Parental Caregiving Strategies and Personality Development of Children (5-12 Years): The Case of Selected Regions in Cameroon

Authors

  • Egbe Gwendoline Arrika

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.47672/ajp.1272

Keywords:

Parental caregiving strategies, personality development, human flourishing

Abstract

Purpose: There seems to be a lot of challenges and crisis all over the world that is disturbing world peace. So therefore, almost every human being is going about looking for different ways to be happy and be at peace. Human flourishing achieves determinacy and reality only through a joint engagement of the individual's unique talents, potentialities, and circumstances with generic goods and virtues. Encyclopedia of applied Ethics 2nd Edition (2012). Flourishing is when people experience positive emotions, positive psychological functioning and positive social functioning, most of the time, "˜living within an optimal range of human functioning.' Fredrickson (2005). This Study seeks to identify the ways through which parents care for their children and how it influences their personality development. It is believed that the more a person is shown love, the more he will feel secured and be happy thus develop a positive personality. Parental caregiving varies across cultures and beyond the survival of children, parents are fundamentally invested in their children's education and socialization as well as other social actors.

Methodology: This study made use of the survey research design and the method of data collection was through observation and the use of interviews and focus group discussions. A total of 220 children were randomly sampled drawn from different regions of Cameroon using 6 caregiving practices such as taking children out of the home, listening to children, spending time with them, buying them gifts, playing games and telling them stories and providing basic needs.

Findings: The findings of this study reveal that, the family background, social influence, socio-economic status, peaceful environment free from wars, stable marriage live of parents, providing for children's basic needs within their means and parents creating time for children out of their busy schedules will go a long way to bring out a positive personality in their children. Also, the findings indicates that other avenues and actors within the environment may provide the opportunity to promote the development of positive personality traits such as N.G.Os, the government and stake holders, parents themselves, extended family and the school community.

Recommendation: More broadly, the current results support continued efforts to incorporate personality constructs into developmental research involving children and adolescents. The findings of this study will be significant to Parents, children, and educators and will guide them on best ways to develop children's personality thus contributing to human flourishing.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

Egbe Gwendoline Arrika

Department of Educational Psychology, Faculty of Education

References

Axelrod, R. (1984). The evolution of cooperation. New York: Basic Books.

Bell, D. C., & Richard, A. J. (2000). Caregiving: The forgotten element in attachment. Psychological Inquiry, 11, 69-83.

Bernard van Leer Foundation. (1984). Multicultural societies: Early childhood education and care, summary report and conclusions. The Hague, Netherlands: Bernard van Leer Foundation.

Bowlby, J. (1982). Attachment and loss. Vol 1: Attachment (2nd ed) New York: Basic Books.

Bowlby, J. (1988). A secure base: Parent-child attachment and healthy human development. New York: Basic Books.

Bretherton, I. (1980). Young children in stressful situations: The supporting role of attachment figures and unfamiliar caregivers. In G. V. Coelho & P. J. Ahmed (Eds.), Uprooting and development (pp. 179-210). New York: Plenum.

Cassidy, J. (1999). The nature of the child's ties. In J. Cassidy & P. R. Shaver (Eds.), Handbook of attachment: Theory, research, and clinical implications (pp.3-20). New York: Guilford.

David C. Bell. (2001). Evolution of Parental Caregiving Personality and Social Psychology Review 2001, Vol. 5, No. 3, 216-229. Copyright by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.Affiliated Systems Corporation, Houston, Texas.

Erikson, E. (1968). Childhood and society. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Fredrickson, B. L., & Losada, M. F. (2005). Positive affect and the complex dynamics of human flourishing. American Psychologist, 60, 678-686. doi:10.1037/0003-066X.60.7.678

Freud, S. (1995). The Ego and the Id (1923). In The Id and the Ego and Other Works. https://doi.org/10.1097/00000441-196111000-00027 [6]

Freud, S., Jung, C. G., McGuire, W., McGlashan, A., Manheim, R., Hull, R., & Carrington, F. (1994). The Freud/Jung letters: The correspondence between Sigmund Freud and C. G. Jung (abridged ed.). Bollingen series, 94

Goodnow, J.J. (1988). Parents ideas, actions, and feelings: Models for developmental and social psychology. Child Development, 59, 286-320.

Heard, D., & Lake, B. (1997). The challenge of attachment for caregiving. London: Routledge.

Nsamenang, A.B. (1992a). Human development in cultural context: A Third World perspective. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Nsamenang, A.B. (1992b). Perceptions of parenting among the Nso of Cameroon. In B.S. Hewlett (Ed.), Father child relations: Cultural and biosocial contexts (xi-xix). New York: Aldine de Gruyter.

Nsamenang, A.B. (1992c). Early childhood care and education in Cameroon. In M.E. Lamb, K.J. Sternberg, C-P. Hwang, & A.G. Broberg (Eds.), Child care in context: Cross-cultural perspectives (pp. 419-439). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

Nsamenang, A.B., & Lamb, M.E. (1994). Socialization of Nso children in the Bamenda Grassfields of northwest Cameroon. In P.M. Greenfield & R.R. Cocking (Eds.), Crosscultural roots of minority child development. Hill

Nsamenang, A.B. & Lamb, M.E. (1995). The force of beliefs: How the parental values of the Nso of Northwest Cameroon shape children's progress toward adult models. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 16, 613-627.

Nsamenang, A.B. (1996). Cultural organization of human development within the family context. In S.C. Carr, & J.F. Schumaker (Eds.), Psychology and the developing world (pp. 60-70). Westport, CT: Praeger.

Nsamenang, A.B. (2000). Fathers, Families, & Child Well-Being in Cameroon: A Review of the Literature. Pennsylvania Univ., Philadelphia. National Center on Fathers and Families. Annie E. Casey Foundation, Baltimore, MD. 2000-07-00 19p.

Pomerantz, E.; Thompson, RA. Parents' role in children's personality development: The psychological resource principle. In: John, OP.; Robins, RW.; Pervin, LA., editors. Handbook of personality: Theory and research. 3. New York: Guilford Press; 2008. p. 351-374.

Solomon, J., & George, C. (1996). Defining the caregiving system: Toward a theory of caregiving. Infant Mental Health Journal, 17, 183-197.

Songyang Zhang1 (2020). Psychoanalysis: The Influence of Freud's Theory in Personality Psychology. Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 433 International Conference on Mental Health and Humanities Education (ICMHHE 2020) Renmin University of China, Beijing 100080, China.

Sroufe, L. A., & Waters, E. (1977). Attachment as an organizing construct. Child Development, 48, 1184-11

Downloads

Published

2022-11-04

How to Cite

Arrika, E. G. . (2022). Parental Caregiving Strategies and Personality Development of Children (5-12 Years): The Case of Selected Regions in Cameroon. American Journal of Psychology, 4(2), 24–33. https://doi.org/10.47672/ajp.1272