HumanBecoming - Temperament

Technical Characteristics

Children are born with a specific temperament. Temperament refers to an individual's tendency towards particular emotional and behavioral responses to specific situations. The temperament a child is born with can fall into three different types: easy, difficult, or slow-to-warm up. A child's temperament interacts with the environment around them to create a child's personality. How a parent parents their child, depending on their temperament (nurture), will result in how they interact with others and other things in the world (nature).

Expected Growth Trajectory/Needs as a Function of Age

Temperament does not change; it is something that stays the same throughout someone's life. However, how one learns to handle their temperament determines how they will function as they grow. Effortful control is the ability to consciously manage one's behavior, emotions, and attention, allowing one to override impulses and stay focused on goals. Effortful control, if learned and practiced, can increase and improve as someone ages.

Expected Variations

Temperament can be seen everywhere across the world; however, different cultures focus on self-regulation and take care of different types of babies differently. Western culture, for instance, is focused on self-esteem, while Collectivist culture is focused on learning and discipline, and self-improvement.

Ideal Conditions to Support Flourishing

A supportive household, some freedom, some structure, and caregivers willing to make mistakes and learn from them. Ideal conditions include caregivers who don’t want to change their baby into something they are not because a baby's temperament plays a big role in the development of their personality.

Goodness of Fit

The quality of the relationship between the baby and the caregiver's temperaments determines the quality of the attachment between the two. Attachment styles include: secure attachment, insecure-avoidant attachment, insecure-resistant attachment, and disorganized attachment.
When goodness of fit is high, it offers strategies for consistent emotion regulation, helping children learn to regulate, leading to a secure and healthy attachment.

Threats to Flourishing

Children with more difficult temperaments can have a harder time in school/academics. It can be harder for parents to be patient with children who experience bigger feelings. Children who get overstimulated quickly can have trouble learning how to manage their big feelings and get along with their peers. Babies who are slow to warm up can have trouble stepping out of their comfort zone.

Some people are more plastic (i.e., more acceptable to outside forces) than others. Think of the Orchid and Dandelion, for example. A dandelion just becomes; it can grow anywhere. An orchid, on the other hand, is highly responsive; an orchid needs a certain kind of nurture to help grow and stay healthy. We can think of children like this… some can thrive anywhere (a dandelion), while others need to be given different soil or positioned in indirect bright sunlight to survive.

Field notes / Observation guide. What signs to look for?

Children need to learn how to self-regulate their emotions (effortful control). Some examples of how infants and toddlers can get help regulating emotions include, but are not limited to:

Response modification -- Baby wearing, carrying, rocking, music
Redirection/distraction -- diverting attention from an unwanted action
Situation modification -- going to a quiet room or space
Exaggerated social referencing -- leaning in with a big smile & cooing
Use emotional language -- naming feelings and tone of voice

If someone is wondering if difficult babies need to be regulated differently, they do not. Regulate difficult babies the same as other babies; their reactions come from being overstimulated. However, distraction doesn't usually work. Remember, emotions are contagious! How the parent is reacting to a specific situation plays into how their baby is going to react as well.