Why do some parents rear competent children and others fail? What makes an excellent parent? Here is new understanding that all parents vitally need. Modern parents have been inundated with theories of child psychology. They have been warned about everything from potty training to supposedly inevitable stages of increasing delinquency. But too often, parents have not been told what positive actions they can take to help their children develop to the fullest. Why this lack of knowledge? Surprisingly, it's because psychologists haven't really known what an excellent parent does. Most child psychology theories remain unproved - and a great many of these try to explain abnormal development, rather than to identify what goes into optimal child rearing. "Little is actually known," claims Harvard's Burton White, "about the age range, six days to two-and-a half years" - a rather upsetting statement in the midst of an explosion of writing on early child development. Isn't it time we began to have answers to parents' unanswered questions?
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