Childrearing practices and their impact on the development of cognitive spatial skills

Abstract

The quality of childrearing practices is thought to play a crucial role in the development of cognitive spatial skills. However, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the antecedents of children's social and cognitive competence are more than the provision of stable home environment and care. In this review, the impact of parent-child interactions on development of cognitive spatial skills is examined in the context of psychosocial and biological models. It is argued that early family experiences and parent-child interaction effects should have no particular primacy in determining spatial competence but rather it is the genotype that primarily determines cognitive spatial competence and the environments that are experienced.

IFE PsychologIA Vol. 13(2) 2005: 38-55