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Show SUCCESSFUL PARENTHOOD The theme of the recent Mid - century White House Conference on Children and Youth was. "For Every Child a Healthy Personality." Two years of fact finding by a staff recruited from universities, universi-ties, national, governmental and voluntary agencies went into a preliminary report which states the essentials for providing children with a chance at healthy adjustment to living. This report is so full of understanding that, when it is published in the spring, it should equal in popularity that fabulous government pub-. pub-. lication. "Infant Care," which has sold in millions. We can give you only an inkling of the insight, inspiration inspira-tion and plain good sense contained con-tained in this fact finding report re-port of the conference. Work in the field of personality developed de-veloped is still so new that the report lays no claim to giving the final answers. Even the definition of a healthy personality per-sonality is offered as a tentative tenta-tive one, though is seems to us satisfactory. It reads: " . . the individual with a healthy personality is one who actively active-ly masters his environment, shows a unity of personality, and is able to perceive the world and himself correctly." The attributes of a healthy personality are also described as "the ability to love and the ability to work. What makes up a healthy personality? Few of us have all the components, com-ponents, but a preponderance of favorable attributes usual- growth into a reasonable, mature ma-ture and happy person. Here are the basic needs according to the combined thinking of the authorities in many fields consulted by the conference fact finding staff: 1. The sense of trust. The child learns to trust or mistrust mis-trust the world in the first year of life according to the response to his needs. If it is warm and loving, even if mistakes mis-takes are made in interpreting interpret-ing the baby's actual needs, the sense of trust will take root. 2. The sense of autonomy. Proving to himself and the world that he is a person in his own right, with a mind and a will of his own. is the next concern of the child from one to three. But this sence of independence must be coupled with the ability to accept and use the guidance of others if the personality is to grow in healthy ways. 3. The sense of initiative. The enterprise and imagination imagina-tion of the four and five-year-old needs encouragement for the development of the special initiative required for the child to select eventually his social goals and make the best use of his talents. 4. The sense of accomplishment. accomplish-ment. This fourth stage, from about 6 to 11, is almost bound to be successful for the child who has achieved the first three steps in developing a sound personality. In this period per-iod the child learns to work at tasks and finish them. The value is not in the actual tasks accomplished but in the sense of competence acquired, as contrasted with the sense of inadequacy which may become be-come the lifelong burden of the child who has little or no experience ex-perience of success in these years. These four steps bring us to adolescence, as well as to the end of our space. Next week we will outline further development devel-opment of the healthy personality person-ality as the child enters the grown up world. |