In today's world, it is almost the norm for children to be
out of the house for part of each day while mothers go to
work. In 1991, the National Institute of Child Health and
Human Development (NICHD) initiated a comprehensive
longitudinal study of almost 2000 children from various
social walks of life. The participating children were in a
variety of child care arrangements, ranging from relatives to
center-based care, for a part of each day. Phase I of the
study was conducted from 1991 - 1994, and followed children
from birth to three years. Phase II followed these children
between 1995 - 2000 through their third year in school. The
next phase is slated to continue till 2005, but already the
findings are alarmingly clear.
The NICHD does not have our hashkofa nor did they
study children from our particular background. Moreover,
investigators often draw on the same research studies but
interpret the findings differently. Below is a very abridged
form of their findings, and before mothers get hot under the
collar about pontificating researchers, we will discuss our
own children and whether any of these findings apply to
them.
The more hours that toddlers spend in child care, the more
likely they are to turn out aggressive, disobedient and
defiant by the time they are in kindergarten.
This correlation holds true regardless of whether children
come from rich or poor homes, regardless of their sex and
regardless of whether they are looked after by a nanny or at
a day care center. The findings throughout these ten years
were alarmingly conclusive. On the other hand, one view is
that quality day care from infancy clearly has a positive
effect on children's verbal and cognitive development,
especially when children come from homes where they are not
well stimulated. This does not preclude the fact that their
behavior is affected if they are sent out of the house for
more than ten hours a week, especially in the first two years
of their lives.
To summarize, there seems to be little doubt that children
who are given out for care, regardless how good the
arrangements are, are less well off than those children who
are looked after by mothers at home. Babies who are fed
exactly when they want to be fed, picked up and rocked every
time they cry, in short, who are looked after by a mother who
is their devoted slave, seem to surpass their peers in most
things. Older children, too, whose mothers are not at home
when they come from school are at a decided disadvantage.
Research into human behavior has several drawbacks. First of
all, the subjects and their parents have to be willing to be
studied. Secondly, the care the children receive is studied
by the researcher's standards. For instance, the yiras
Shomayim which a child might receive from an unqualified
caregiver can far outweight all the verbal and cognitive
development which are the secular criteria. Lastly, in spite
of the check list of the yardstick on which the child and the
caregiver are measured, the researchers themselves are human
beings, not computers. Thus, what one might class as
disruptive behavior, the other, from a different culture,
might feel is good healthy class participation.
For example, an observer walking into a roomful of thirty-
five cheder boys may not find a quiet controlled
atmosphere. Yet the six-year-old boys may be doing very well
according to their rebbe's standards and expectations. This
particular rebbe does not insist on a quiet classroom. Since
some of these boys may well have been out of the house since
the age of three months, the question arises whether they are
worse off than those who have been at home with their mothers
since birth.
Many mothers go out to work because they want to do so.
Either because they think that being `just a housewife' is in
some way degrading to a girl who had a successful career
before she was married, and they are bored at home. Or
because they feel that the extra income makes all the
difference between being able to afford a few luxuries, or
only having just enough for the bare essentials.
These mothers might do well to consider the findings in this
research and look after their own precious children for the
first two or three years of the babies' lives. Furthermore,
once the children start school, the mothers would do well to
see their children off in the mornings, and to be there to
greet them and give them time and attention when they come
home. Some mothers find, to their dismay, that their baby is
more attached to the babysitter than to them! Older children,
too, tend to confide in a nanny, or maybe a grandmother who
has looked after them in their early years, rather than in
their mother. (Perhaps the Torah exempts women from all time-
bound mitzvos so that nothing should interfere with
the upbringing of their children.)
However, quite a large proportion of working mothers go out
to work out of sheer necessity. They are more or less the
sole breadwinners, as they want their husbands to be able to
learn, and thus, they are prepared to juggle the impossibly
difficult tasks of running a home, keeping a job and being a
good wife and mother. They do not particularly enjoy going to
work, but have no choice. Naturally, they will find the very
best care possible for their child. A capable and willing
grandmother is a wonderful mother substitute. Some
grandfathers are also eminently suitable. A babysitter who
takes in many little children in order to supplement her own
meager income, while she might live conveniently near, is not
always a wise choice, especially if she has a baby of her
own.
Some of these working mothers adjure the babysitter not to
let the child nap while he is in her care, since they want
the child to sleep as soon as s/he gets home so that she can
sleep, too. This is very logical, but not quite fair to the
child, on two counts. Firstly, when a toddler or baby wants
to sleep, he needs to sleep! And he will cry and be cranky
till he is allowed to do so. Secondly, a child needs the love
and attention of his own mother, in his own home, and the
fact that she works does not interest him in the least.
Mothers should not feel guilty if they cannot manage all the
time, but should bear in mind that the more time and
attention they give the child, the better it will be for both
of them.
As mentioned, many women go to work in order to buy bread and
milk for the family. It is essential that the children see a
happy face and contented demeanor. The working woman
supporting a learning husband is not a martyr, and must not
give her children that wrong impression. She is doing a
wonderful job because she WANTS to do it, and if she is fully
convinced of this fact, b'ezras Hashem, her children
will not be part of such `statistics' and will not have the
negative characteristics of those children who have been
cared for by others. Incidentally, I doubt if any of the
children who participated in this study came from families of
a dozen or more children...
