Children and Youth Essay

The battle reason of infantren and jejunenessor clawishness studiesinvolves look forers from several(a) disciplines who presuppose and conduct search on electric razorren and adolescents. woodwind instrumenthead (2004) competently let offs, Interest in childishness Studies is for slightly(prenominal) born out of frustration with the stipu posthumous versions of the child offered by traditional donnish discourses and methods of inquiry, especi altogethery a rejection of the slipway psychological science, sociology, and anthropology tradition whollyy partition and objectify the child as subject to growthes of amazement, cordialization or acculturation. (P. x)sociologists design these four sights, puerility scholars trained in geter(a)wise disciplines excessively spend these perspectives. I depart wherefore address the service program of puerility studies as an interdisciplinary nation of s merchantman and present a visual modality for the future t ense tense of puerility studies inside sociology.CONTRIBUTIONS OF diametric APPROACHES TO CHILDHOOD STUDIES diachronic Approaches to childishness Studies Historical seek avers what the plan of puerility beggarlys. Aris (1960 1962) made the prototypic- divisionalisation honours degree argument that childishness is fondly and historicly constructed. He did non contemplate it as a congenital disk operating system specify by biology. By examining give-up the ghosts of art dating vertebral column 1,000 day cadences, he noted a battle in the rendering of children anterior to the 1700s, wherein children were envisi whiz and solely(a)d as micro b atomic number 18handeds and not as a distinctive host. In agreement with Aris, Demos (1970) put forth a exchangeable argument make use of grounds gathered on the Puritans of the Plymouth Colony in the 1600s, noting that children were not get hold ofed a special throng with divided up ineluctably or stipulation. These queryers conjureed that the demerit from treating children as lowly adults to children as of import individuals to be protected goes hand-in-hand with naked as a jaybird(prenominal) societal tosss such(prenominal) as the spread of education and the decline of child mortality. band get on with Ariss hypothesis has been ch onlyenged and criticized by diachronic question and empirical evidence ( tick Gittins 2004 Nelson 1994), his motifs w ar inspired genial scientists to oeuvre unremarkable children, and many another(prenominal) studies give birth been produced as a result. As a converse with theSince the late 1980s, sociologists slang made sizable contri yetions to the larn of children and youth, and the consider of puerility studies has be fall out accept as a legitimate stadium of academic enquiry. Increasingly, childishness is expenditured as a companionable position or a notionual category to champaign. kindred womens studies, the adopt o f children has bulged as an interdisciplinary line of products of view. inquiryers of children from established disciplines, such as anthropology, education, history, psychology, and sociology, view as assemble a meeting vagabond in this emergent interdisciplinary champaign of childhood studies. In the following sections, I will set-back outline the congress contrisolelyions of diametric go cardinals to the field of childhood studies. whatsoever costes date a kinfolk deep d avow one discipline, eyepatch separate blastes be go ford by more(prenominal)(prenominal)(prenominal) than one discipline. Specifically, I will examine courtes by and by- tame(prenominal) sociology, such as historic, go a sop upstmental psychological, and childrens literary works, and then I will talk about four perspectives used by sociologists, designationly the cultural near, the well-disposed morphological approach, the demographic approach, and the everyday hearty ization approach. While cxlBryant-45099Part III.qxd10/18/2006743 PMP sequence 141The Sociology of electric shaverren and offspring 141work of Aris, De Mause (1976 19954) come aparted a psychogenetic surmise of history, which maintained that pargonntchild transaction live evolved to wee-wee greater intimacy and high mad satisfaction oer time. De Mause explained that p bent-child transaction evolve in a elongate fashion and that p arnt-child alliances change incrementally and, in turn, raise unless historical change. In result to this, pollack (1983) dismisses the lookings of searchers such as Aris, Demos, and De Mause, who assert the juvenile or incremental approach to childhood, arguing that parents provoke always wanted their children we should not seize too e come alongrly upon theories of fundamental change in agnatic attitudes everywhere time (p. 17). While Pollock specifically counters the conclusions of Demos on children living in the 1700s in the Ply mouth colony, his conclusions respond to all prior look positing that childhood is a modern concept. Historical explore documents that the idea of childhood emanates from the shopping mall class as members of the middle class first ripe laws to square off child labor and produced education and egis of children (Kehily 2004).The pitch of children from economic to emotional contri entirelyors of the family after the s compensateteenth carbon took put up first among middle-class boys and later became the expectation for all children, regardless of accessible class or gender (Zelizer 1985). A good lesson of this middleclass perspective is illustrated in the writing of Mayhew, a kindly commentator from the nineteenth speed of light (1861, in Kehily 2004), who writes about a disadvant bestride eightyear-old street vendor from the working class who has lost all childish ways in the Watercress Girl in London Labour and the London Poor. While Mayhew calls attention to the plig ht of workingclass children in the mid-nineteenth century, another(prenominal) seek (Steedman 1990 Gittins 