On Temperament
Originally published in OHbaby! Issue 31, Spring 2015
Have you ever wondered about the ways that your kids are different from one another? Even when people have the same parents, the same influences, the same environment, there can be real variation in the way we encounter the world. What’s up with that?
Ditto your siblings - think about the ways you are the same or different from the folks you grew up with. You might’ve shared a room (even a womb!) but you are likely able to identify ways you are fundamentally different, as well as ways you’re the same.
These differences and similarities can likely be explained in a variety of ways, but one really useful lens to use when we’re considering the variables from one person to another is the one that comes with an understanding of temperament research.
Famously published by Alexander Thomas and Stella Chess in the late 1960’s after years of observation, the work included a description of nine temperamental traits. These traits are believed to be observable throughout a person’s lifespan, beginning in the first months of life.
It is thought that we all fall somewhere along a continuum for each of these traits, and - this is crucial - that there is no right or wrong way to be with any of these things. There is no good, there is no bad, there is only different. We’ll come back to that.
Below I’ve listed those which are believed to be the most constant for a whole lifetime in bold. The traits are:
Activity level
Does your body command you to move or invite you to be at rest? How active is this person? Is this a wriggly baby? Does this adult have a hard time sitting still for long periods?
Biological Rhythms
Is this a person who tends to get tired at fairly consistent times? Do you get hungry around the same time, or different times, each day? Can you predict your daughter’s poo schedule?
Approach/Withdrawal
Is Baby likely to observe a new person (new toy, new place) for a while, or will he crawl toward it immediately? Does a toddler music group, business meeting or cocktail party (remember those?) see you introducing yourself to new people or hanging back for a while?
Mood
Is your typical daily demeanour smiley or grumpy? How about your children? When they roll out of bed do they tend toward upbeat or downbeat?
Intensity of Reaction
How highs are your children’s highs? How low are your lows?
Sensitivity
How much do you notice humming lights, variations of temperature, or scratchy labels? Does sunlight in her eyes bother your baby a lot, a bit, or not at all?
Adaptability
How quickly do you tend to adjust to changes? Does a traffic detour throw you? A new piece of software? What would baby think of a changed-around bedroom? New food?
Distractibility
If you’re having a conversation and you can hear another conversation on the periphery, do you lose your train of thought? Can your child keep working on something when there are other things going on on the room?
Persistence
Is a 1000 piece puzzle your idea of a good time, or are 12 pieces more than enough? How soon is your urge to try a different strategy (or quit) when things aren’t working out? When your child has the opportunity for uninterrupted play, will he stay with one game for long or zoom between activities?
Alright, so it’s typical that we would all read those traits and run them through the filter of our own culture and our own experience. We are likely to prefer the expression of those traits in one way or another - perhaps we think being highly distractible is a failing, or maybe we can’t help but feel a bit judgey as we imagine someone with intense reactions feeling their high highs and low lows. There is the potential for smugness as we contemplate how we (or our kids) land on one continuum or another.
You might have even gotten away with a quiet bit of judging in the past, but temperament is another way that parenting will keep us honest and make us humble! We cannot predict how our babies will unfurl, or how our third baby might express herself in contrast to her big brothers.
Remember: there is no good or bad in the expression of these traits. We just are the way we are. So are our children. They are people who’ll unfold, not things to mould!
Over time, people may learn to amend their innate way of being in order to get along more easily with others. For example, my default setting is generally mildly Grouchy with a tendency toward Melancholy. However, most people don’t know that about me!
I have learned that if I smile more, practice gratitude and ‘fake it till I make it’ in terms of projecting a sunshiney mood, I tend to generate a more positive response in others. Over time, this has contributed toward making me a more positive person in terms of my mood, but it doesn’t amend my deepest, truest expression of my temperament. I’m a surly girlie who is also a happy, grateful mama. Both things are true.
This fits with the equation as described by Peter Mangione, researcher at WestEd Education Laboratory in California and co-creator of the Program for Infant Toddler Care (PITC), who teach temperament among other child development topics to teachers and others in the USA. Peter Mangione says: “Temperament plus experience equals personality”.
So while we might use our life experience to work with our natural temperamental tendencies, it is foolish and unhelpful to deny the existence of those natural temperamental tendencies. And they’re not good, they’re not bad, they just are what they are.
The challenge for parents and other caregivers is to practice some radical acceptance around these temperamental traits. Self acceptance, and acceptance of our children’s way of being, too. Because time and again the research points to “Goodness of Fit” as being a vital component in building a healthy relationship and creating a healthy self-image.
