Putting a Child in Day Care: Issues for Working Parents

Abstract

In 1981, more than half the mothers in the United States were employed outside the home. By 1990, it was predicted that 70% of children would have two working parents. The number has been increasing each year since World War II, and 10 times as many mothers of small children work now as did in 1945. Now it is more culturally acceptable than even before for mothers to have jobs. Even so, there is still a strong bias against mothers leaving their babies in substitute care unless it is absolutely necessary. Society does not yet whole-heartedly support working mothers and their choices about substitute care. We do not have enough studies yet to know about the issues for the infant. The studies we do have are likely to be biased or based on experiences in special, often privileged populations. We need to know when it is safest for the child's future development to have to relate to two or three caregivers; what will be the effects of a group care situation on a baby's development; when babies are best able to find what they need from caregivers other than their parents; when parents are best able to separate from their babies without feeling too grieved at the loss. In a word, we need information on which to base general guidelines for parents. For it could be that the most subtle, hard-to-deal-with pressure on young adults comes indirectly from society's ambivalent and discordant attitudes, which create a void of values in which the building and nurturing of a family becomes very difficult.