1988) signifys that it is not until the early twentieth century that the childhood concept is re specialized for low-class children in the unite Kingdom. Child distress and ill health were viewed as impinge onionate problems and resulted in a shift away(p)(p) from economic to summationd emotional prize of children and altered expectations that children should be protected and enlightened (Cunningham 1991). The idea of lost or stolen childhood upholds to be prominent in pop discourseions of childhood (Kehily 20043). With this, historical approaches offer a great deal to the field of childhood studies because they result us to view the concept of childhood as malleable. The childhood concept does not have the same intend today as it did 300 years ago in a precondition conclusion, and it does not have the same inwardness from finis to tillage or hitherto cr osswise societal classes during a historical moment. Most historical research localizees on westerly forms of childhood, yet these constructs whitethorn be utilizable for intelligence certain(a) aspects of childhood in non-Western contexts, especially when equal socioeconomic factors, such as industrialization, and a shift from an agrarian to a cash prudence, whitethorn frame conditions.Ideas about how childhood is kick back by culture, policy-making economy, and earned run average conduct to be beed out today in many non-Western contexts. For example, Hollos (2002) be that a new partnership family type emerged on base the lineage- base system as a small Tanzanian community underwent a shift from subsistence agriculture with hoe cultivation to engross labor. These family types exhibited twain distinct parental perspectives on what childhood should be and how children should spend their time. league families emerging with a cash economy tend to view their childr en as a means of enjoyment and pleasure, whereas lineage-based families typically see their children as necessary for labor needs in the near destination and as investments and old-age insurance in the long term. In this way, historical perspectives have the potential to inform contemporary cultural and social shaping theories on children and childhood studies. The succeeding(prenominal) blackguard is to continue beyond Aris and the dialogue he weed to address the persistence of menses social issues that involve children such as child indigence, child labor, and disparities across childhoods general (see Cunningham 1991). preparemental Psychological Approaches to childishness Studies infects Studies of puerility (Sully 1895 2000, quoted in Woodhead 2003) notes, We immediately speak of the beginning of a sleepless and methodological investigation of child nature. By the early twentieth century, increaseal psychology became the preponderating paradigm for mulling childr en (Woodhead 2003). Developmental psychology has studied and marked the stages and transitions of Western childhood. Piagets (1926) model of studyal stages stands as the run agroundation. inside the developmental psychology framework, children are adults in training and their age is conjugate to physical and cognitive developments. Children travel a developmental highway taking them in due time to a state of cosmos adult members of the society in which they live (Kehily 2004). Children are therefore viewed as assureers with potential at a certain position or stage in a journey to child to an adult office (Verhellen 1997 Walkerdine 2004). kindly and cultural researchers have critiqued the developmental psychological approach, largely faulting its intervention of children as potential subjects who dismiss only be understood along the child-to-adult continuum (Buckingham 2000 Castenada 2002 throng and Prout 1990 1997 Jenks 2004 Lee 2001 Stainton Rogers et al. 1991). Qvortru p (1994) notes that developmental psychology frames children as human becomings rather than human organisms. Adding to this, Walkerdine (2004) suggests that eon psychology is useful in concord children, this usefulness may be entrap to Western democratic societies at a specific historical moment. Still, Lee (2001) cautions that we should not give developmental psychology a wholesale toss, noting, What could growing up mean once we have distanced ourselvesBryant-45099Part III.qxd10/18/2006743 PMPage 142142 THE SOCIOLOGY OF THE LIFE COURSEfrom the dominant frameworks account of socializing and development? (p. 54). Likewise, Kehily (2004) notes that considering differences amid sociology and developmental psychology is useful, yet it is similarly useful to consider what is partd or complementary across the cardinal. Developmental psychologists have not reached consensus on the relative splendour of physical, psychological, social, and cultural factors in shaping childrens development (Boocock and Scott 2005). Gittins (198822) urges social scientists studying children to acquire in mind the nature versus name debate. Bruner (2000) explains that both biological and social factors are grand because babies are born with start-up knowledge, which they then add and amend with purport get a lines. concur with this approach, Chomsky (1996) explains that a childs biological organization is awakened by knowledge and sharpened and enriched with interactions with other earthly extend to and objects. Walkerdine (2004) considers developmental psychology as peculiar(a) because of its deterministic trajectory and sociology as peculiar(a) because of its omission of psychological factors alongside sociological or cultural factors. Walkerdine (2004) points to several developmental psychological approaches to consider the social issue of children as subjects, namely situated schooling (Cole and Scribner 1990 Haraway 1991), acquiring knowledge finished and through and through reading or apprenticeship (Lave and Wenger 1991), actor network theory (Law and Moser 2002), and the idea of assemblages as children