YOUNG CHILDREN'S DISCRIMINATIONS OF PARENT AND CHILD ROLES1,2

Abstract

parent-child relationships and the child's personality structure at different periods of development. In broadest outline, his view is that: (a) each phase of socialization is initiated by an increased differentiation of the social structure into which the child is being socialized; (b) under the impact of each new social structure, there are certain changes in the motivations, cognitions, and performances of the child; (c) there is an ordered sequence of social structures during socialization and a corresponding developmental sequence of needs and role conceptions in the child; (d) each reorganization of needs and roles in this sequence arises from a discrimination (bifurcation) on a specific dimension to which the child was previously insensitive; (e) the dimensions used to discriminate needs and roles are derived from the Pattern Variables (11), postulated to be a basic and exhaustive set of binary choices made in any action sequence by the mature adult. This study investigates several aspects of Parsons' theory concerning the development of parent and child role concepts in the young child. The mother, father, daughter, and son are treated as four basic role types in the family social structure. It is hypothesized that the discrimination of

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