Bound to get a huge amount of attention today is a story in the Observer about a study that found young children doing better in meeting developmental goals when primarily cared for by their mothers.
Easy to know what will be done with that – get women barefoot and pregnant back in the kitchen. But of course there is another way of telling that, as Yvonne Roberts makes clear:
Leach insisted her findings should not be interpreted as a demand that mothers stay at home. Instead, she described it is as supporting a demand for ‘developmentally appropriate high quality childcare’.
Indeed it is interesting that children with childcarers did better than those with relatives, probably the researchers suggest, because childcarers (usually women looking after three or so children in their own home) made more plans and had training in helping the babies develop, which the relatives lacked.
Somehow I doubt that the need for higher-quality childcare is the spin this story will get in most quarters, however.
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