This concept of Goodness of Fit does not mean that we have to be just like our children in order to best care for them, but it does challenge us to meet them where they are and care for them in a way that honours their inborn temperament.
An example: imagine a ten month old baby boy who is at the “highly sensitive” end of the continuum for that particular trait. For him, the loud noises of his sister’s video game are overwhelming, the smell of grandad’s aftershave makes a farewell kiss hard work, and having socks that are too tight (you know: red marks around chunky wee ankles) is just about unbearable. (Forget for a moment that Baby’s expression of these irritants is influenced by his position on other trait continuums, like “mood” or “intensity of reaction”!)
If that ten month old is cared for by a mum who is at the low end of the sensitivity continuum, she might not even notice those things herself. She might barely hear the video game, not notice the aftershave. If she doesn’t tend to feel irritated by too-tight clothing she mightn’t consider the discomfort that those red elastic marks represent on her baby boy’s ankles.
This doesn’t mean that mama is a meanie or a monster. It just means she’s used to experiencing the world the way that she experiences it. Just as we all do! But, if that mama is aware of temperament and has taken time to observe her son and wonder - just wonder - where he might sit along the various continuums, she will be in a much better position to meet him where he is, and to provide Goodness of Fit.
In this example, mum does not need to change anything about her expression of her own temperament, nor does she need to try and change anything about her son - there is nothing wrong with being sensitive to external stimuli. It just means she pays attention to those details for her son. If he’s cranky she might think “oh, the light is shining right in his eyes. That mightn’t bother me, it mightn’t have bothered his sister, but it bothers him!” So she says “hang on love, I’ll move that lamp for you”.
The highly active parent might have to amend the activity plan for the child who prefers to sit and read. Not all the time, maybe, but just with an acceptance that says “it’s oK to experience the world in the way that you experience it!”. The parent who prefers to hang back and observe might have to learn radical self-acceptance (because that is a fine way to be!) even as he parents a daughter who barrels up to introduce herself to strangers at the playground (because this is also a fine way to be!).
This concept is key, because providing Goodness of Fit has been associated with some really important outcomes, even the development of self-regulation. In the words of PITC: “there is Goodness of Fit when we handle a child and make demands in a manner that enables the child to meet the demands successfully. There is poorness of fit when when the parent’s or caregiver’s expectations are beyond the child’s temperamental abilities.”
So if we’re talking about a highly distractible child, and we’re trying to get him dressed and out the door to kindergarten - it would be a display of temperamentally aware, Goodness of Fit-ish parenting to turn off the television and allow him to concentrate on the task at hand. Poorness of fit might look like expecting the child to focus on getting dressed while Doc McStuffins is doing her thing in the background.
Over time, these conscious, repeated experiences can really contribute to a child’s sense of self. Accepting a child’s expression of those nine traits in the way we accept our child’s brown eyes, or left-handed-ness, goes a long way to communicate to them that they are just fine. Imagine a child having to wonder: Is the way I exist on this earth acceptable? Am I OK? Can I succeed in the world? If a child is consistently labeled, criticised or belittled for their inborn traits it can be really unhelpful. It’s the modern-day version of slapping a child’s knuckles for picking up the pen with her left hand.
Much follow-up research has been done since Thomas and Chess published their pioneering work. For example in 2004 Theodore Wachs defined various influences on temperament, adding an important biological component to our understanding.
Genes
Brain Processes
Family Environment
Nutrition
Culture
Biomedical Conditions
Toxic Substances
This deeper understanding of temperament research creates a cool developmental loop, where temperament influences family environment, and family environment influences temperament. Cosmic!
One final point, friends, and then I’ll leave you to rush off to www.b-di.com (b-di stands for behavioural diversity) so you can do some temperament assessments for yourself (do the whole family - it might explain some things!).
This final point comes from the wonderful Dr. Ron Lally, also from PITC. He reminds us that “Fairness to children is not treating each child the same”.
Miriam McCaleb has been a kindergarten teacher, a university lecturer and is a certified trainer for PITC. She is mama to two great girls. Understanding temperament research was revolutionary in Miriam’s life, contributing to marital harmony as she realised that her husband’s tendency to listen to music, work on the computer and watch television all at once was not an act of war. She’s just highly sensitive to external stimuli, and that is OK!
Visit her at www.baby.geek.nz