Are nurseries bad for young children's emotional development?

[OldieMum]

The Guardian has made this a front-page issue today and it also has a long, and thoughtful article by Madeleine Bunting, here Both stories report on a growing body of evidence suggesting that children under 2 in group daycare (ie not childminders, grandparents or nannies) show signs of being less co-operative and more aggressive later on, even though they may have better cognitive skills. Children over 2 seem more clearly to benefit
from group care, perhaps because they are interacting more with other children by then. Under 2, they mainly interact with staff, who do not pay them enough individually-tailored attention (Bunting talks about an 'emotionally bland' kind of interaction). DD (18 months) goes to a small nursery three days a week, so I have a strong personal interest in all this. What are other people's observations about the impact of daycare on their children? I feel very positive about it. DD gets a lot of attention from the staff and she loves going there.

Exactly Eddm. So someone has been paid shitloads to research this , then theyve worried lots of parents , perhaps making them feel guilty for working and trying to provide for their family. And then they say 'oh yeah but the so called damging effects dont last very long'.

What a load of bollocks.

I have only clicked onto this thread after reading the Guardian article today. I am feeling quite depressed as it points out what has been worrying me ever since dd was born.
I had always intended to put my child into nursery to go back to work - it was and still is the only way. Nothing prepared me for for the way I feel since her birth and I am very sad at the thought of leaving her. She will be barely 5 months old!

Oh and Thank you cuppy for your eloquent and heart-warming take on thsi!

Like many others here I found the study interesting but way too inconclusive. We didn't hear any details at all about what 'kind' of problems children in long-term daycare might suffer later in life.

I totally agree with Jimjams that it depends on the nursery / carers as to the effects of childcare on a child. I live in a very deprived part of London and when I was considering dd spending some time part-time in a nursery (nursery was my first choice for all the obvious reasons: not alone in a home with a stranger, group activities, structured day etc. etc.) but the nurseries I visited near me were truly awful. The food they gave the kids was dire, the staff seemed very unmotivated and I frequently saw very young babies left crying for too long before anyone was free to deal with them. I couldn't have sent dd there. Neither did I find a decent childminder situation. So I put a lot of this down to my area. And I can imagine a 4-month old in one of the nurseries I visited being 'damaged' in some way by the experience which was bordering on neglect from what I saw. On the other hand I did see a wonderful nursery which was way beyond my budget which I would have LOVED to send dd to.

jmg1- so true... we worry ourselves senseless, all we can do is our best for them!

who knows how/why people turn out like they do... a combination of many many factors, so it is very simplistic (and makes good copy) for these researchers to make sweeping statements... which provides nothing but more worry!

I found the article very thoughtful and interesting, and I didn?t get the feeling that Madeleine Bunting was condemning anyone for their childcare choices, but pointing out how little real choice is available. If we all had the money and a free or affordable high quality childcare option round the corner, the right to maternity leave for two or three years, the right to return to work part-time, and child benefit at a level which reflected some of the cost of not working in the cash economy, we could all decide whether to be SAHMs, careerists, or half and half. The whole point of the article seemed to me to be criticizing the fact that that choice is not there, not trying to guilt-trip mothers for what child care they use.

I'd like to see it that way meannbean but as I said earlier this afternoon:

could this have been written from a more emotive view point?? 'their eyes are begging for interaction, for an adult smile?' is that not just written to evoke an emotional response? Well it did and I think it's extremely sloppy journalism.

For somethin that's upposed to be a factual article about choice, this sounds very much like guilt trip material IMHO

BR

br - that is just a HUGE guilt trip. If you ever look at my dd, she'll always give you 'puppy dog eyes' that you could describe as begging for interaction but she gets so much attention she'll probably end up spoilt!! This is extremely sloppy journalism and makes me think that the facts must be very shaky if they have to rely on pulling heart strings to support their argument.

I agree BR, definately making even some mn's feeling guilty.
My opinion is a child can be 'emotionally damaged' by so many different factors and this artical has blamed solely day nurseries. I feel this is wrong - it doesnt matter what care your cild gets - be it childminder - nanny or nursery - its the QUALITY of care they get. You can see when touring nurseries if they are any good by the way the children are and uf you had any doubts you wouldnt send your children there.
Please dont let this article depress you Mrs Doolittle - when i worked in a nursery I treated each baby with loads of love and affection and Im sure youll find your baby will get the same.

Oh God ...
Yet another thing for me to worry about ...
Haven't read everyone's replies but did look at the article ...
I HATE this kind of thing ...
I worry enough about my son and his emotional development and over sensitivity, blaming myself nearly every day for not bonding with him when he was born, having severe PND and giving up breastfeeding to soon ... believe me I wear a hair shirt !!!!
I had NO choice in the matter ... I HAD to go to work, I had no one in my family who was able to look after him full time and there was no way I could afford a nanny ... I spent two years having him prised out of my arms screaming until I finally moved to NZ so that I could be a mum.

I know I am ranting but it is like Stephen Biddulph and his 'no mother who has a boy under 3 should work if she wants him to be a happy and well adjusted' approach ....
I am off to cry some more tears into the bucket of guilt that is labelled 'Motherhood'

ghosty - please don't get worked up about this!! You're not a bad mum for doing what you feel is right and no study will ever know as much about your own child as you do. Also, the main point being missed in all this is that even if you totally believe the study, they also say that the effects go after the child is about 5, so once your child is over 5 its all irrelevant anyway.

