Notes on the development of a child

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Hook^iiLS

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Contents

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Publisher's Note.

List of Errata.

Introduction

It is a well-recognized fact in the history of science that the very subjects which concern our dearest interests, which lie nearest our hearts, are exactly those which are the last to submit to scientific methods, to be reduced to scientific law. Thus it has come to pass that while babies are born and grow up in every household, and while the gradual unfolding of their faculties has been watched with the keenest interest and intensest joy by intelligent and even scientific fathers and mothers from time immemorial, yet very little has yet been done in the scientific study of this most important of all possible subjects, — the ontogenic evolution of the faculties of the human mind. Only in the last few years has scientific attention been drawn to the subject at all. Its transcendent importance has already enlisted many observers, but on account of the great complexity of the phenomena, and still more the intrinsic difficulty of their interpretation, scientific progress has scarcely yet commenced.

What is wanted most of all in this, as in every science, is a body of carefully observed facts. But to be an accomplished investigator in this field requires a rare combination of qualities. There must be a wide intelligence, combined with patience in observing and honesty in recording. There must be also an earnest scientific spirit, a loving sympathy with the subject of investigation, yet under watchful restraint, lest it cloud the judgment; keenness of intuitive perception, yet soberness of judgment in interpretation.

Now I am quite convinced, from my intimate acquaintance with her, and especially from a careful examination of her work,

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iv Introduction.

that Miss Shinn possesses many of these qualities in an eminent degree. The careful, painstaking, patient, intelligent character of her observations must be evident to every reader. The perfect honesty of the record and the really earnest scientific spirit in which the investigation is undertaken and pursued to the end, are equally certain. I am sure, too, I easily detect evidence of the loving, sympathetic relation with the subject, necessary for insight and yet not sufificient to obscure the judgment.

I am quite convinced, therefore, that the observations herein recorded are thoroughly reliable. If so, it is impossible to overestimate their importance. Of course, interpretation must go hand in hand with observation and record; and interpretation in a subject so difficult, must be more or less doubtful ; but Miss Shinn has shown singular wisdom in the caution and modesty with which she draws her conclusions. I feel quite confident that the work as a whole deserves, and will receive, the thoughtful attention of Psychologists as a valuable addition to the materials of their science.

Joseph Le Conte.

NOTES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF A CHILD.

The child of whose development the following record was kept was born and has continuously lived on a fruit ranch near Niles, in the neighborhood of San Francisco Bay. Her parentage is purely American, all four grandparents being descended from early colonists, — three from New England settlers, the fourth from New Jersey and Virginia Quakers. I have a detailed record of the conditions of health and longevity of her kin for two generations preceding her; in general these were good, and there is in none of the four grandparental lines any family tendency to disease of any sort.

The temperaments of both parents are sanguine, fond of pleasure and change. The education of the father was a university special course in history and sociology, taken after thirty years of age; the earlier education was considerable but unsystematic, mainly literary and historical. That of the mother was systematic through the high school period, ending at seventeen years. The occupation of the father up to the time of her birth had been chiefly journalistic and literary; of the mother, teaching for two years before marriage; her remoter ancestors were almost all farming and seafaring people. The ages of her father and mother at the time of her birth were respectively thirty-eight and twenty-two years.

She was at birth a strong, active, good-natured baby^ without defect, and her health has been (now up to the last quarter of the third year) practically perfect. She was born two weeks late, — a point that may have some bearing on the rapidity of early development. The conditions of climate and opportunities for outdoor life have been singularly favorable.

She has been the only child in a large household of grown people, and the object of a great deal of attention. She has never been for an hour in the care of a servant, has never been secluded in a nursery, but kept in the midst of the family. She has been taken about a great deal with her parents upon short raih'oad and hotel trips. The general tendency of her environment has been in my judgment toward developing a liking for change and excitement,, and unfavorable to continuous attention.

The record as here given is an abstract of copious notes kept from day to day, set down in many cases instantly upon the occurrence, and always very promptly. I have admitted in a few instancesoccurrences reported to me by the child's mother and grandmother,, but none reported by any other person (except two in the first month by the nurse); in these cases I have always stated that the note was at second hand. I am under obligation throughout to the mother for invaluable co-operation.

TJie Development of a Child.

MEASURExMENTS.i

Weight.

Height.

Weight.

Height.

At birth I mo

3 4 5 6

7 8

9 lo II

9 lbs. (naked) ...

