The Social

Construction
The of Social
Childhood
Construction of
Childhood
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Reporter:
MARIA CECILIA M.
YANONG
 What is Childhood?
- Childhood, ‘the state of being a child’ is often defined in contrast to
adulthood.

- When we take a look at the Cambridge English dictionary the word

child is defined as ’ as ‘a boy or girl from time of birth until he or
she is an adult’.

- And in The Oxford English dictionary it defines a child as a young

human being below the age of puberty, or below the age of a legal
majority.

- Hence the 2 lexicons have the same definition about childhood

Social Construction of Childhood: A Brief Definition

The social construction of childhood refers to the idea

that childhood is seen (or “constructed”) differently by
different societies. Examples of social constructs
include “Children as good”, “Children as evil” and
“children as innocent”. If you believe childhood is
socially constructed, you believe ways of seeing
childhood can change across times and cultures.
“Childhoodis not universal; rather, it is a product of culture and
as such will vary across time and place.”- Kehily (2008)
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The Evil Child
Another very common way of viewing childhood 06
in the middle ages was to see them as ‘Evil’. This
was for a long time a deeply religious view of
children.
 01
Born Evil
02

03

rn 04
y b e li e v e d c h ildren were bo
an
a n d Ju d e a n theologians, m a rd e n o f E d e n (Wiley, 2002).
early Christia n the G n
Beginning with ’s g u il t fo r h is ‘original sin’ in o f m a n y C h ri stian and Judea 05
inherited Adam one
sinners having id e a o f c h il dre n as sinners is fi ft h ce n tu ry (Wiley, 2002)),
e e
e noted that th of children in th and Judean
While it must b ded th e in n o c e n ce
wers o f C h ri stia n
iews (i nde ed, Pope Leo defen a l id e a a m o ngst many follo O ld a nd New Testam
ent. 06
v in fl u e n ti me s in th e
lly been an ed to several ti childhood.” (N
ew
it has historica a l si n is a ll u d is e v il fr o m
xample, origin of the human
heart ed that childre
n
religions. For e in c li n a ti o n he s h a v e p re a ch
states: “Every Christian churc iley, 2002).
Genesis 8:21 At v a ri o u s tim e s,
eir in h e ri te d si n s (W
ersion, 2011) lieve them of th
International V e in o rd e r to re
d at a young ag
must be baptize
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The Good Child 04

While the view of child 05

ren as ‘evil’ persisted
ages, it is believed that for much of the middle
the upper classes in En
children as ‘innately go gland began to perceiv
od’ at some point in the th e 06
17 Century.
 01
Born Good ve d th at th e gro wi ng mi ddle classes in Britain
oned earlier, belie iniature
Philippe Aries, who I menti ey no lon ge r ne ed ed to see their children as ‘m
th at th
developed enough money ne y to pa m pe r th eir children, suddenly their views
of 02
enou gh mo re
adults’. When parents had , ch ild re n of th e ric h upper classes were therefo
to Ar ies t
children changed. According ap ab le of do ing wr on g. In fact, this view is the exac
t and inc 03
suddenly seen as good, swee wa s se en to be bo rn inn ately bad and in need of
The Evil child
opposite of the Evil child.
adult.
discipline to become a good 04
y! Jean -Ja cq ue s Ro us se au is the most well-known
Emile, The ‘Good’ Bo
Jean-Jacques Rousseau And as inn ate ly go od an d na tural. He rejects the idea th
at
ho od 05
proponent of the view of child arg ue s th at civ ilis ati on is the culprit of corruption,
but rat he r
children are corrupt at birth, th eir Cr ea to r ma de th em , but everything degenerates in
as good as
arguing that: “All things are In Ro us se au’s acclaimed book, Émile,
or On
06
au , 17 62 , p. 1).
the hands of men” (Rousse he wo uld rai se Émile, a fictional child, to resis
t the
es ise s ho w
Education (1762), he hypoth op os es mo ra lis ing and romantic ideas about th
e
ho ut , he pr
corruptions of society. Throug ou ld be pr ot ec ted fro m the evils of the adult world
.
d child ren sh
child’s goodness. He believe int er pr et ati on s of re lig iou s texts got him chased out of
ntroversi al
Just for good measure, his co
France. Bonsoir, Rousseau!
 01
Born Good ve d th at th e gro wi ng mi ddle classes in Britain
oned earlier, belie iniature
Philippe Aries, who I menti ey no lon ge r ne ed ed to see their children as ‘m
th at th
developed enough money ne y to pa m pe r th eir children, suddenly their views
of 02
enou gh mo re
adults’. When parents had , ch ild re n of th e ric h upper classes were therefo
to Ar ies t
children changed. According ap ab le of do ing wr on g. In fact, this view is the exac
t and inc 03
suddenly seen as good, swee wa s se en to be bo rn inn ately bad and in need of
The Evil child
opposite of the Evil child.
adult.
discipline to become a good 04
y! Jean -Ja cq ue s Ro us se au is the most well-known
Emile, The ‘Good’ Bo
Jean-Jacques Rousseau And as inn ate ly go od an d na tural. He rejects the idea th
at
ho od 05
proponent of the view of child arg ue s th at civ ilis ati on is the culprit of corruption,
but rat he r
children are corrupt at birth, th eir Cr ea to r ma de th em , but everything degenerates in
as good as
arguing that: “All things are In Ro us se au’s acclaimed book, Émile,
or On
06
au , 17 62 , p. 1).
the hands of men” (Rousse he wo uld rai se Émile, a fictional child, to resis
t the
es ise s ho w
Education (1762), he hypoth op os es mo ra lis ing and romantic ideas about th
e
ho ut , he pr
corruptions of society. Throug ou ld be pr ot ec ted fro m the evils of the adult world
.
d child ren sh
child’s goodness. He believe int er pr et ati on s of re lig iou s texts got him chased out of
ntroversi al
Just for good measure, his co
France. Bonsoir, Rousseau!
 01

