Marie Woolf (the editor of this article) has written about a key comment made by Ian Duncan-Smith that highlights the fact that children from so called ‘dysfunctional families’ are at a distinctly greater risk of being both mentally and physically underdeveloped by the time they start school. His claims can not be disregarded, as there is sound evidence from scientific studies to back up his claims. He has put it down to a lack of growth during a ‘critical period’ of development, in which, a child must be exposed to the necessary amount of stimuli (such as exposure to words, touch and social interaction) to permit full development of cognitive capabilities expected from a child of that age group. This is also why, he says, when it comes to starting their formal education (at age 4) “their brain is probably at the age of a child of one but being asked now to comprehend and make decisions at that of the level of a child of three and four”. The clear lack of language and social skills can easily be linked to the child’s upbringing and thus, their families. It is commonplace to find parents “failing to bond with their babies” in the most basic of ways such as reading or even merely speaking to them. In the more extreme cases, children that frequently witness violent and angry scenes at home, tend to exhibit such behaviour when at school. From then on, he predicted a downward spiral, ultimately leading to becoming “drug addicts, criminals or alcoholics”.
However, Katherine Rake accused Mr Duncan-Smith of making generalisations about people from ‘poor backgrounds’; saying “It is critical not to confuse family dysfunction with family type.” I agree with her to an extent because every family has their own ways of ‘nurturing’ a child. Cultural differences see the greatest variation in what is believed to be good nurturing practices. For example, in the collectivist culture of Japan, it would not be uncommon to find a four year old child with their older, but not yet teenage siblings, taking the subway to run an errand for their mother. Whereas in the individualist culture here in the UK, such a sight would never occur. I only agree with her to an extent however, because these stereotypes do exist for a reason. They merely highlight the blatant recurrence in the link between a families dysfunctionality and their child’s mental and physical underdevelopment.
