Psychology news article assignment
Title of Article: Anxious or reserved? You might’ve been that way as a baby
https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/25/health/infant–temperament–predicts–adult–personalitywellness/index.html
Summary: Write a two–sentence summary of the topic discussed in the article and your overall impression of the content.
The topic of this article overall focuses on the topic learned in week 6 about attachment and temperament, and specifically in the article it points out that the temperament one may have had as an infant can predict your personality and social experiences as an adult. It also points out that a behavioral trait that everyone has inherited throughout evolutionary history is inhibition and that babies with high levels of inhibition will exhibit overly cautious, fearful and avoidant responses to unfamiliar situations and objects.
Takeaway Points: Write two main conclusions made within the article.
1. A takeaway point that was really important in this article is that with the study included in it that was published in the journal Proceedings of the Natural Academy of Sciences, found that the babies who were more behaviorally timid became more reserved and introverted adults due to the brain activity as adolescents who avoided or perceived their mistakes were highly associated with
anxiety and depression in adulthood.
2. Another important conclusion that was made in the article includes how the temperament as a baby can impact the success and health in adulthood, especially in shaping one’s personality, relationships, career, educational success, and mental health in adulthood. However, parents can look for signs by helping their children overcome and approach anxiety–provoking situations, and encourage them to realize the potential positives of their situations.
Importance: Why is the topic important to study?
This topic about temperament and inhibition as a child is important to study because the problem approaches when a child begins to be too reserved and anxious at a young age could potentially affect their future. Although not every inhibited baby entered adulthood with mental challenges, it did affect other things like the ability to talk to strangers and people of authority was more difficult which relates more so to their social skills. Temperament for babies is a significant factor to finding more ways in research to try to improve the growth of one’s adulthood. This topic can open up a world to more research questions and also help parents look for signs so that they can try to help their children work through their anxiousness, so that they can live a better life. Of course there is nothing wrong with being reserved and introverted, which was emphasized towards the end of the article, however, it can become a problem when it interferes with one’s life. If someone’s anxiety is holding them back from accomplishing what they want to do because of their attachment and inhibition to their parents when they were younger, that is the problem researchers and scientists are trying to fix. Temperament during infant and childhood years are good predictors of how one’s life could be as an adult, so it’s important to research about these trends and figure out ways of how to Critique: Do you agree or disagree with the author(s) conclusions? Why? If you disagree, how would you improve their overall presentation of the information?
