John and Elizabeth Newson investigate the upbringing of seven hundred Nottingham children as they reach the age of four. Parents are interviewed in their homes with a realistic yet human approach and the minimum of technical jargon, and the open-ended questions allow them to produce 'a detailed and descriptive study of how parents do in fact treat their children and - equally important - how children treat their parents.'
No one can fail to be impressed by the concern and perceptiveness shown by mothers of all classes, different though their approach may be to the common problems of the parent - child relationship.
This book was first published in 1968.
1. Background and introduction
2. The child in his context
3. Focus on four-year-olds
4. Pressures for independence
5. Social learning and the control of aggression
6. Rights and privileges of property and play
7. Shared and private worlds
8. Mealtimes and manners
9. Must we to bed indeed?
10. Rituals and comfort habits
11. Coda to toilet training
12. Who told thee that thou wast naked?
13. Patterns of persuasion and compulsion
14. Verbalization and the question of truth
15. Satisfaction and doubt in the parental role
Biography
John Newson, Elizabeth Newson