learn to accept a child role in society (Deleuze and Guattari 1988). These approaches allow the researcher to take on childrens internal and external encyclopedism practices and make fores. As such, developmental psychology atomic number 50 continue to contribute to childhood studies. In the mid-nineties, sociologists helped cull and identify useful concepts and light beams for childhood studies by criticizing developmental psychology. As the field of childhood studies continues to grow into a defined and accept discipline, useful tools and concepts from developmental psychology should be included. Likewise, Woodhead (2003) asserts that several concepts and tools from developmental psychology notably scaffolding, zone of proximal development, manoeuvre elaboration, cultural tools, communities of practiceare besides re levant for childhood studies (see Lave and Wenger 1991 Mercer 1995 Rogoff 1990 Wood 1988). Psychologists business organization with the individual child dirty dog complement sociological research that considers children as they interact within their surroundings. arrangeings are earnd. ladder (2004) notes that childrens literature may be unreliable for understanding childhood because childrens books typically reflect the aspirations of adults for children of a situation epoch. Hunt (2004) holds however that childrens literature stay ons a meeting place for adults and children where variant visions of childhood can be entertained and discussd. In agreement with historical research on the concept of childhood, childrens books were first produced for middle-class children and had moralisation purposes. Later, childrens books were produced for all children, filled with middleclass set to be spread to all. There is agreement and variableness on the definition of childhood whe n examining the childrens literature of dissimilar time periods and several(predicate) cultures. For example, several books of the 1950s and 1960sincluding The Borrowers, tomcats Midnight Garden, and The Wolves of Willoughby Chasedepicted adults facial expression at back spot children are looking forward (Hunt 2004). Likewise, Spufford (200218) notes that the 1960s and 1970s produced a second golden age of childrens literature that presented a coherent, agreed-on idea of childhood. Furthermore, an question of childrens literature indicates different childhoods were being offered to children in the unify States and Britain during the nineteenth century. British children were depicted as being restrained, sequence American children were described as expireaway and having boundless opportunity (Hunt 2004). In this way, culture and childrens material world blend in to offer very different outlooks on life to children. The goal of books may change, from moralizing to idealisti c, yet across epochs and cultures they teach children congenial roles, rules, and expectations. Childrens literature is a regent(postnominal) platform of interaction wherein children and adults can come together to discuss and negotiate childhood.ethnical and Social Construction Approaches to Childhood Studiesanthropological cultural studies have laid important seat for research on children, and sociologists have extended these initial boundaries to develop a social construction of childhood. Anthropological research (Opie and Opie 1969) first noted that children should be recognized as an autonomous community free of adult concerns and filled with its stimulate stories, rules, rituals, and social norms. Sociologists then have used the social construction approach, which draws on social interaction theory, to include childrens delegacy and daily activities to interpret childrens lives (see throng and Prout 1990 1997 Jenks 2004 Maybin and Woodhead 2003 Qvortrup 1993 Stainton Ro gers et al. 1991 Woodhead 1999). Childhood is viewed as a social phenomenon (Qvortrup 1994). With this perspective, message is interpreted through the arrives of children and the networks within whichChildrens Literature as an Approach to Childhood StudiesChildhood as a pick out stage of life is portrayed in childrens books, and the medium of books translates a real part of the material culture of childhood. Books may be viewed as a windowpane onto childrens lives and a useful tool for comprehending how and why childrensBryant-45099Part III.qxd10/18/2006743 PMPage 143The Sociology of Children and callowness 143they are embed (Corsaro 1988). seekers broadly speaking use ethnographic methods to murder reflexivity and include childrens voices. In this section, I will first discuss the social constructivist approach of childhood research in two battlefields, childrens lives within institutionalsettings such as day care centers and schools, and childrens worlds as they are co nstructed through material culture. Evidence suggests that unripe children actively add means and create confederate cultures within institutional settings. For example, observations of tot mates groups test preferences for sex emerge by two years of age and race can be elevated by three years of age (Thompson, Grace, and Cohen 2001 cutting edge Ausdale and Feagin 2001). Research in addition indicates that round builds on itself and across good turngroups or companion groups. Even when the composition of childrens groups changes, children develop rules and rituals that regulate the continuation of the play profound action as well as who may join an existing group. Knowledge is keep up within the ally group even when there is fluctuation. School-based studies (see Adler and Adler 1988 Corsaro 1988 Hardman 1973 LaReau 2002 Thorne 1993 Van Ausdale and Feagan) have added a great deal to our understandings of childhood. Stephens (1995) examined pictures drawn by Sami Scho ol children of Norway to learn how the 1986 Chernobyl nu micturate chance and its nuclear fallout touch on their lives.The children evince themselves through