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The Innocent Child
The view of childhood as a 06
time of innocence is, by an
dominant way of viewing ch d large, the
ildren in today’s day and ag
e.
 A quick distinction: 01
ings.
is bo rn w ith an in nate tendency to do good th
 The good child e th e bl an k slate, or tabula rasa. 02
ba d: th ey ar
is born neither good or
 The innocent child e m us t be ve ry careful not to corrupt
ec io us . W
nocent, they are very pr way as we treat the
 Because a child is in ild in m uc h th e sa m e 03
en treat the innocent ch
them. Therefore, we oft
good child (above). 04
en ce s, an d w e tr y to encourage them to do
d influ
W e tr y to pr otec t th e innocent child from ba

good things! 05
un ta bl e be ca us e th ey don’t know better.
em acco
m isb ehaves, we don’t hold th
 W he n a child
ol ong th is inno ce nc e as long as possible. 06
ant to pr
 Furthermore, we w
ourn
ie s to pr ot ec t th e in no cence of children. We m
on TV shows and mov em swear for the first tim
e,
 We place warning ow in g up , w e he ar th
e see our children gr
lost innocence when w
he n w e se e them be ing devious and sneaky.
and w
 01
When sociologists say th
at ‘childhood is socially
that the ideas we have constructed’ they mean
about childhood are crea 02
being determined by th ted by society, rather th
e biological age of a ‘ch an
ild’.
03
Some of the aspects of
childhood which are infl
uence by society includ
e: 04
 The length of childh
ood and the moment a
child becomes an adult
 The status of childre 05
n in society – their righ
legal protections/ restri ts and responsibilities,
ctions we place on them what
06
In Modern Britain, it is
society that determines
adulthood starts, and when childhood ends
that age is currently an
individual reaches the ag set at 18, when an
e of ‘legal entitlement ’.
 01
n ly b ec o m e ad u lt s at the age of
ot just sudd e
However, children do n le n gt h y tran si ti o n from childhood,
so a ve ry
18. In Britain there is al
02
ad u lt h o o d , w it h ch ildren gradually
into
through adolescence, ts ’ as th ey progress through
l enti tle m en 03
picking up certain ‘lega
their teenage years. 04
th e ag e o f 1 4, th e ag e of sexual
n work from
For example, children ca h ich th ey can drive is 17.
th e age at w 05
consent is at 16, and
e ag e at w h ic h ch ild hood ends is
etermines th 06
The fact that society d st s ar gu e th at ‘ch ild hood is socially
socio lo gi
part of the reason why ’ sim p ly m eans created by
ly co n st ru ct ed
constructed’ – ‘social
biology).
society (rather than by
 Ideas
The Social
Associated
Construction
with Childhood of
Childhood
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Reporter:
WILBERT M. OLASIMAN
 Ideas Associated with Childhood
There are a lot of ideas associated with childhood, and how it differs
from adulthood. In Modern Britain we tend to think of children as
being dependent, naive, innocent, vulnerable, and in need of
protection from adults.

