IN THE past thirty years, we have witnessed a huge increase in the amount of time young children spend away from mothers in institutional daycare or in the care of relatives or hired babysitters. Studies have shown that this non-maternal care affects childhood behavior. But very little has been written about how non-maternal care affects the individual over the long term. 

The Rev. James Jackson, pastor of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church in Littleton, Colorado, wrote this fascinating essay about the possible links between daycare and anti-social behavior by college students. He included the essay in his pastoral bulletin yesterday.  I have never heard a priest or preacher speak out against the scourge of daycare. Judging from what churches have said on the growth of institutional care for children, one would think it was a non-issue, rather than a pressing threat to the individual and society.

Here is Rev. Jackson’s essay: 

                                                                                      ON DAYCARE

The latest issue of First Things gives a rather grim analysis of the state of our graduate schools. I say graduate schools for though they are still called universities, that’s probably a misnomer, given that the real meaning of that Latin word is “to turn one around.” In other words, there doesn’t seem to be a center any longer to them, and we may as well call them multiversities. 

The grimness of the analysis is partially the result of looking at the binge drinking and hook-up cultures which are rampant at our colleges. …  But how should we account for this great increase of such very destructive behavior? For one answer, I want to use some psychology, which can be very helpful in this case, and I’ll start with some of the common characteristics of adult attachment problems. 

Adults with attachment problems have difficulty handling conflict with other adults, tend to deny responsibility for wrong-doing, have control problems manifested in covertly manipulative or overtly hostile ways, have difficulty showing empathy, remorse, trust, and compassion with others, have a lack of ability to give and receive genuine affection or love, are resistant to efforts to nurture or guide, lack cause-and-effect thinking, are superficially charming and engaging, feel isolated and depressed, and engage in addictive behaviors (substance abuse, sexual addiction, work addiction, etc.). They may show some or all of these problems. 

A study that came out in 2002 (cf. Archives of General Psychiatry, Dec. 2008) which found that nearly 50% of the college age students endorsed some sort of psychiatric condition within the previous year (conditions listed above), and 1 in 5 endorsed behaviors consistent with personality disorder, second only to alcohol abuse. Most did not receive any treatment. Keep in mind that personality disorders and substance abuse are the disorders which are the most resistant to psychological treatment. 

How do we account for this? Many things come to mind, but we should consider daycare, since if you put on a graph the huge upswing of these problems, and put next to it the huge upswing of children in daycare centers, you see quite a pattern. In other words, the more children in daycare, the greater the binge drinking and hook-up there are fifteen years later. I think this is not a coincidence. 

First, we should admit that this concerns a good portion of our population in America. It is estimated that somewhere between 61-76% of all U.S. children under the age of five are in some sort of institutional, non-maternal care. Thirty years ago the number was more like 25%. Moreover, some of these children are in multiple childcare environments. 

Second, if you take a good work on the subject of how children attach to adults (The Developing Mind, 1999, Daniel Siegel, M.D.) you find the following observations: “The brain is the social organ of the body and for its health development we need interpersonal experiences that are consistent across time. The basic relationship that a child has with their caregivers helps them establish a way of regulating their emotions. In the early years of life neural networks are established in the brain that will be utilized throughout the person’s life. Attachment at its core is based on parental sensitivity and responsivity to the child’s signals, which allow for collaborative parent-child communication. Contingent communication gives rise to secure attachment and is characterized by a collaborative give-and-take of signals between the members of the pair. Contingent communication relies on the alignment of internal experiences, or states of mind, between child and caregiver. This mutually sharing, mutually influencing set of interactions – this emotional attunement of mental state resonance – is the essence of healthy, secure attachment. Suboptimal attachments arise with repeated patterns of non-contingent communication.” 

The tortured English aside (you can’t say “lousy” in a scientific paper, you have to say “suboptimal”); “non-contingent communication” (talking to strangers?) and that strange word “caregiver” aside (it speaks of an institutionalization of what should be a very nurturing bond – a grace-filled bond of parent and child), you see the problem. If parent A drops off his child at the daycare, and caregiver A takes over for the day, with parent B picking up the child and taking over for the evening, but then caregiver A has Tuesday off so caregiver B takes over the next day…you get the picture. To put it simply, the brain of a child is made to attach to someone. But the more “parents” in the mix, the more difficult this attachment is to make. And if there is more than one daycare institution involved, the problem is even worse. If the child receives their food, warmth, comfort, attention etc, not primarily from their parents, but from many people, then his ability to attach decreases with each decreasing giving of care by the parent. 

Results from another study (Violato and Russell, The Changing Family and Child Development, 2000) show that there was a small negative effect of non-maternal care in the in the cognitive and social-emotional domains; that there were large negative effects for non-maternal care for behavioral outcomes and relational development, and that males tended to fare more poorly with non-maternal care than did females in all four domains measured. These four domains were: a) cognitive, b) social-emotional [this domain looks at whether individuals can even identify socially appropriate behaviors], c) behavioral [this domain looks at whether the person can engage in behaviors which are consistent with their beliefs], and d) attachment. 

To put this simply, it means that a young man might be able to recite what the Church teaches about morality, but will likely be unable to apply it to his actions the more he has received his care non-maternally. This issue of attachment is also very important because it can not only affect relationships on a natural level, but also on a supernatural level, and thus it affects radically the ability to be friends with God. It has profound implications for vocations to the priestly and religious life, since those depend on the ability to attach to God. 

I say all this as an answer to several who have asked what I thought about daycare in general. I hope the above is a sufficient, though I’m sure it’s not a complete answer.

                                                            — Comments —

Laura writes:

It’s worth noting that even children in maternal care can suffer from attachment problems. Not all women are able or willing to give their children adequate care. However, a child away from his mother much of the time may have attachment problems even if he has a nurturing mother.

Jill F. writes:

The church is contributing to the process; all over the U.S. churches rush to start preschools and “mothers day out” programs. What message is the church sending to women everywhere when they establish such programs? That mothers need “deliverance” and “help” to relieve the burden of child rearing. The Bible addresses the challenges of motherhood in the book of Titus where it is written, “the older women are to teach the younger women how to respect their husbands and love their children…”. This leads me to believe that learning to “love” our children does not always come naturally and that it CAN be taught. In viewing the teachings of scripture as a whole, the way that we learn best is in the context of family, especially families across the generations.

As the mother of many, I often tell the younger women not to be surprised that mothering is such hard work, both physically and emotionally and spiritually… and shouldn’t it be? We are shaping souls and the arduous task of doing this transforms us as well. We should not be taken aback that when we choose to send our children away from us for most of the day hurts not only their tender souls but ours in the process.

Laura writes:

With so few women home, it really can be a problem for a mother of young children to do basic things like go to the dentist or do shopping. The ideal thing is to share babysitting with other women. Church nursery schools that meet for a few hours a week do come in handy when there are not these alternatives. However, I agree with what you say: there are aspects of raising children that just don’t come naturally and women aren’t prepared for it all today. They are so busy in their pre-mothering years. They have no time to anticipate what is ahead and mentally prepare for it. 

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