CHILD PSYCHOLOGY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 285, 2 December 1933, Page 14

CHILD PSYCHOLOGY.

"If you want to make a success of anything, first of all you must know what you are using, and secondly, what you want to do with it,", was the keynote of the lecture which Dr. Margaret Lowenfeld, Psychological Director of the Institute of Child Psychology, delivered before a Parents' Association.in London recently. Dr. Lowenfeld stressed the importance of parents setting out to ascertain their children's emotions, and, having ascertaihed those ' emotions, according them respect.' She also explained how impossible it is to separate the physical ftom the psychological. The specialists who concentrate on this very vital aspect of the future welfare of the race know that there are children who have every apparent advantage in life, yet cannot settle down. The boy who is intended for the army may desire nothing more than to dissect animals. His parents possibly regard this passion for biology as a "cruel streak," yet, properly faced, it is quite easy to cope with.

The Girl Child. The same remark applies to a girl who, reared in the amenities of comfortable country life, can only wander round a room remarking upon 'he "lovely feel" of various fabrics. To ler parents she is "unsatisfactory" to a degree; yet she will explain her yearnings to a friendly doctor. Dr. Lowenfeld asks the parents to usurp the functions of the doctor— except in extreme cases—and seek the root of unrest and discontent. If we have it in our power to make the first stops of a cure easy, so much the better, and so much nearer is success for our children.