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Social & Emotional Development
Developing Self-Regulation
WiseTip: SE-REG-M0818-G01B

Call your baby by name and describe the actions you are doing with them.

1, 2, 3

  1. New Jersey Birth to Three Early Learning Standards. (2013). New Jersey Council for Young Children.

  2. Bodrova, E., & Leong,D.J. (2007). Tools of the mind: The Vygotskian approach to early childhood education. 2nd ed. Columbus, OH: Merrill/ Prentice Hall. (Level III) USA.

  3. Pisoni DB, Conway CM, Kronenberger WG, Horn DL, Karpicke J, Henning SC. (2008). Efficacy and effectiveness of cochlear implants in deaf children. In: Marschark M, Hauser PC, editors. Deaf cognition: Foundations and outcomes. Perspectives on deafness. New York, NY, US: Oxford University Press. pp. 52–101

8-18 months
Caregiving
WHY IT MATTERS

Parental co-regulation was found to be the most effective means of developing self-regulation with infants and toddlers. Co-regulation involves: (1) Providing a warm and responsive relationship where children feel respected as individuals, comforted and supported in times of stress, and confident that they will be cared for no matter what. This positive relationship will promote self-efficacy and allow children to feel secure enough to practice new skills and learn from mistakes.
(2) Structuring the environment by having consistent and predictable routines to allow children to feel safe to explore. (3) Teach and coach self-regulation skills through modelling, instruction, practice opportunities, prompts for skill enactment, and

reinforcement of successive approximations

Reinforcement of Successive Approximations - Shaping with successive approximations is a procedure used to develop a new behaviour or one that rarely occurs. In shaping with successive approximations, a series of initial and intermediate behaviours are established in successive approximations to the desired target behaviour. The initial response that is reinforced bears some resemblance to the target behaviour (e.g., speech sounds and speaking in sentences) so that the intermediate responses can be progressively shaped toward the target behaviour.1

1. Sundel, M., & Sundel, S. S. (2018). Behavior change in the human services: Behavioral and cognitive principles and applications. Los Angeles: SAGE.

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  1. Murray, Desiree W., Rosanbalm, Katie, Christopoulos, Christina, and Hamoudi, Amar (2015). Self-Regulation and Toxic Stress: Foundations for Understanding Self-Regulation from an Applied Developmental Perspective. OPRE Report #2015-21, Washington, DC: Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (Level III)

Talking about what you are doing helps children develop language abilities to describe their experiences. Developing a child’s language abilities can help promote self-regulation. Research has shown that improved language ability could promote the development of self-regulation for several biological reasons.

First, motor and language systems are closely linked in brain activation patterns and their development. Processing action-related language activates motor and premotor cortices.

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  1. van Elk M, van Schie HT, Zwaan RA, Bekkering H. (2010). The functional role of motor activation in language processing: Motor cortical oscillations support lexical-semantic retrieval. NeuroImage.50:665–677.
Spoken language processing may influence the development of fine motor skills.
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  1. Horn DL, Davis RAO, Pisoni DB, Miyamoto RT. Behavioral inhibition and clinical outcomes in children with cochlear implants. Laryngoscope. 2005;115:595–600.
 Second, language processes are associated with neural circuits in the frontal lobe including the frontopolar, medial frontal, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortices that underlie aspects of self-regulation. Hence, this suggests that helping the child with language development will also help in self-regulation.
4, 5, 6

  1. Lee HJ, Kang E, Oh S-H, Kang H, Soo Lee D, Lee MC, Kim C-S. Preoperative differences of cerebral metabolism relate to the outcome of cochlear implants in congenitally deaf children. Hearing Research. 2005;203:2–9.

  2. Pisoni DB, Conway CM, Kronenberger WG, Horn DL, Karpicke J, Henning SC. (2008). Efficacy and effectiveness of cochlear implants in deaf children. In: Marschark M, Hauser PC, editors. Deaf cognition: Foundations and outcomes. Perspectives on deafness. New York, NY, US: Oxford University Press. pp. 52–101.

  3. Petersen, I. T., Bates, J. E., & Staples, A. D. (2015). The role of language ability and self-regulation in the development of inattentive-hyperactive behaviour problems. Development and psychopathology, 27(1), 221–237. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954579414000698

Vygotsky’s theoretical framework, central to current research on self-regulation, identifies a child’s emerging language acquisition as a vital force in the development of self-regulatory skills. Researchers found that the growing mastery of language leads to the emergence of private speech where children talk to themselves to guide their thinking about what they should do. Private speech helps younger children move from other-regulation to self-regulation.

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  1. Bodrova, E., & Leong,D.J. (2007). Tools of the mind: The Vygotskian approach to early childhood education. 2nd ed. Columbus, OH: Merrill/ Prentice Hall. (Level III) USA.
Adults who can model private speech to younger children can support children in developing their thinking processes and move on to regulate themselves.
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  1. Cheyney, K., Wang, J., & Bettini, B. (2013). Make every word count: Using language as a bridge to self-regulation in early childhood settings. Dimensions of Early Childhood. 41(2), 11-17 (Level III)