Psychology and parenthoodBruce, H. Addington (Henry Addington)
Science
Psychology and parenthood
Bruce, H. Addington (Henry Addington)
Child psychology
But, more fortunate than the boy of the orchard, this child had an
unknown friend at court, Mrs. Hannah K. Schoff, who interceded with
the judge and gained his permission to place the little incendiarist
in a good home instead of the House of Refuge. Five years afterward,
reporting to the International Prison Commission the result of her
experiment, Mrs. Schoff was able to declare that this dangerous
juvenile criminal had developed into “as sweet, attractive, and good a
child as can be found anywhere.”
An Italian Camorrist had two sons. The younger, at the age of three,
was separated from his father, taken to a distant city, and given
a good education. Like the Juke child of the eighth generation he
grew to be an exemplary young man. His brother, who remained with the
father, became, like him, a man of vice and crime, hated, feared, and
despised.
But far more impressive than isolated instances like these are the data
now available regarding the outcome of similar experimentation on a
large scale. Four years ago the Children’s Aid Society of New York—the
organisation which took the Juke foundling under its wing—published a
report detailing the results of its “placing out” system for a period
of more than half a century. The officials of this society have always
been imbued with the idea that every child, no matter how bad his
heredity, is entitled to the benefit of a good home upbringing, and in
accordance with this idea they have, during the period covered by the
report, placed twenty-eight thousand children in carefully selected
homes, besides finding situations in the country for about three
times as many older boys and girls. Most of their wards have been
slum children, having back of them a family history of crime, vice,
insanity, or pauperism. Nevertheless, the society’s officials inform us:
“A careful investigation of the records gives the following results: 87
per cent. have done well, 8 per cent. were returned to New York, 2 per
cent. died, one quarter of 1 per cent. committed petty crimes and were
arrested, and 2-1/4 per cent. left their homes and disappeared. These
last were larger boys of restless disposition, unaccustomed to country
life or any sort of restraint. Some of them struck out for themselves,
obtaining work at higher wages, and were temporarily lost sight of, but
years afterward we hear of them as having grown up good and respected
citizens.... The younger children placed out by the society always show
a very large average of success. The great proportion have grown up
respectable men and women, creditable members of society. Many of them
have been legally adopted by their foster-parents. The majority have
become successful farmers or farmers’ wives, mechanics, and business
men. Many have acquired property, and no inconsiderable number of them
have attained positions of honour and trust.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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