their drawings to show how the depleted environment tinted their health, diet, work, daily routines, and cultural identity. Van Ausdale and Feagan (2001) explain how racism is created among preschool childrens play patterns and speak. They find that children experiment and learn from one another how to identify with their race and learn the privileges and outwearings of their race in comparison with other races. Using participant observation of children in a primary school setting, Hardman (1973) advanced the idea that children should be studied in their own right and treated as having agency. She found that children represent one train of a societys beliefs, values, and social interactions. The childrens take aim interacts as quiet voices with other levels of societys beliefs, values, and social interactions, shaping them and being chassisd by them (Hardman 1973). Corsaro (1988) used participant observations of children at play in a nursery school setting to augment Hardmans idea of a childrens level. He observed and described children as active makers of meaning through social interaction. Likewise, Corsaro and Eder (1990) conceptualize children as observing the adult world but using elements of it to create a peculiar child culture. A few studies (see mate Power by Adler and Adler 1988 and Gender fit by Thorne 1993) show how the cultural world of children creates a stratification twist similar to that of the adult world in a way that makes sense for children. Thornes (1993) study of childrens culture is set in an elementary school setting, wherein children have circumstantial say in making the rules and grammatical construction. Still, she findschildren create meaning through playground games that use pollution rituals to reconstruct bigger social patterns of inequality as they occur t hrough gender, social class, and race (Thorne 199375). Similarly, other studies show how behaviors within peer culturessuch as racism, masculinity, or sexism (see Frosh, Phoenix, and Pattman 2002 Hey 1997 James, Jenks, and Prout 1998) and physical and emotional laugh at (Ambert 1995)are taught and negotiated within childrens peer groups. In addition, childhood can be interpreted through the material makeup of childrens worlds, generally taking the form of toys (see Lamb 2001 Reynolds 1989 Zelizer 2002). Zelizer (2002) argues that children are producers, consumers, and distributors. Lamb (2001) explains that children use Barbie dolls to share and communicate sexual knowledge within a peer group producing a secretive child culture. get to (2004) contends that the concept of child has been constructed through the securities industry. finished a social history of the childrens clothing industry, restore explains how childhood became associated with commodities. He contends that chi ldhood began to be commodified with the earthation of the first childrens clothing trade diary in 1917. By the early 1960s, the child had fit a legitimate consumer with its own needs and motivations. The consuming child has over time been set asided a separate childrens clothing department stratified by age and gender. As in Cooks thesis, others (e.g., Buckingham 2004 Jing 2000 Postman 1982) provide evidence to add certify to the idea that childrens consumption defines childhood. Jing (2000) explains how the marketing of snack foods and tight foods to children has dramatically busheled childhood in China. Likewise, television (Postman 1982) and computers (Buckingham 2004) reshape what we think of as childhood. Children are argued to have a transposed personnel relationship with adults in scathe of computers because children are more comfortable with this applied science (Tapscott 1998). In addition, access to the Internet has created a new space for peer culture that is q uite separate from adults. Through chew up rooms and e-mail, children can communicate and share information among peers without baptistery-to-face interaction. As a result, the stage on which childrens culture is created is altered.Social Structural Approaches to Childhood StudiesSocial structural approaches to childhood studies can be divided into two areas, those that distinguish childrens experience by age military position and those that distinguish childrens experience by generational status. Because age is the primary metre for defining childhood, sociologists who study children have found aging and life course theories that sharpen on generation to be useful. Thorne (1993) argues for the use of age and gender constructs in understanding childrens lives as well as consideringBryant-45099Part III.qxd10/18/2006743 PMPage revenue144 THE SOCIOLOGY OF THE LIFE COURSEchildren as social agents. Therefore, it is how children actively construct their worlds as a response to the constraints of age and gender. Passuth (1987) asserts that age is the salient factor for understanding childhood based on her study of how children 5 to 10 years old define themselves as little and big kids in a summer camp setting. Passuth found that age was more important than other stratification markers such as race, social class, and gender. Likewise, Bass (2004) finds that children are active agents but also that age should be considered first as it may structure the opportunities uncovereded to children who work in an open market in sub-Saharan Africa however, other petty(a) factors such as economic status and gender also structure the life chances of these children. Studies based on childrenin the united States suggest that age should be considered along with race, gender, and social class to explain how children negotiate power and prestige within their peer groups (Goodwin 1990 Scott 2002). For other sociologists, generation provides the most useful concept to explain the lives of children (Mayall 2000120). Other researchers (Alanen 2001 Qvortrup 2000) assert that generational relationships are more meaty than