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Agreed!!! But as far as i am concerned its nurture. Babies rather people know only what is taught to them. This goes hand in hand with Your Baby Can Read. It creates a bond with the parent because the parent is fostering the learning of the child and teaching them skills that they can use later on in life.
I agree that bonding is crucial at the early years of life. It is important to create that nurturing bond while they are young. Can that bond be fostered and strengthened by teaching ASL to infants? Is that a way for infants to connect to their caregiver on a different level?
It's not really two different topics. ALS and bonding IS a nature versus nurture topic in itself. An interesting paper would address all four IMO.
The topic of teaching ASL to infants/children is very interesting. Does ASL influence a different bonding experience between child and caregiver? Or is it just nurture taking its course and the child/caregiver would have this bonding relationship without the use of ASlL? Is this a different level of bonding that occurs, as the child is aware that the caregiver understands them thus creating a "tighter bond" that may not happen in other cases?
Agreed!!! But as far as i am concerned its nurture. Babies rather people know only what is taught to them. This goes hand in hand with Your Baby Can Read. It creates a bond with the parent because the parent is fostering the learning of the child and teaching them skills that they can use later on in life.
Thank you! I agree it creates and fosters a bond that is between the parent and they are able to communicate on a new level with the child. Thank you
[SIZE=3]Research has shown that forming a bonding relationship between parent and child helps with the formation of intimate relationships later in life. Early bonding is said to have an influence on self-esteem for the child. Bonding between parent and child can be accomplished by using American Sign Language. Babies lack the type of motor skills that enable speech but do have the ability to understand and use language well before they are able to do so verbally. Does American Sign Language foster bonding between parent and child which can be influential later in life? Or is it debate between nurture verses nature?[/SIZE]
Well of course the important thing here is AMERICAN sign language.
Actually it is well known that pretty much everyone in the world speaks american. you know that form of english that is spoken to non english speakers. Slowly and very loudly. and if they don't get it well they must be *&^%&%#$
ASL can be very instumental in assisting with bonding between individuals, but I feel that there is a stretch in the research to state that bonding early in life is what leads to higher self-esteem, etc. There is a defintely correlation between early life events and later life events. I believe that there is a true mixture of nature and nurture when it comes to children and how they grow, but one of more does not mean less of another.
There are many circumstances in which there is more nurture than nature but children end up the same.
I also think other factors, including motivation and experience help with the esteem later in life.
My older daughter knew 200+ signs by the time she was 21 months old (and I stopped counting). That was a lot more words than she could speak, but she did also speak just fine. Many people use "baby signs" just to teach their babies how to communicate basic needs, but we chose to teach all sorts of signs for more communication. I loved knowing that she saw a bird outside, before she could say it. It really showed me that she was really a little person inside that baby body, with her own independent thoughts and observations. And I never really thought about it that way, but maybe it did help our bonding because she was really able to communicate that with me at an early age.
My younger daughter is "delayed". She is almost 2, but she doesn't really talk. She has about 10 spoken words. We have also taught her ASL, which was also recommended by her therapists, and she has about 35 ASL signs now. Most of them are of the practical variety - EAT, DRINK, MILK, MORE, FINISHED, COLD, DIAPER, HELP, HURT, BED, etc. But she is starting to learn some others, like SOCKS, SHOES, BERRY, DOG, BOOK, BABY, etc. With a child who is a late talker, it has been really so helpful that she can sign to communicate her needs with us.
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I think that most of the bonding process is nurture, though I do think there is some nature component there as well. What I'm thinking of specifically, is that I know that some people have higher levels of OXTR - Oxytocin Receptor - than others. People with higher levels of this receptor could be more sensitive to oxytocin, which is a hormone involved in bonding. Some studies have shown that mothers with OXTR GG genotype display increased sensitivity to infant crying, for example. Oxytocin is also released by infant suckling, so breastfeeding promotes bonding, but perhaps moreso in some mothers than others depending on their genetics.
Very interesting, ADVentive! Are you planning on teaching them a foreign language? It would be interesting to see how quickly and easily they'd pick it up since they were using language (ASL)before they would have (spoken English) normally.
My older daughter is very interested in all foreign languages. She says that she prefers to listen to music in other languages now because "I already *know* English!" haha
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ASL and Bonding