We tend to see children as having insufficient experience and

knowledge.
The Separation of Childhood and Adulthood 01
There seems to be near universal
agreement that there are some 02
fundamental differences between
adults and children. For example 03
people in most societies seem to
.
agree that: 04

1. Children are 2. Children are dependent 05

physically and on adults for a range of

psychologically biological and emotional 06
immature needs – Children need a
compared to adults lengthy process of
socialization which takes
several years.
The Separation of Childhood and Adulthood 01

02
3. In contrast to
adults, children are 03
not competent to run
.
their own lives and 04
cannot be held
responsible for their 05
actions
06
In contrast to the period of childhood, one of the defining characteristics
of adulthood is that adults are biologically mature, are competent to
run their own lives and are fully responsible for their actions.

However, despite broad agreement on the above, what people mean by

childhood and the position children occupy is not fixed but differs
across times, places and cultures. There is considerable variation in
what people in different societies think about the place of children in
society, about what children should and shouldn’t be doing at certain
ages, about how children should be socialised, and about the age at
which they should be regarded as adults.

For this reason, Sociologists say that childhood is socially constructed.

This means that childhood is something created and defined by
society:
The Social Construction of Childhood in Modern
British Society 01

Part of the social construction of childhood

02
in modern Britain is that we choose to have
a high degree of separation between the 03
spheres of childhood and adulthood. Add
in details to the headings below: 04

05
● 1. There are child specific places where only children and Orange
‘trusted adults’ are supposed to go, and thus children are
06
relatively sheltered from adult life.
2. There are several laws preventing children from doing certain
things which adults are allowed to do.
3. There are products specifically for children –which adults are
not supposed to play with (although some of them do).
All of the above separations between adults and children have nothing to do
with the biological differences between adults and children – children do
not need to have ‘special places’ just for them, they do not need special
laws protecting them, and neither do they need specific toys designed for
them. We as a society have decided that these things are desirable for
children, and thus we ‘construct childhood’ as a being very different to
adulthood.
 The Social Construction of Childhood –
01
A Comparative Approach
02

A good way to illustrate the

Child Labour social construction of childhood Child Soldiers 03
is to take a comparative
approach – that is, to look at 04
how children are seen and
treated in other times and
places than their own. Three 05
fairly well-known examples of
Forced Marriage how childhood can vary in other Trokosi 06
countries include:

Check the answers

 Child Labour – In some cultures children are seen as an ‘economic asset’
and expected to engage in paid work – In Less developed countries
children are often seen as a source of cheap (free) labour on the farm, in
the home or in sweat shops where the wage can help boost the family
income.
 Child soldiers – In conflict, typically young teenage boys may be recruited
to fight, effectively taking on very serious adult responsibilities several
years younger than they would do in ‘western’ societies.
 Forced Marriage – In some countries, young teenage girls are sometimes
coerced into arranged marriage without their consent, taking on the duties
of a wife or mother at a young age. This is well-documented in India and
Ethiopia, for example.
In West Africa, thousands of girls and women have been enslaved by a
practice called ‘trokosi’. Girls as young as seven are given away by their
family to pay for the sins of family members. They get forcibly shipped to
a shrine, possibly in a foreign country, stripped of their identity, and are
forced to work as ‘servants of God’.

NB this isn’t to suggest that any of these conceptions are ‘equal’ to our
conceptions of childhood in the west – it is purely to illustrate that there
are plenty of cultures where adults DO NOT think children are ‘in need of
protection’ and so on, and many hundreds of millions of adults who
believe that childhood should end a lot younger than 16-18.
Philippe Aries – A Radical View on the
Social Construction on Childhood
The historian Philippe Aries has an extreme view on childhood as a social
construction. He argues that in the Middle Ages (the 10th to the 13th
century) ‘the idea of childhood did not exist’ – children were not seen as
essentially different to adults like they are today.