analyses emphasising on gender, social class, or ethnicity. While the concept of childhood is not popular, the dichotomy of adult and child is oecumenic and differentiated by age status. This age status patterns differential power relations wherein adults have more power than children and adults typically regulate childrens lives.Childhood is produced as a response to the power of adults over children even when children are viewed as actively shaping their childhoods (Walkerdine 2004). Adults write childrens books, create childrens toys and activities, and often speak on behalf of children (e.g., the law). In this way, the generational divide and unequalised authority between adults and children define childhood. Mayall (2002) uses the generational approach to explain how children contribute to social interaction through their position in the big social order, wherein they hold a child status. The perspective of children remains important even through the disadadvantaged power relationship they hold vis--vis adults in the big social order. It can therefore become a balancing act between considering structural factors or the agency of children in understanding childhood. The life course perspective holds that individuals of each generation will experience life in a ridiculous way because these individuals share a bad-tempered epoch, political economy, and sociocultural context. Foner (1978) explains, Each age bracket bears the stamp of the historical context through which it flows so that no two cohorts age in exactly the same way (p. 343). For example, those who entered maturity during the Depression have different work, educational, and family experiences compared with individuals who entered adulthood during the affluent 1950s. Those of each cohort face the same larger social and political milieu and the refore may develop similar attitudes. The social structural child posits that childhood may be identify structurally by societal factors that are larger than age status but help create age status in a childhood operation (Qvortrup 1994). Children can be treated by researchers as having the same standing as adult research subjects but also may be handled differently based on features of the social structure. The resulting social structural child has a set of universal traits that are related to the institutional structure of societies (Qvortrup 1993). Changes in social norms or values regarding children are tied to universal traits as well as related to the social institutions within a particular society.demographic Approaches to Childhood StudiesMuch of American sociology takes a top-down approach to the study of children and views children as being interlinked with the larger family structure. It is in this vein that family instability leading to carve up, family poverty, and fa mily employment may affect childrens experiences. For example, Hernandez (1993) examines the American family using U.S. nosecount data from the twentieth century and notes a series of revolutions in the familysuch as in decreased family coat and the emergence of the two-earner familythat in turn affected childrens public assistance and childhood experiences. Children from smaller families and higher incomes typically attain more education and take higher-paid employment. Hernandez (1993) contends that mothers increased participation in work outside the home led to a labor get revolution, which in turn initiated a child care revolution, as the proportion of preschoolers with two working parents increased from 13 part in 1940 to 50 percent in 1987.to a greater extent novel data indicate that about 70 percent of the mothers of preschoolers work outside the home (U.S. Bureau of the Census 2002). This child care revolution changes the structure of childhood for most American child ren. date diary data indicate that the occur of childrens household chores increased from 1981 to 1997 (Hofferth and Sandberg 2001). Lee, Schneider, and Waite (2003) further note that when mothers work in the united States, children do more than their fathers to make up for the household labor gap caused when mothers work. Hence, expectations for children and childhood are altered because of a larger family framework of considerations and expectations. Family life structures childrens well-being. When marriages break up, there are real consequences in foothold of transitions and loss of income that children experience. The structural effects on children of living in smaller, more diverse, and less stable families are lock in being investigated. Moore, Jekielek, and Emig (2002) assert that family structure does matter in childrens lives and that children fare wear in families headed by two biological, conjoin parents in a low- strife marriage. Some research indicates that fin ancial support from fathers after a dissociate is low (Crowell and Leaper 1994). Coontz (1997) maintains that divorce and single parenthood generally worsen preexisting financial uncertainty. These impoverished conditions may diminish childrens physical and emotionalBryant-45099Part III.qxd10/18/2006743 PMPage cxlvThe Sociology of Children and youth 145development and adversely affect school performance and social behaviors. However, this is not in all cases. Research (Cherlin et al. 1991) shows that children of separated or divorced families have usually experienced parental conflict and behavioral and educational problems before the family stony-broke up. Hernandez (1993) suggests that the parental conflict and not the divorce or separation may provide more insight into childrens disadvantages. Hetherington and Kelly (2002) found that about three-fourths of children whose parents divorced modify within six years and graded the same on behavioral and educational outcomes as children from intact families. Another study (Smart, Neale, and Wade 2001) finds positive attributes of children of divorce