath, a rock and cuddle.
@Mary: Many of us, even adults, are grumpy when sleepy, frustrated or hungry (which would explain my crankiness right now… must eat lunch.)
@Paola: I wonder if it’s your daughter’s age (2.5; definitely a rough transition for emotionality) that makes her less able to self-soothe or if it’s really a budding personality difference between your kids. I have to say that I SUCK at predicting how my kids will go through transitions. It’s incredible to me how I can have all this theoretical background, and I DO understand stuff in hindsight I think, but in terms of actually predicting… not so good. I was convinced that my more anxiety-prone boy would have a hell of a time during this 3.5 year old shift and he’s doing totally fine (except he can’t fall asleep easily now, but he’s not ornery about it). My other little boy who rarely stopped smiling, rarely cried, almost never got frustrated? HE’S lost his mind in the last month. 3 or 4 meltdowns/day. Go figure… So, I guess my point is I wonder if you’ll see any changes in your daughter’s personality in a year or so. Obviously, I don’t have a CLUE, but these changes are fascinating.
I am really enjoying reading your blog and this stuff about temperament is very interesting. I do find it difficult to determine where exactly my child fits (isn’t there a Facebook quiz that could tell me exactly what she is???).
My daughter turns 1 next week and has been enjoying cosleeping and nursing ad nauseum. I am pretty cool with it (except she’s getting kinda big), but my husband is ready to ship her out to her own bed.
I am back to work in September and she will be in daycare 3 days/week. I’ve decided, after reading your book and blog, to get through this transition, give her a few weeks to settle in & then commence “sleep training” (funny how the term bothers me…).
My daughter is an intense being. She is very sociable and adapts well to new situations…mostly, as long as I’m nearby. She is easily frustrated by her inability to do things, like lift really heavy objects, but calms easily with minimal intervention. The few times I have left her to cry a bit (when I was beyond frustrated), she has been relentless – getting herself into a hysterical state.
So, what does this make her temperament-wise??? I guess the point is that it’s not so clear cut.
My real question is when considering sleep-training methods, what is the general rule of thumb? Is it wiser to go the gentle route with a more intense, more reactive kid or should we fight fire with fire and let her wear herself out with a good round of freaking out??
I know you’re unlikely to endorse any particular method but it would be interesting to hear yours and other’s thoughts.
Thanks for the fascinating discussion.
@Yona: I’m working on the next post that hopefully will address exactly your last question about how we should consider temperament issues when we’re planning to sleep train. There’s really no rule of thumb, but I do have some thoughts (that don’t go beyond much of what we put in the book, so if you’ve already read that, I’m not going much beyond that discussion since there’s no real research on this topic. But I’m hoping to open it up enough for others to join in with their experiences).
Oh, and yeah, I’m not fond of the term “sleep training” either, but we couldn’t think of a better all-encompassing term. I had a few words to say about it when I first started the blog:
http://bedtiming.typepad.com/bed-timing/2009/04/i-hate-the-term-sleep-training-too.html
Just re-read your post and had to laugh at the last bit : “I trust that you will tell me that my previously charming and sweet little boys will indeed learn how to control the OVER-THE-TOP weeping and wailing and HORROR when their blocks fall, they don’t get a second ice cream cone, or, dare I say it, THEY. MUST. GO. TO. BED. NOW”
My 5yo DS has learned some self-control in your scenarios but… now he is into bumping his sister in the bath and pulling her hair when she fails to comply with his demands. Still has a way to go
Isabela, I am loving this little series. I’ve been reading it and looking at it from both a parent’s perspective and a teacher’s perspective. I have seen in my classes, my nieces and my daughter that there are extremes to every end, and there are moderate temperances in between. My daughter is quite reactive, but this could be part of her difficult age. As she gets older–especially just in the past couple of weeks–she has been calmer (though still reactive to me leaving), has been playing more independently, and has not been crying as long (it’s more self-regulating than usual, but she does cry easily). In other words, because of her developmental stage at this point in time, she is becoming more self-regulating and less reactive.
I do wonder, though, how much of this is her nature, her age, and how much is because of the teaching I’ve been doing. I’ve been waiting a moment or two before picking her up when she falls or is frustrated, using more sign language with her, and spending more time away from home both with and without her, and at times with other children.
Being the first child (and so far, an only child), she is accustomed to being the center of attention and mommy being available to her 24/7. That’s another factor that hasn’t been touched just yet, is birth order. How does birth order affect these temperament tendencies? Are first-borns more likely to be reactive and middle- or third-born children more likely to be self-regulating? And how to parenting styles factor in? A parent who coddles and keeps their baby in a bubble may be more likely to have a reactive child, whereas a parent who “forces” independence (by not picking up, using CIO, etc) may be more likely to have a more self-regulating child. Hmmm… More food for thought.