ResumenResumenEste artículo proporciona una visión de conjunto de las funciones cognitivas y emocionales que los juegos madre-bebé aportan tanto al niño como a la madre. Implicando al niño en interacciones que comportan repetición, turnos, atención conjunta y ausencia de literalidad, los juegos pueden ayudar a los bebés en su desarrollo de destrezas lingüísticas y sensoriomotoras. A través de los intercambios lúdicos las madres facilitan y provocan en sus hijos conductas de un nivel elevado que los bebés serían incapaces de producir por sí mismos. Los juegos cumplen también diversas funciones emocionales: ayudan a los niños a hacer frente a la «pérdida» de la madre y a desarrollar los conceptos de yo, dominio y humor. En lo que concierne a las madres, los juegos aportan un contexto suplementario en el que se estimula la vinculación madre-hijo.SummaryThis paper provides an overview of the cognitive and emotional functions of mother-infant games for both the infant and the mother. By involving the child in interactions that feature repetition, turn-taking, mutual attention, and non-literality, games may help infants in their development of both linguistic and sensorimotor skills. Through game-like interactions mothers facilitate and elicit high-level behaviors from their infants, behaviors from their infants, behaviors that infants would be unable to perform by themselves. Games also serve several emotional functions: they help children to deal with the «loss» of the mother and to develop a concept of self, of mastery, and of humor. For mothers, games provide an additional context that fosters maternal bonding to the infant.RésuméCet article donne une vue d'ensemble du rôle des jeux mère-enfant dans le développment de la connaissance et des émotions tant de l'enfant que de la mère. Ces jeux peuvent aider l'enfant à développer leurs capacités linguistiques, sensorielles et motrices en le poussant à des échanges caractérisés par la répétition, l'alternation, l'attention mutuelle et la non-litéralité. Grâce á ces échanges ludiques, la mère suscite et facilite ces comportements d'un niveau élevé que l'enfant ne pourrait accomplir du lui-même. Les jeux jouent aussi un rôle sur le plan émotionnel:. ils aident l'enfant à faire face à la «perte» de la mère, et à développer le concept du soi, de la maitrîsse, de l'humour. Pour la mère, les juex fournissent un contexte supplémentaire qui nourrit le lien maternal avec l'enfant.PALABRAS CLAVE: Juegos madre-bebéinteracciónfunciones cognitivasfunciones emocionalesKEYWORDS: Mother-infant playinteractioncognitive functionemotional function
Abstract In this study, the authors used a national, Web-based survey to examine female and male siblings of individuals with disabilities. More than 1,160 adult siblings completed a 163-question survey about themselves, their siblings, and their sibling relationships. Most respondents reported fairly close contact with their siblings and positive sibling relationships, good health, and benefits from being a sibling to a brother–sister with disabilities. Compared with men, women reported benefiting more from the sibling relationship. Relative to the U.S. population, female (though not male) siblings married later and divorced less often, and these women had their first child at later ages. Implications are discussed regarding future research and service needs.
For many families of young children who are deaf, a cochlear implant may be the most viable option for promoting spoken language development. Children may qualify for a cochlear implant as young as 12 months if they have demonstrated minimal benefit from conventional amplification. In order for oral language to occur, however, parents need to be fully involved in their children's early-intervention program. This article presents 2 family constructs that are associated with language learning in young children with cochlear implants: parental involvement and maternal self-efficacy. After reviewing the theoretical and clinical applications of these family constructs, we provide practical suggestions for professionals working with families who have young children with cochlear implants.
Abstract With the growing life expectancy for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, siblings will increasingly assume responsibility for the care of their brother or sister with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Using a 163-item survey completed by 757 siblings, the authors identified factors related to future caregiving expectations. Siblings expected to assume greater caregiving responsibility for their brother or sister with disabilities if they were female, had closer relationships with and lived closer to their brother or sister with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and were the lone sibling without a disability. Siblings who expected to assume higher levels of caregiving had parents who were currently more able to care for their brother or sister with disabilities. With a better understanding of who intends to fulfill future caregiving roles, support can be provided to these siblings.
Abstract The developmental approach toward mental retardation historically has examined whether retarded individuals behave as do nonretarded individuals. An alternative approach involves using data from handicapped populations as “experiments of nature” to provide information about typical developmental processes. Three examples of this use of mental retardation findings include examinations of sequences, rates, and cross-domain relations. Certain instances of universal sequences appear to have been replicated by findings from children with mental retardation, but in other cases mentally retarded children help illustrate the extremes to which certain individual styles of development can be taken. Changing rates of development in different types of retarded children sometimes appear due to changes in the developmental tasks facing the child, sometimes to changes in neurobiologic factors related to chronological age. Cross-domain findings from children of diverse etiologies suggest the necessity of certain, specific connections among seemingly disparate behaviors in development. The article concludes with a discussion of mental retardation research as an experiment of nature that serves to replicate and amplify existing findings as well as to spur new extensions of developmental theory.
The use of mother-infant games as therapy may be useful in early intervention work with delayed children. Within the game context mother first gets the child seated facing the mother (stage-setting), then gets the child's attention (attention-getting). Once this has been achieved, mothers begin playing the particular game, providing the appropriate context (e.g., holding out hands for ball in roll the ball game; leaning forward and vocalizing while hidden in peek-a-boo) to aid infants in the performance of game-relevant behaviors. These strategies, employed in precise patterns in roll the ball game and peek-a-boo with normal infants, can also be applied to work with delayed children. We present a case study of game interactions between a severely delayed two-year-old boy and his mother, employing the techniques of normal infant-mother game interactions to aid development.