 Aries uses the following evidence to support his view…

 Children were expected to work at a much earlier age
 The law often made no distinction between children and adults
Works of art from the period often just depict children as small adults – they
wear the same clothes and appear to work and play together.
 In addition to the above Edward Shorter (1975) argues about parental
attitudes to children in the Middle ages were very different from today…

 High infant mortality rates encouraged indifference and neglect, especially

towards infants
 Parents often neglected to give new born babies names – referring to them
as ‘it’ and it was not uncommon to eventually give a new baby a name of a
dead sibling.
Aries argues that it is only from the 13th century onwards that modern
notions of childhood – the idea that childhood is a distinct phase of life
from adulthood – begin to emerge. Essentially Aries is arguing that
childhood as we understand it today is a relatively recent ‘invention’
The Development of Social Care
Policy in England
The Social
Construction of
Childhood
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Reporter:
WARRENE C.
ARGAWANON
 Introduction
The closer integration of health care and social care has
been a policy goal of successive UK governments for over 40
years. A variety of policy and financial tools have been used but
overall progress has been patchy and limited. This is due to a
variety of reasons including differences in culture and ways of
working, funding and accountability arrangements and separate
regulatory regimes that assess the performance of individual
organizations but not the system as a whole. There is general
agreement that current arrangements are complex and confusing
and too often fail to ensure that people receive the right services,
in the right place at the right time.
 In the UK social care generally refers to a range of
practical support to meet needs that arise from ageing,
disabilities, physical and mental ill-health and problems arising
from drug and alcohol misuse. This usually takes the form of
residential and nursing homes, day centers, equipment and
adaptations, meals and home care. It also includes the
mechanisms for delivering services, such as assessments, personal
budgets and direct payments (these being used by individuals
themselves to arrange their own support).
Background to Current Policy Initiatives
01

02
The impetus for integration as
a policy goal has been driven
03
by three major factors.
04

1. An ageing population and shifts in the pattern of 05

disease means that more people are living longer with a
mixture of needs – including complex co-morbidity, frailty 06
in very old age and dementia – that require coordinated
care from different professionals, services and
organizations.
Background to Current Policy Initiatives
01

02
.
2.The increasing fragmentation and complexity in how
services are commissioned, funded and provided. Since 03
the foundation of the NHS in 1948, responsibility for what
we describe as ‘social care’ has rested with 152 local 04
authorities. Successive reorganizations have created new
divisions and since the NHS and Community Care Act 05
1990, 90% of publicly funded social care services – such
06
as care at home and residential and nursing home – are
provided by private and voluntary providers.
Background to Current Policy Initiatives
01