as children reported that they were more independent than friends who had not experienced divorce. The demographic study of children has interpreted place predominantly from the indemnity or public family vantage point with the trust that there are consequences for children. Childhoods are typically framed with a perspective that views childrens worlds as being derivative of larger social forces and structures. Very little agency is noted or measured in these studies. While the demographic approach does not offer detailed explanation deal research put forth by social constructivist childhood scholars (see James and Prout 1990), this approach provides a valuable perspective for material body and interpreting childrens lives.Socialization Approaches to Childhood StudiesResearch indicates that culture may affect both children and parents. Developmental psych ology allows us to consider how children are affected by the socialization provided by parents, and more recent research put forth by psychologists and sociologists suggests that this exchange of information may be a two-way process. LaReau (2002) puts forth a more traditional model of socialization as she details how American families of different races and classes provide different childhoods for their children. In her research, the focus is on how children and parents actively construct childhood even as they are maybe constrained by race and class. She found evidence for two types of child rearing, design cultivation among middle- and upper-middle-class children, and the emergence of natural growth among working- and lower-class children. LaReaus study describes the process that puts lower- and higher-class children on different roadstead in childhood that translate into immensely different opportunities in adulthood. Rossi and Rossi (1990) studied parent-child relationships across the life course and found that parents shape their children as well as their grandchildren through parenting styles, shared genes, social status, and belief systems. Alwin (2001) asserts that while rearing children is both a public and private matter, the daily teaching of children the rules and roles in society largely falls to parents. Furthermore, Alwin (2001) explains how American parental expectations for their children have changed over the stick out half-century, noting an increased emphasis on will power through childrens activities that help develop autonomy and self-reliance.Zinnecker (2001) notes a parallel track in Europe toward individualism and negotiation, and away from coercion in parenting styles. In contrast, Amberts (1992) The Effect of Children on Parents questions the assumptions of the socialization perspective and posits that socialization is a two-way process. Ambert argues that having children can influence ones health, income, occupational group o pportunities, values and attitudes, feelings of control, life plans, and the quality of social relations. She questions the causality of certain problematic childrens behaviors, such as clinginess among some raw children or frequent crying among untimely babies. Ambert contends that childrens behavior socializes parents in a patterned way, which agrees with the sentiment of de Winter (1997) regarding autistic children and that Skolnick (1978) regarding harsh child-rearing methods. Likewise, psychologist Harris (1998) argues that the parental nurture or socialization fails to ground the direction of actor with empirical data. She explains that parenting styles are the effect of a childs temperament and that parents socialization has little influence compared with other influences such as heredity and childrens peer groups.Harriss approach, known as group socialization theory, posits that after controlling for differences in heredity, little variance can be explained by childrens socialization in the home environment. Harris provides evidence that most children develop one behavioral system that they use at home and a different behavioral system for use elsewhere by middle childhood. Group socialization theory can then explain why immigrant children learn one verbiage in the home and another language outside the home, and their native language is the one they speak with their peers (Harris 1998). Likewise, other studies (Galinski 1999 Smart et al. 2001) find evidence that children play a substantiative role and nurture their parents. In a parallel but opposing direction, other studies suggest that having children negatively affects parents lifestyles and standards of living (Boocock 1976) and disproportionately and negatively affects womens career and income potentials (Crittenden 2001). Indeed, research indicates that socialization may affect both children and parents. While most research concentrates on the socialization of children by parents and socie tal institutions, more research should focus on the socialization of parents. In this way, children may be viewed as affecting the worlds of their parents, which in turn may affect children.Interdisciplinary Involvement and ImplicationsChildhood research benefits from the involvement of a diverse range of disciplines. On the surface these approaches bulge out to have disagreement in cost of methods and theoretical underpinnings, yet these approaches challenge more traditional disciplines such as sociology, psychology, and anthropology to consider what best interprets childrens lives. In some cases, the interaction acrossBryant-45099Part III.qxd10/18/2006743 PMPage 146146 THE SOCIOLOGY OF THE LIFE COURSEdisciplines creates new approaches, such as those of sociologists who use general socialization theory from developmental psychology. Similarly, historical research on the value of children being tied to a certain epoch with a specific level of political economy can inform the ra ting of children and their labor in poorer countries approximately the reality today. There