http://worldcat.org/entity/work/id/2011417

Infancy and human growth

"Growth is a word to conjure with. There is always some danger that the term will be used in a mystical or vitalistic manner which will defeat its scientific usefulness, but we may at least try to avoid this danger. The present volume aims to deal with early human growth at close range, by methods of systematic observation and of direct record. Chapter 1 of the present book takes an introductory glance at the total cycle of mental growth chiefly to suggest the close relations between the psychological and the biological aspects of developmental problems. Succeeding chapters deal with individual studies of a widely diversified group of infants and young children whose behavior was comparatively investigated at periodic intervals. By means of normative formulations of their advancing levels of maturity it has been possible to give objective expression to the course, the pattern, and the rate of mental growth in normal and exceptional children. Although, at the present stage of our methods, these measurements must be regarded as only approximations, the data are quantitatively presented by means of tables and of growth graphs. Unusual as well as usual growth complexes are discussed, but the emphasis throughout is on the normal aspects of infancy. All of the chapters bear directly or indirectly on normal mental growth"--Preface. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved).

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