Quick reality check, when was the golden age when mothers stayed home , devoting themselves to the raising of their children?????

Well, my Mother worked part time and the rest of the time she worked damn hard on the housework. No automatic washing machines and dishwashers in those days. From the age of 4 we were expected to be out of the house entertaining ourselves. I went to school full time at the age of three and was so happy as I had been bored fartless at home, watching my mother do the dishes etc.

then there was my grandmother. TBH, she was a SAHM, but with 6 kids and no electricity in the house. she spent all her time boiling clothers in a copper, and scrubbing them with a wash board. My grandfather was a miner, so the washing was one hell of a job. So she didn't have much time for a lot of SAHMing. The older kids raised the younger ones.

And then there was my great gran. Not a lot of reading round the kitchen table then, either, as she couldn't read or write. She also had 6 kids, and the elder two joined their dad in the pit at the age of 12!!!!

And guess what, all these people did fine.

FFS, we all do so much for our kids. We worry and fret and are loaded down with guilt. And WHY???

We have all, all of us, never done so much with and for our kids. Lets get real!

HMB - I agree. I posted yesterday about this myth of the golden age of childhood when mothers were with their kids all day.

I noticed on the way home yesterday that the Evening Standard's take on this research was 'Nurseries turn toddlers into thugs' - front page. Appalling.

I'm glad I've kept up with this thread!

Totally agree with everything you have said hmb. I really think some people dont live in reality and have got very sheltered lives if they see fit to critcise and judge every single thing that really isnt important. Of course taking your children to nursery is a personal choice but you are hardly 'harming' the child ffs! I think more effort ought to be put into catching child abusers and so forth than criticis=ing good mothers all the time

ks you make a good point too. If nursery was SO bad why are there SS nurseries for families that cant cope for one reason or another?

I am going to stop reading this thread because it is getting on my nerves for some reason

Letter in the Guardian today

Madeleine Bunting is right to draw attention to research that points up the difficulties of providing nursery care of sufficiently good quality to meet the needs of infants, the preference of many parents not to return to work when their children are very small and the need for better provision of parental leave (Are nurseries bad for our kids? G2, July 8).
But to suggest that nurseries might be bad for children is a sweeping assertion that misunderstands the many ways in which community and private nurseries, pre-schools and other childcare provision serve the needs of families. Childcare is valued by parents, not simply in order to work, but as a means of providing social experiences for their children, a period of respite for themselves, a way of meeting other parents and an opportunity to get advice and help from early-years workers.

Sure Start programmes, as the author acknowledges, offer a range of activities to support parents and their children, drop-in facilities and workshops as well as child care, and there is a compelling case for extending this type of approach more universally.

Similarly, the growth in private nurseries, many of them offering very good provision, draws attention away from a parallel growth in community nurseries, where parents are involved in the management and day-to-day operation of the nursery.

If a rethink is required, then perhaps it should be to enter into dialogue with parents about what they actually want, which is unlikely to be either a "one-size-fits-all" model of full daycare, or a return to pre-1997, when the care of children was seen to be a private matter, whatever the family circumstances.
Margaret Lochrie
Director, Capacity

Well after dropping ds1 at school today ds2 said "ds1 school, me nursery" So I said "ooh no no nursery today you're staying at home and playing with mummy all day". And he burst into tears! "I want nursery". Bad for his emotional development? Maybe other children are just more interesting to a 2 year old than boring old mummy?

You and me both, Jimjams.

This happened on the first day dd went to nursery. I picker her up at lunch time, 'what do you want to do this afternoon?' 'go back to nursery.'

Bad Mummy!

I met three mothers early on who chose nurseries over child minders purely because they didn't want their children making an emotional bond with one person. I assume because they would be jealous.

Not reaqd all this BUT for us nursery has had huge benefits for DD. She went at 21 weeks and is now 2y 3m. We have only posiitve experiences and I would always choose a nursery now over a child minder due to our experience. It has suited us and our DD. DD has thrived and had no problems with behaviour or development in any way.

I would also argue that the individual attention thing depends on where you go. My DD has had individual attention regularly. And the child ratio is the same in a nursery as with a child minder anyway.

Stories luke these really annoy me

Message withdrawn

I read this article again and I think it's important to remember a couple of things. Re. the 'puppy dog eyes yearning for attention' thing she does qualify that by saying maybe she's just reading this into the situation. Also it is a study questioning whether nurseries or child minders / nannies are better for a child under 1. Not in general about whether or not mums should work / feel guilty about working.

I'm iffy about what I think of the report as I said earlier, so not defending it as such, just trying to straighten out a couple of points that are getting on people's nerves.

My children have been in nursery from a very young age and they have thrived. They have never been in nursery full days, as me and DH both work flexible hours so we can deliver and pick them up so their days are not 8-6 which I think is a long day. I think rather than looking at this research and using it to argue that mums should stay at home longer, it should be used to argue for longer full-time maternity leave, longer paternity leave, flexi-hours for both mum and dad and look at the culture of long working hours in this country. All which makes the UK not very family-friendly. In Scandinavia women have been back at work for generations and children in nurseries and we are (most of us) well-adjusted happy people! The difference, however, is that in Scandinavia women going back to work coincided with dads getting more involved in childcare and the home. In this country, the debate seems to be still if mums should go back to work or not. In Scandinavia, it is more about how we can make it easier for parents in the workplace (with emphasis on parents rather than mothers).