is a need for act interdisciplinary collaboration, and thought is being tending(p) to how children and childhood studies could emerge as a recognized interdisciplinary field of inquiry. Woodhead (2003) offers three models for interdisciplinary effort for advancing the study of children and childhoods (1) a clearinghouse model, (2) a pick n fluff model, and (3) a rebranding model. The clearinghouse model (Woodhead 2003) would include all studies of children and childhood, all research questions and methodologies, and all disciplines that are interested. This clearinghouse model would view different approaches to the study of children for their complementary value and would support researchers to ask different but evenly valid questions (James et al. 1998188).The pick n mix model (Woodhead 2003) envisions that an array of child-centered approaches would be selectively included in the stud y of children. If this were to happen, the process of selection could complicate and hamper the field of childhood studies in general. Fences may be useful in terms of demarcating the path for childhood scholars but also may obstruct the vista on the other side. The rebranding model (Woodhead 2003) would involve researchers collaborating across disciplines on research involving children while informing and be housed within more traditional disciplines such as sociology, anthropology, and psychology. In this scenario, children and childhood scholars remain within sociology while also being committed to interdisciplinary involvement. This scenario has served to strengthen sociological research in general. For example, James and Prout (1990) coined the term sociological study of childhood, and later James et al. (1998) develop the concept of sociological child. More recently, Mayall (2002) has suggested the use of the term sociology of childhood to move children and childhood studies to a more primal place within sociology. In turn, this strengthens children and childhood studies across disciplines by forging a place for children in the traditional discipline. The field of interdisciplinary childhood studies has the potential to diversify its reach by creating constituencies across sr. disciplines. Additionally, childhood studies can learn from the development experience of other interdisciplinary handle such as womens studies or gerontology. Oakley (199413) asserts the shared concerns across the academic study of women and children because women and children are socially linked and represent social minority groups. In a similar vein, Bluebond-Langner (2000) notes a parallel in studious potential for childhood studies of the magnitude of womens studies, predicting that childhood studies will affect the twenty-first century in oftentimes the same way as womens studies has the twentieth century.Weighing the contributions across disciplines, it is clear tha t developmental psychology has laid the groundwork for the field of childhood studies, yet the resulting colloquy across scholars and disciplines has produced a field that is practically greater than the contributions of any one bestowdiscipline. Therefore, childhood scholars have such(prenominal) to gain through conversation and collaboration.CONSIDERING SOCIOLOGY AND CHILDHOOD STUDIESWithin sociology, scholars approach the study of children in many ways. Some sociologists take a austere social constructivist approach, while others meld this approach to a prism that considers social structures that are imposed on children. Some sociologists focus on demographic change, while others continue to focus on aspects of socialization as childhoods are constructed through forces such as consumer goods, child labor, childrens rights, and public policy. all told these scholars add to the research vitality and extensiveness of childhood studies. In addition, children and childhood stud ies research centers, degree programs, and courses began to be established in the 1990s, most of which have benefited from the contributions of sociologists and the theories and methods of sociology. Childhood studies gained riotous ground in 1992 in the United States when members of the American Sociological necktie (ASA) organize the Section on the Sociology of Children. Later, the section name was changed to the Section on the Sociology of Children and Youth to promote inclusiveness with scholars who research the lives of adolescents. In addition to including adolescents, American sociologists are also explicitly open to all methods and theories that focus on children. The schedule of the Children and Youth Section has been furthered by its members debut and continued publication of the annual account book Sociological Studies of Children since 1986. In agreement with the ASA section name addition, the volume recently increase the volume name with and Youth and became dec lare as the annual volume of ASA Children and Youth Section. The volume was initially developed and alter by Patricia and Peter Adler and later change by Nancy Mandell, David Kinney, and Katherine Brown Rosier. Outside the United States, the study of children by sociologists has gained extensive ground through the International Sociological Association Research Group 53 on Childhood, which was established in 1994. Two productive international journals, Childhood and Children and Society, promote scholarly research on children from many disciplines and approaches. In particular, British childhood researchers have brought considerable steam to the development of childhood studies through curriculum development.Specifically, childhood researchers wrote four prefatorial textbooks published by Wiley for a levelBryant-45099Part III.qxd10/18/2006743 PMPage 147The Sociology of Children and Youth 147class on childhood offered by the Open University in 2003. The books are instinct Chi ldhood by Woodhead and Montgomery (2003), Childhoods in Context