II " (in clothes)

13 "

15 "

(measurement unsatis

19 in factory) 24 25 n.

At i3mos

14 15 16

17 18

19 20 21 22

23 24

Girth around breast, in first month, 15 inches; at six months, 17^ inches; at one year, 18^ inches.

The measurements of height during the first year seemed to me of little value, because the child's struggling disconcerted them, in spite of every care. Each measurement, however, was repeated three or four times. They were taken by holding the baby straight upon a sheet of cardboard, the head against a fixed point, and marking at the heels. The measurement of height at eight months seems certainly wrong.

At twelve months the measurement was taken both by laying her upon a sheet of cardboard, and by having her stand against the wall. Standing she measured 28 inches. During the second year, the measurements were taken standing, each one three times or more. The child was interested in the process, and tried to stand still and straight.

I have compared the record of weight carefully with my notes

Following Galton's charts.

as to the child's health, appetite, spirits, etc., but without finding a constant relation. During the first half year the weight increases without any marked fluctuation, though between the third and fifth months the ratio declines, and this may be due to the fact that near the end of the fifth month the mother's nursing was slightly supplemented by other food; after this change she was a little fretful for about a week; she also had two teeth coming, which were cut just after the close of the month. In the ninth and tenth months six more teeth were cut, and during these months and the eleventh she was weaned; durmg the eleventh her appetite was noticeably diminished, and she had several slight colds and touches of digestive derangement, and during the twelfth a persistent cold. Yet the only month that shows any falling off in weight, or even any marked check in increase, is the tenth.

In the second year again the only month that shows a decrease of weight is the thirteenth, in which no reason appeared for this beyond a slight digestive derangement in the third week, with impaired appetite. During the fifteenth month the increase in weight is especially large and an increase of appetite was noticed; yet by this month dentition had fairly begun again, and the first molar came through early in the moni-h. In the rest of the year, the increase in weight month by month is very uniform^ except for a check in the nineteenth and twentieth, and another somewhere between the twenty-first and twenty-third. Yet the teething was distributed quite equally through these months to the end of the nineteenth, with accompanying rash; and she had more or less cold each month before the twentieth. The severest cold and cough was in the nineteenth month, and was quite enough to account for the check in increase of weight; but no corresponding reason for the continued check in the twentieth appeared; nor, on the other hand, does any marked increase in weight attend the perfect physical vigor after the completion of dentition. In the seventeenth month and thereafter till the twenty-third, a vague loss in gayety and physical buoyancy was quite perceptible, though there was almost no fretfulness, and the child's muscular strength was considerable, for late in the eighteenth month (538th day) she

^ More rigidly so as the scales recorded no fractions under half pounds.

Shinn.] The Dcvelopjuent of a Child. 9

picked up with one hand a flatiron, which weighed seven pounds, and walked off a yard or two with it. In the latter part of the year, and especially the twenty-fourth month, she seemed overflowing with physical energy, often jumping about and squealing in sheer exuberance of spirits. Yet her increase of weight was the .same in the seventeenth and twenty-fourth months.

A weekly record would very likely give clearer results.

SIGHT.

I. Sensibility to Light.

The child seemed quite conscious of the difference between light and darkness the first day. At about an hour old, she stopped crying instantly when a cover was lifted from her face; and her eyes certainly turned toward any person who came near her, from this time on through the first and second weeks. As she did not really look at anyone before the fourth week, I could only suppose that she saw an approaching person as an interruption of the light; her eyes turned toward us, however, when we did not pass between her and the window. The nurse said that her head and eyes turned toward the lamp from the first night on.

In the third, fourth, and fifth weeks she gazed at light surfaces with apparent satisfaction, especially the light of the lamp on the ceiling, the face of one holding her, if it was turned toward the light, and most of all her mother's forehead, where the wave of dark hair rolled away, contrasting with the white skin. On the twenty-first day her mother and grandmother noticed her steady gaze at a black silk dress crossed with white stripes.

The twenty-fifth day I observed convulsive shutting of the eyes against dazzling light, or against moderate light after sleep or after darkness, exactly as described by Preyer; at moderate light under other conditions the baby gazed with apparent comfort.

In the fifth week, twenty-ninth day, she first went outdoors; she seemed to dislike the light, and kept her eyes shut.

After this, pleasure in gazing at bright surfaces was gradually displaced by interest in faces. In the sixth week, however, the baby gazed a good deal at the angle of the ceiling and wall where a dark border joined the light ceiling. In the seventh week (forty-seventh day) she stopped in the midst of fretting to gaze through an open window at white clothes hanging in the sunlight.