02
3. There is the. longstanding distinction between NHS care
that is mostly free at the point of use and funded through 03
general taxation and publicly funded social care which is
subject to a financial assessment – a ‘means test’. The 04
growth in property and pension wealth has seen
increasing numbers of people who are expected to fund 05
the full costs of their care. The division between a free
NHS and means tested care is causing increasing 06
difficulties in terms equity, efficiency and
effectiveness compounded by reductions in local
authority care budgets.
 Policy Process
The overall legislative context for health and social care in
England is the Health and Social Care Act 2012 and the more
recently enacted Care Act 2014 which place duties on various
organizations to promote integrated care. The former heralded an
extensive structural reorganization designed ostensibly to
‘liberate’ the NHS’ from top-down centralized political control . It
created new local organizations – clinical commissioning groups
(CCGs) to commission health care with the intention of a stronger
leadership role for General Practitioners. A new national body –
NHS England – was created to run the NHS rather than the
Secretary of State for Health.
 Policy Process
The passage of the legislation became mired in political
controversy over the emphasis on competition and concerns that
this would lead to private sector organizations playing a bigger
role in the provision of NHS services. A pause in the legislative
process and subsequent amendments placed a more emollient
emphasis on the importance of collaboration and a feature of the
legislation that enjoyed wide support was the creation of local
authority-led Health and Wellbeing Boards charged with bringing
local partners around the table to promote integration and
oversee commissioning through a local health and wellbeing
strategy.
 Policy Process
The Government has worked closely with health and social care
organizations to establish a new national policy framework for
integrated care – Integrated Care and Support: Our Shared
Commitment supported by central and local government,
regulators and national representative organizations from the NHS
and social care . This describes how national barriers could be
overcome and how local areas can use existing structures such as
Health and Wellbeing Boards to bring together local organizations
to achieve better integrated services.
The Content of Policy Initiatives
The foundation of current policy is an agreed definition
of integration developed by National Voices, a national coalition of
health and care charities and embedded in the ‘Shared
Commitment’ framework. This definition is a person-centred
‘narrative’ – “I can plan my care with people who work together to
understand me and my carer(s), allow me control, and bring
together services to achieve the outcomes important to me”.
The ‘Shared Commitment’ document sets out a shared a vision for
integrated care and support so that over the next 5 years “this will
become the standard model for everyone with health and care
needs”.
The Content of Policy Initiatives
The Government's principal policy to achieve integration
is the Better Care Fund – £3.8b described as ‘a single pooled
budget for health and social care services to work more closely
together’ so that older and disabled people are offered better,
more integrated care and support. The Fund will be introduced in
2016 and each local authority and CCG must submit for approval a
jointly agreed plan setting out how they will use their allocation.
The plans are expected to include provision for 7 days a week care
services (to speed up discharge from hospital), a named
professional who coordinates each individual's care; better data
and information sharing and joint assessment and care planning.
The Content of Policy Initiatives
Concerns about the impact of the Fund on NHS finances have led
to a tightening of the rules and a more centralised and top-down
approach to the management of the Fund has been adopted.
Plans submitted in September 2014 indicate that local areas
intend to pool £5.3b – higher than the £3.8b envisaged originally
– and are projecting in 2015/16 savings of £532 m and a planned
reduction in emergency hospital admissions of 3.1%. It should be
noted that the Fund represents a small proportion – less than 5%
– of England's total spend on the NHS and social care.
The Content of Policy Initiatives
The Government has also adopted another, separate policy
initiative in which local areas with ambitious and innovative plans to
develop integration at scale and pace were invited to become ‘Pioneers’ –
leading the way by testing out new approaches such as different models
of commissioning, new payment methods and sharing progress with the
rest of the country in return for tailored support. From over 100
applications, 14 were selected and announced in November 2013 and a
further wave of 11 sites were announced in February 2014.
In contrast to the relatively prescriptive approach to the Better Care Fund,
the pioneer programme aims to encourage bottom-up innovation and
stimulate local experimentation in a way that avoids a national ‘one size
fits all’ template.
Each pioneer site has adopted a different and distinctive approach to
integrating services, including: 01

02

Extending existing integrated ‘Connected care’ for older people 03

teams to mental health and with long term health conditions
primary care. andCloudy
families with complex
Rainy needs.
04

05

06
Partnership with voluntary sector
Whole system redesign with
to promote independence and
GPs at the center of care
coordination. prevent hospital admissions.
 01
Prevention and self care.
02

03

04
Cloudy Rainy
Integrated local multidisciplinary
05
teams.
06
Integrated commissioning
and contracting.
 Of particular interest will be the extent to which new models of
payment and contracting mechanisms can be developed that offer
incentives for care outside of hospital.
Another initiative is a new personal commissioning programme
operated by NHS England which aims to give individuals themselves –
especially those with high levels of need – more power to shape their
own care and support. The programme will begin in 2015 for 3 years in 10
demonstrator sites.
A guiding principle is that individuals, with the right support, are
better placed to design and integrate their own care than statutory
organizations.
 The Proposed Program has Two Core Elements:
01
1
02
A care model that will include
personalized care and support
planning, with the option of an 03
integrated personal budget (covering
health as well as care needs) that 04
could be managed by the council, the
NHS, or by a third party provider (e.g.
a voluntary sector partner);
2 05
A financial model that is based on an
integrated, “year of care” capitated
payment model which covers an 06
allocation to providers for covering a
whole range of services for a defined
period of time rather than a single
episode of treatment .
 A final policy development which will affect the future of
integrated care throughout England is the publication a ‘Five Year
Forward View’ for the NHS which describes new models
of health care delivery which break down the barriers between
primary, community and acute health care. 29 ‘Vanguard’ sites
have been chosen to lead the development of these new models
of care.
 01

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Thank 03

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You!
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