The Impact of Family Negligence on A Child's Development - Paper Example

The development of a child is much dependent on the environment in which the child is brought up. This environment is created by the family from which the child is born. Children's genetic predispositions depend on their parent's or guardian's childrearing regimes to bring up into well-behaved beings and this develops the concept of how the family structure functions. They develop behavior and characters from the time they start understanding their environment according to how their parents or guardians teach them and this later affects them as they grow up into mature adults. Family negligence thus will adversely affect the grooming of children as they will lack someone to guide and direct them on what to do and how to behave and provide them with vital needs. This has been a major topic upon which many research studies have been conducted to ascertain its worthiness and there is much evidence to prove the credibility of this claim. The purpose of this study is thus to sample various evidences in support of how the family negligence influences the personality of a child and draw out insightful conclusion about the claim.

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Introduction

The ability of a mature person to overcome issues and handle problems in life depends greatly on how the person was brought up. When people are asked to explain what parental care is, most of them visualize it as feeding children, giving support to the children or providing them with basics needs such as food, clothing and shelter. Child care goes beyond that. Parents dictate what values and characters their young children absorb from the environment. The ability for children to develop is based upon parental care foundations at the early life stages of the child. Parents play an important role in the making of a child's behavior despite their education, income and social class and a well grown up person is always a product of good childrearing capabilities of his/her parents (Family Pediatrics Report, 2003).When parents fail to carry out their responsibility leading to negligence, most of the neglected children may not able to develop well.

Early life disruptions in family functionality affect the development of the personality of a child. A form of family structure functionality disruption is breakups and divorce that split two parent families into single parent families. Elkin and Handel (1978) defined "the family as the first unit with which children has a continuous contact and the first context in which socialization patterns develop" (p.118). Furthermore, The Family Pediatrics Report (2003) argues that the interpersonal relationship in the family is one the main influencing factor in children's personality development. Interpersonal relationship is having a close union or link between two or more people, which lasts long. This union is much influenced by strong love and affection. The number of parents raising a child thus influences the interpersonal relationship. For instance, Kids who are raised by two parents feel more secure and having an identity as compared to children who are raised by single mum or dad. This is because breakup of family ties puts excess pressure on the parent remaining in care of the children as he/she may neglect certain needs of the children due to insufficient income. The neglected children will feel lonely, rejected and even as useless being sand this will negatively affect their development.

Further research done by Ross MacKay from the ministry of social development in New Zealand titled "impact of family structure and family changes on child outcome", found that case of breakup and remarriage causes child neglect. The increase number of family breakups and remarriages influences the ability of to provide basic needs. Furthermore, the presence of either step father or step mother causes physiological problems to the child from that step family. The children develop a behavior which is termed as rude and occasionally have emotional problems. This experiences shape how they grow in contrast to those children grown in intact family experiencing cohesion and they end up growing well (Eric, 2016).

Most societies dictate how their members should behave and certain things that people should do or not for the better functionality of the society. Some of these prescriptions vary from society to society while others are similar. Some of the similar prescriptions between societies is the way parents are required to nurture and protect their children. In all societies, children are trained on how to speak their language, greet elders and how to behave socially in general. Each generation has to learn these values to ensure progression and conservation of their cultural norms. Parents thus come in handy in helping their children learn these cultural values and teach them new ones. A research carried out by Cox Samuel titled "Family background effects on personality development and social acceptance" which was basically meant for studying how family background influences personality development of school children and their social acceptance. The study found that family background influenced the child bearing practices, children personality development and social acceptance by peers. Furthermore, it found that parental love or rejection influenced the children's character (Maccoby, 2000). Family negligence to children will thus result in children who does not respect the cultural values of the society and who are less sociable as they will grow up with certain bad behaviors absorbed from the environment

Parental material responsibility negligence affects child development. Parental responsibility involves a parent to have individual duty to children affairs. Kwalombota Mahalihali argues that children who are raised by responsible and dedicated parents generally perform better in all aspects of life. They get the love and protection they require from their parents and this boosts their mental and physical health. Such children grow up healthy and strong and become enthusiastic people (Nakao K et al., 2000). Parental responsibility negligence comes in critical to the emotional and well being of the children. For instance, drunken parents will always have impaired judgment and are more likely to forget to look after their children. This will result in children lacking certain needs such as clothing, food and social guidance which will adversely affect their personality development.

Emotional support negligence influences the behavioural development of children. Emotional support involves understanding the social and psychological problems that children face. This support will help the children to understand the relationship between behavioural and emotional influences and eventually improve their self-esteem. Bethel Moges and Kristi Weber suggested that "It is important for the overall development of children that parents are present enough to support them, and this support fosters confidence and growth in many areas. Sometimes, just being physically present is not enough. Parents that may be nearby but are not emotionally invested or responsive tend to raise children that are more distressed and less engaged with their play or activities. A study investigating the connection between parent's investment and children's competence suggests that the emotional involvement of parents really does matter and affects the outcome of their child's emotional competence and regulation." Parents are thus advised to spent enough time with their children and advice the appropriately regarding certain challenging issues in life. Children who spent much time with emotionally supportive parents develop well emotionally than those whom their parents are either away or don't advise them accordingly (Bas ter Weel & Tyas Prevoo, 2014). Emotional negligence can be very dangerous to proper development of a child especially in hostile societies. For instance, such children may get involved in bad companies and start bad practices such drug abuse, involvement in sex and theft while still at a very young age. Furthermore, parents who always get drunk and start quarrelling will affect the mental and psychological well-being of their children. They will torment the feelings of their children anytime they quarrel and this will affect the emotions of the children.

Conclusion

In conclusion, parents are an integral part in the development of their children. They are like the source code from which children have to copy their behaviour in their development to becoming good adults. Parents with good childrearing regimes bring up children who are fit in all aspects and can handle any problem in life. Such children also make their parents proud and the society at large. However, parents who neglect their children do more harm than good. Children without proper parental guidance find it difficult to differentiate between good and evil. If negligence happens at an early stage of the child's development, it can be rectified by legislation through passing strict laws regarding child protection but if this cannot be controlled then children will grow up knowing what they think is right but, in the end, it will lead to a society with people of undesired personalities. It is thus very important for parents to take good care of their children and help the society in bringing up responsible members of the same society.

References

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