In the twenty-fifth week she was evidently interested in producing a change of light in playing "peekaboo;" when a handker-

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chief was thrown over her face she would first stare about the room through it some seconds, then pull it off.

In the second year, the difference of light and darkness was a matter of a good deal of interest. In the twentieth month, 590th day, I saw her outdoors, especially when driving, cover her eyes several times with her hands. I thought the sunlight might be too brilliant, but it is more likely she was experimenting, for in the following weeks she would often cover her eyes with her hands and take them away; hide her face in a cushion, or on her own arms, often saying, "Dark!" then lookup, — "Light now!" The 598th day, on waking, her first remark was "Light. Aunty make light," pointing to a place on the wall where the light must have fallen from a concealed candle I had lit in the night. The 6iith day I was told she pointed to a mass of dark clouds hanging low, and said, " Dark over there." The same day, after hearing a story about the moon that interested her much in the twentieth and twenty-first months, she asked over and over, " Dark?" Answered, "No, it was light after the moon came," she would say, "Light now?" or " Dark? No." She then buried her face in a cushion; then looked under the cushion, saying softly, "Dark," then down behind the lounge, saying, " Dark there." When a curtain was raised higher, producing a change in the light, she would comment at once, " Light."' I was told that on a railroad trip, 641st day, she made no comment on entering tunnels, but regularly ejaculated, on -emerging, "Light!"

In the twenty -third month, 699th day, the moonlit garden, seen from the window, seemed to be quite a strange place to her ; she did not recognize objects, and when I spoke of the lilies, e.g., would say, "Where lilies?"

In the twenty-fourth month, 720th day, she saw heat lightning. When she had been told its name, she ran from one member of the family to another, saying earnestly, "Ruth saw flash lightning!" — "What did it look like?" she was asked. She shut her eyes as tightly as she could, and clinched her hands, saying, " Looked like just this way."

2. Movements of Lids.

I watched for the various asymmetric movements mentioned by Preyer, but no one about my niece was able to see as much asymmetry as in the case of his child. The lids were never but twice — on the 5 3d and 54th days — unequally raised to any extent that was perceptible without close scrutiny; both times were immediately after sleep.

On the 27th day her mother saw the lids raised with a downward look, just as noted by Preyer; and for some days after I saw this repeatedly myself, the sclerotic coat visible above the iris; I have no note of it except when she was in the bath, at which time the movements of her eyes were more active and more asymmetric. After the first month this look was rare, noted not at all in the second month, but several times at the end of the third and during the first half of the fourth, 90th to 105th days; so far as my notes indicate, it was always when the'baby was being bathed, or wiped after her bath.

On the 104th day I first saw the brow wrinkled in looking upward; but for some days before, the skin between the forehead and fontanel had wrinkled with this look.

Contrary to Preyer's observation, she nursed from the first with eyes closed ; after the 47th day, the lids were dropped oftener than entirely closed; I never but twice saw them open, and on one of these occasions it was because she caught sight of a candle as she was placed at the breast, and stared at it awhile before closing her eyes. I have since watched and inquired about several other babies^ and found none that nursed with open eyes.

We were not able to observe any regular relation between widely^ opened eyes and pleasure in the case of my niece. Up to the fifth, week her eyes at no time opened as widely as they did from that date; and it was not till the seventh week that I noticed them, stretched widely, in the bath and while wiped, in connection with, signs of satisfaction, — panting, and movements of limbs. She had then had instead for a couple of weeks a habit when bathed, or undressed by the fire, of fixing her eyes on her mother's face and turning her head away, so as to give a curious sidelong look,.

wliich somehow had an unmistakable effect of high satisfaction. Up to the 45 th day the look appeared only when she was bathed or undressed; on that day once when lying dressed, but very comfortable, on the lounge; after this I have no more note of it; it seems to have disappeared as an expression of satisfaction with the appearance of the wide-eyed staring, — which, however, never became a marked habit. I never saw her shut her eyes under discomfort, as having nose or ears washed ; she either submitted indifferently, or expressed discomfort by wriggling and uttering little sounds. The fallen lids when nursing accompanied an expression of great content. In fear and in surprise her eyes were opened wide.

