Parental bonding=happy, stable child

http://now.uiowa.edu/2012/10/parental-bonding-makes-happy-stable-child

By: Richard C. Lewis Oct. 11, 2012

Parents: Want to help ensure your children turn out to be happy and socially well adjusted? Bond with them when they are infants.

That’s the message from a study by the University of Iowa, which found that infants who have a close, intimate relationship with a parent are less likely to be troubled, aggressive or experience other emotional and behavioral problems when they reach school age. Surprisingly, the researchers found that a young child needs to feel particularly secure with only one parent to reap the benefits of stable emotions and behavior, and that being attached to dad is just as helpful as being close to mom.

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“There is a really important period when a mother or a father should form a secure relationship with their child, and that is during the first two years of life. That period appears to be critical to the child’s social and emotional development,” says Sanghag Kim, a post-doctoral researcher in psychology at the UI who collaborated with UI psychology professor Grazyna Kochanska on the study. “At least one parent should make that investment.”

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Some questions need further study. Among them is whether day-care providers can serve as effective care givers, providing emotional support for infants, or whether they interfere with an infant's ability to bond with the parents.