What Is Child Psychology?

Child psychology is the study of subconscious and conscious childhood development. Child psychologists observe how a child interacts with their parents, themselves, and the world, to understand their mental development.

Why Is It Important?

Everyone wants their child to have healthy development, but it’s not always clear if a child’s behavior is a symptom of a normal stage in development or a sign of an abnormality. Child psychologists can help you understand the difference. Understanding the normal and abnormal psychological patterns of a child can help parents understand how to best communicate and connect with their child, teach their child coping mechanisms for managing emotions, and help their child progress and thrive in each new developmental stage.

Child psychologists can also identify abnormal behaviors early, help detect the root of common behavioral issues such as learning issues, hyperactivity, or anxiety, and help children work through early childhood trauma. They can also help to prevent, evaluate, and diagnose mental health and learning problems, developmental delays or conditions such as autism.

What Is Teen Psychology?

One important component of communicating with teens is helping them understand what lies ahead. Explaining how their bodies will change so that they aren’t caught by surprise can alleviate a child’s anxiety. Beyond physical changes, parents can begin a conversation about the social and lifestyle changes that accompany adolescence. Discussing the consequences of important decisions—like having sex or experimenting with drugs—can encourage a teen to reflect on their choices.

Listening is a powerful yet under-appreciated tool. Parents often orient toward directives and solutions. But setting aside those tendencies and simply listening to the teen can strengthen the relationship. Asking specific or prying questions can make the child feel judged and therefore hesitant to speak openly and honestly. Listening attentively shows interest, validation, and support. It also increases the chances that a teen will confide in a parent as needed. Active listening builds intimacy and trust—while simultaneously allowing the teen to process their experience.

What Is Adult Psychology?

Most people are unaware that they are conducting their lives more from a child’s frame of reference than from an adult mode. Although men and women mature physically and become more capable in their practical lives, rarely do they achieve emotional maturity.

In my view, the primary barriers to maturity are unresolved childhood trauma, the defenses the child forms to ward off emotional pain and existential dread. The latter refers to a core anxiety related to growing up, facing the fact that time is passing, and giving value to life in spite of death’s inevitability.

Adults experience their emotions, but when it comes to their actions, they make rational decisions on the basis of self-interest and moral concerns. As Murray Bowen observed, adults “are able to distinguish between the feeling process and the intellectual process … and [have] the ability to choose between having one’s functioning guided by feelings or by thoughts.” They have a strong sense of identity and strive to live with integrity, according to their own principles and values.