The first time that she winked at having a head suddenly thrust close to her eyes was on the 56th day, when the wink followed slowly but regularly, six times without a failure. It had been tried in vain almost daily for weeks before. I have noted several instances of winking at sudden sounds. 139th day when someone snapped his teeth together several times a foot or so from her face, she winked every time, and looked much surprised; 167th day I was told of her winking at the wind; 185th day, banging her rattle down in high glee, she winked at every blow. As a general thing she was not easily startled, and I saw very few noticeable instances of winking. I did not watch for them carefully, however, knowing that one should be a physiologist to observe intelligently the reflex actions.

3. Movements of Balls.

These also were generally symmetric; but occasionally in the first and second months, especially the first, there was a distinct crossing, and several times in the third month a slight one. When in the bath she rolled her eyes about more irregularly than at any other time. Notwithstanding that the movements of her eyes were generally in unison, there was about them always in the first two months a certain appearance of convergence, — as in the case of all babies of this age I have noticed; and this look was occasionally seen as late as the ninth month, when my last note of it occurs, 249th day.

l^ University of California. [Vol. i.

Fixation.

I have noted her staring at faces especially, among light surfaces, during the third week; this increased in the fourth. On the 25th day, as she lay wide awake and comfortable in her grandmother's lap, staring thus at her face, with an appearance of attention, I leaned down close beside, so as to bring my face into the field of vision. The baby turned her eyes (not head) and gazed at my face with the same appearance of attention, even effort, in slight tension of brows and lips; then back to her grandmother's face, again to mine, so several times. This seems clearly Preyer's "second stage" of fixation. At last she seemed to become aware of my red gown, or the lamplight striking the shoulder, and not only moved her eyes, but threw her head far back to look at my shoulder, with a new expression, a sort of dim interest, or eagerness.

The "third stage," the following of an object in motion, I did not fix satisfactorily. The nurse, who was a careful observer, said that the baby followed the motion of her hand on the 9th day. I could not satisfy myself that she did, even as late as the fifth week; her eyes seemed sometimes briefly to follow the moving hand, but she was so active, moving head and eyes constantly, that I could not trust the appearance ; her mother was satisfied that she followed the motion. On the 33d day I tried a candle, and her eyes followed it unmistakably, rolling as far as they could, and then the head was turned to follow still farther. Had I tried a luminous object earlier, I might have found that she could follow it. I find that almost all mothers and nurses place the attainment of power to follow a moving object much earlier than this, usually in the first week.

In this same week, the fifth, she aquired the h^ibit mentioned above of fixing a sidelong look on her mother.

In the fifth week, too, when held up against the shoulder, she would straighten up her head to see around; and thereafter looking about, as if to see what she could see, became more and more her habit, and together with gazing at faces, was her chief occupation till grasping was established. By the tenth week, she would turn her head to look about thus.

On the 40th day, her eyes for the first time followed the movement of a person (who had possibly attracted her attention by a voice and appearance novel to her) as he moved slowly in a semicircle about the knee where she lay.

At the close of the eighth week, on the 56th day, as she lay on her mother's lap by the fire and I sat close by, she gazed fixedly at my face some fifteen minutes without removing her eyes; indeed, as her mother turned her, in undressing and rubbing, she screwed her head around comically to keep her eyes fixed on me. At last she turned her head clear over and looked at her mother's face. Her mother turned her again toward mine, which she surveyed for a time, then again turned and looked at her mother's; all this with serious attention and effort. Whether she had arrived at a clearer focusing of our faces than before, and was interested in it, or whether this incident was the dawn of recognition of us as separate persons, I cannot tell. It was the same day that she had first responded by a wink to a threat at her eyes.

Soon after, 60th day, I saw some indication that she recognized her mother, for she stopped fretting when hungry on seeing her come in at a door in her line of vision, not three feet away; no certain indication, however, for anyone's entrance might have diverted her attention. The first unmistakable recognition by sight alone was on the 80th day, when she smiled and gave a joyous cry on seeing her grandfather enter. She certainly knew her mother before this, but whether by sight alone, or by the aid of hearing and touch, I could not tell ; and though during the next six weeks she showed in many small ways that she distinguished the persons about her one from another, I could not get proof that it was by sight only. For instance, when I came in in the morning and spoke to her, she was accustomed to greet me with smile or cry; on the 167th day, I came in without speaking, to see if she would make the same demonstration; she looked at me seriously, then fixed her gaze on a lamp I held; I set it away, then came and spoke to her; but she made no response till I bent down, then caught my face familiarly in her hands. By such vague behavior, she defeated efforts to establish certainly her discrimination of our faces until long after I was sure that she did know them. Late in the fourtli month, she noticed any change in our appearance wrought by headgear or