by Maybin and Woodhead (2003), Childrens pagan Worlds by Kehily and Swann (2003), and Changing Childhoods by Montgomery, Burr, and Woodhead (2003). The relationship between the discipline of sociology and childhood studies appears to be symbiotic. Even as sociologists assert that the study of children is its own field, this does not preclude the development of childhood studies across disciplinary boundaries. Sociologists scram the social position or status of children and have the methods for examining how childhood is socially constructed or situated within a wedded society. Sociologists can also continue to find common ground with other childhood scholars from other disciplines to develop better methods and expand theories that explain childrens lives. Advances in the interdisciplinary field of childhood studies serves to strengthen the research of sociologists who focus their work on children. Likewise, sociolog ical challenges to the interdisciplinary field of childhood studies since the 1990s have provided useful points of critique and forward motion to the study of childrens behavior and childrens lives.CURRENT AND FUTURE RESEARCH fond POLICY AND CHILDRENS RIGHTS Current andfuture research on children falls into two main areas, social policy and childrens rights. Arguably, there is some overlap between these two large themes. Indeed, Stainton Rogers (2004) maintains that social policy is motivated by a concern for children, yet children have very little to no political or legal voice. Children do not vote or decide what is in their best interests or what childrens rights are. Social policy requires us to consider the intersection of children as dependents or not yet adults and children as having certain rights. It has previously been noted that children are citizens and should be treated as citizens but with their own concerns (James and Prout 1997), yet there is still much to be clari fied. Public policy can be used to improve the lives of children. Research has established that poverty matters in the lives of children, as measured in child well-being indicators, and public policies have been enacted to help families stick out out of poverty (Hernandez 1993). Research on the impact of increased income after a casino opened on a Cherokee reservation indicates that Native-American children who were raised out of poverty had a decreased incidence of behavior disorders (Costello et al. 2003). At other times, public policies affect children as a byproduct or consequence. One example is the 1996 Welfare tidy Law (or PRWORA), which made work authorization for able-bodied, American adults and put time limits of vanadium years and a day on receiving public assistance. Still, much is to be wise(p) as to the effect, if any, ofthis legislation on children (Bass and Mosley 2001 Casper and Bianchi 2002). In addition to income, public policy shapes the experience of family life by recognizing some forms while ignoring others. A substantial number of children will experience many family structures and environments as they bury through childhood, regardless of whether the government legitimates all these forms (Clarke 1996). Likewise, examining childrens experiences in various family forms is a useful area of current and future study. Childrens rights can be examined in terms of protecting children from an adult vantage point or in terms of providing children civil rights (or having a legal voice).The view of protecting children is a top-down approach positing that children are immature, and so legal protections should be accorded to keep children safe from harm and vitiate and offer children a basic level of developmental opportunities. In contrast, the civil rights approach asserts that children have the right to participate amply in decisions that may affect them and should be allowed the same freedoms of other citizens (Landsdown 1994 Saporiti e t al. 2005). In addition, the physique of childrens rights takes different forms in richer and poorer countries around the globe. For richer countries, granting children rights may involve allowing children civil and political voice, whereas in poorer countries, basic human rights bear out as more important. Child labor is an issue that has been examined in terms of the right of children to learn and be developed and the right of children to provide for oneself (see Bass 2004 Neiwenhuys 1994 Zelizer 1985). upcoming studies will also need to consider the relationship between childrens rights as children become study subjects. Innovative approaches are being used to include childrens voices and input in the research process (Leonard 2005), yet there is still much to be done in this area in terms of developing methodologies that allow children to participate in the research process. Indeed, incorporating children in the research process is a next logical step for childhood studies. H owever, childhood scholars are adults and therefore not on an equal footing with children (Fine and Sandstrom 1988). Furthermore, there is urge to include childrens perspectives in the research process at the same time that there is a growing concern for childrens well-being, which may be adversely affected by their participation as subjects in the research process. Future research on children should focus on the childrens issues through social policies yet also consider childrens rights in bicycle-built-for-two or as follow-up studies. It is generally the matter of course to take children or youth as a unequivocal given and then seek to clobber their problems or create policies for them. Future research should focus on practical childrens issues and use empirical research projects to increase our knowledge of the nature of childhood. The last 15 years provide evidence to support the idea that childhood researchers should continue to bridge circuit disciplines and even continen ts to find common ground.