Question

why a nurse Gives information about the disposition of an infant's body to their parents?

Answer 1

To determine the salient features of core parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices, the committee first identified desired outcomes for children. Identifying these outcomes grounds the discussion of core parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices and helps researchers, practitioners, and policy makers establish priorities for investment, develop policies that provide optimal conditions for success, advocate for the adoption and implementation of appropriate evidence-based interventions, and utilize data to assess and improve the effectiveness of specific policies and programs.

Child outcomes are interconnected within and across diverse domains of development. They result from and are enhanced by early positive and supportive interactions with parents and other caregivers. These early interactions can have a long-lasting ripple effect on development across the life course, whereby the function of one domain of development influences another domain over time. In the words of Masten and Cicchetti (2010, p. 492), “effectiveness in one domain of competence in one period of life becomes the scaffold on which later competence in newly emerging domains develops . . . competence begets competence.” From the literature, the committee identified the following four outcomes as fundamental to children's well-being. While the committee focused on young children (ages 0-8), these outcomes are important for children of all ages.

Physical Health and Safety

Children need to be cared for in a way that promotes their ability to thrive and ensures their survival and protection from injury and physical and sexual maltreatment. While such safety needs are important for all children, they are especially critical for young children, who typically lack the individual resources required to avoid dangers (National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2000). Rather, young children rely on parents and other primary caregivers, inside and outside the home, to act on their behalf to protect their safety and healthy development (Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2015). At the most basic level, children must receive the care, as reflected in a number of emotional and physiological protections, necessary to meet normative standards for growth and physical development, such as guidelines for healthy weight and receipt of recommended vaccinations (Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2015). Physical health and safety are fundamental for achieving all of the other outcomes described below.

Emotional and Behavioral Competence

Children need care that promotes positive emotional health and well-being and that supports their overall mental health, including a positive sense of self, as well as the ability to cope with stressful situations, temper emotional arousal, overcome fears, and accept disappointments and frustrations. Parents and other caregivers are essential resources for children in managing emotional arousal, coping, and managing behavior. They serve in this role by providing positive affirmations, conveying love and respect and engendering a sense of security. Provision of support by parents helps minimize the risk of internalizing behaviors, such as those associated with anxiety and depression, which can impair children's adjustment and ability to function well at home, at school, and in the community (Osofsky and Fitzgerald, 2000). Such symptoms as extreme fearfulness, helplessness, hopelessness, apathy, depression, and withdrawal are indicators of emotional difficulty that have been observed among very young children who experience inadequate parental care (Osofsky and Fitzgerald, 2000).

Social Competence

Children who possess basic social competence are able to develop and maintain positive relationships with peers and adults (Semrud-Clikeman, 2007). Social competence, which is intertwined with other areas of development (e.g., cognitive, physical, emotional, and linguistic), also may include children's ability to get along with and respect others, such as those of a different race or ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, or economic background (Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2015). Basic social skills include a range of prosocial behaviors, such as empathy and concern for the feelings of others, cooperation, sharing, and perspective taking, all of which are positively associated with children's success both in school and in nonacademic settings and can be fostered by parents and other caregivers (Durlak et al., 2011; Fantuzzo et al., 2007). These skills are associated with children's future success across a wide range of contexts in adulthood (e.g., school, work, family life) (Elias, 2006; Fantuzzo et al., 2007).

Cognitive Competence

Cognitive competence encompasses the skills and capacities needed at each age and stage of development to succeed in school and in the world at large. Children's cognitive competence is defined by skills in language and communication, as well as reading, writing, mathematics, and problem solving. Children benefit from stimulating, challenging, and supportive environments in which to develop these skills, which serve as a foundation for healthy self-regulatory practices and modes of persistence required for academic success (Gottfried, 2013).

PARENTING KNOWLEDGE, ATTITUDES, AND PRACTICES

The child outcomes described above provide the context for considering the range of parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices and identifying those that research supports as core. As noted in Chapter 1, the term “knowledge” for the purposes of this report refers to facts, information, and skills gained through experience or education and understanding of an issue or phenomenon. “Attitudes” refers to viewpoints, perspectives, reactions, or settled ways of thinking about aspects of parenting or child development, including parents' roles and responsibilities. Attitudes may be related to cultural beliefs founded in common experience. And “practices” refers to parenting behaviors or approaches to childrearing that can shape how a child develops. Generally speaking, knowledge relates to cognition, attitudes relate to motivation, and practices relate to ways of engaging or behavior, but all three may emanate from a common source.

These three components are reciprocal and intertwined theoretically, empirically, and bidirectionally, informing one another. For example, practices are related to knowledge and attitudes, and often involve the application of knowledge. According to behavior modification theory (Ajzen and Fishbein, 1980; Fishbein et al., 2001), a person's attitude often determines whether he or she will use knowledge and transform it into practice. In short, if one does not believe in or value knowledge, one is less likely to act upon it. What parents learn through the practice of parenting can also be a source of knowledge and can shape parents' attitudes. Parenting attitudes are influenced as well by parenting self-efficacy, which has been broadly defined as the level of parents' self-belief about their ability to succeed in the parenting role (Jones and Prinz, 2005).

Parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices are shaped not only by each other but also by a number of contextual factors, including children's characteristics (e.g., gender, temperament); parents' own experiences (e.g., those from their own childhood) and circumstances; expectations learned from others, such as family, friends, and other social networks; and cultural systems. Of particular relevance to this study, the contextual factors that influence parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices also include the supports available within the larger community and provided by institutions, as well as by policies that affect the nature and availability of supportive services.

In response to the study charge (Box 1-2 in Chapter 1), this chapter presents the evidence on core parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices separately. However, it should be noted that in the research literature, the distinctions among these concepts, especially knowledge and attitudes, are not well-delineated and that the applications of these concepts to parenting often are equally informed by professional wisdom and historical observation.

Parenting Knowledge

Parenting is multidimensional. To respond to the varied needs of their children, parents must develop both depth and breadth of knowledge, ranging from being aware of developmental milestones and norms that help in keeping children safe and healthy to understanding the role of professionals (e.g., educators, child care workers, health care providers, social workers) and social systems (e.g., institutions, laws, policies) that interact with families and support parenting. This section describes these areas of knowledge, as well as others, identified by the available empirical evidence as supporting core parenting practices and child outcomes. It is worth noting that the research base regarding the association between parental knowledge and child outcomes is much smaller than that on parenting practices and child outcomes (Winter et al., 2012). Where data exist, they are based largely on correlational rather than experimental studies.

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