1 6 Univei^sity of California. [Vol. i.

wraps, with surprised looks at the articles, however unobtrusive in form and color; and on the i6oth day, though staring with the usual surprise at our hats, she paid no attention to that of a stranger who had come in with us. As she would answer a smile by laughter and movements; once laughed at a grimace (130th day); in the sixteenth week, when especially interested in an uncle, would smile when he looked at her; and {e. g., 119th day) watched our lips, even looking from her mother's lips to mine, when interested in a sound we made, — it seems certain that by the fourth month at least, our faces must have been clear to her. In the sixth month, being separated from her mother when hungry, she cried hard for her, watching at every turn in a corridor and every door passed through, and was instantly comforted at sight of her; but I had no dQubt she had recognized her perfectly weeks before.

The 141st day, she seemed to recognize her grandmother through the window; but the day before, I was told, this slight obstacle had prevented recognition till her grandmother raised the sash and smiled at her alternately with and without its intervention; and on the 143d day she seemed to find me unfamiliar seen through the pane. On the 158th day she held out her arms to me when she was some ten feet from the closed window through which I looked at her; and in the eighth month, 228th day, she recognized her grandfather's head some thirty feet away, through two closed windows. Yet as late as the twentieth month, being in a company of strangers in a room not strongly lighted, she took them for neighbors, calling one and another by the names of persons to whom they bore slight resemblance.

Once in the fifth month, 136th day, I called to her, the back of a willow chair being between us. She looked each side of the chair with growing surprise, and at last directly at the back several times, but without seeing me, though it was easy to see through the open work: either she could not recognize my face crossed by the willow rods, or did not understand carrying her look past the obstacle; her face was somewhat troubled as well as amazed, jaw dropped and brows lifted.^

^ Professor Joseph Le Conte reminds me that if she looked at the chair back she saw my face doubled.

The objects early noticed by her, other than bright surfaces or shining points, and faces, were (if I pass by the hghted surfaces of color, 25th and 37th days): 42d day, bunch of yellow flowers; 56th and 57th, knot of red ribbon; 62d, red and yellow strips; 68th, bunch of bright sachets, shadows of chandelier quivering on the ceiling; 80th day, she became silent when fretting, and watched attentively the leaves of a small notebook fluttered before her, moving hands and feet with interest; 87th, an eyeglass dangled from a strino". Up to nearly three months old, therefore, she had not, so far as I saw, in spite of her looking about, really looked at any special objects that were not lighted up, colored, or in motion. On the 87th day, however, she twice looked seriously, but without appearance of curiosity, at a rattle in her hand; after this, fixing her eyes with attention on various objects became common. Bright or colored ones did not seem to keep their ascendency after the third or at all events the fourth month, nor moving ones whose motion was not followed, though they continued to attract: 105th day she watched the moving landscape from the car window for a half hour with pleasure; 130th day watched the windmill; i62d, noticed especially of all the sights in the city, passing cable cars, walls of the elevator as it rose and sank, and trees blowing outside a window.

I had noted especially that up to the incident of the rattle on the 87th day she had never looked at anything held in her hands, even when she showed interest in having it there; and thereafter she looked at such objects rarely and with slight attention, till grasping was fully established. This process was gradually acquired during the whole of the fourth month; I did not see her fix an object with her eye and then try to reach it before the 113th day. There was a constant progress in co-ordination of eye and touch in learning this. I shall hope hereafter to give details of this under the subject of Grasping. I never but once saw her hold up an object, — her rattle, as she lay on her back in the sun, 134th day, — and inspect it long and carefully; nor did she ever at any time look with attention at her own hands, as some babies do ; not even when, 97th day, she was pounding her fist down hard on the table, did she look at it.

As to the size of objects of which she had clear enough vision to try to grasp them : the rattle, an unusually small one, was the smallest I have note of until the latter part of the fifth m^onth, when she would reach for, seize, and play with the curtain cord, and put the knot into her mouth; in the sixth month, 158th day, she tried to catch flies on the pane; i68th, tried to reach a fragment of red sugar on the floor, scarcely one-fourth inch in diameter, and thereafter several times bits of paper, petals, etc., of similar size. In the sixth month also a few other very small objects were grasped, as a rubber ring, of the smallest size used for papers, and strings were favorites. In the latter part of the eighth month, the smallest scraps and shreds on the carpet, down to pin-head size, occupied her a good deal; once a single hair,