Early use of non-parental childcare is not harmful for most children

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What type of childcare arrangements do parents choose before their children are 18 months old? Does the choice of childcare affect children’s language skills and mental health at the age of five? These are some of the questions that are explored in a new report prepared by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health as part of a collaborative project with the Ministry of Education and Research. The report indicates that there is no evidence that early centre-based childcare is harmful for most children.

Most pre-school children in Norway attend different types of childcare arrangements on a daily or weekly basis, and by far the majority are in centre-based childcare (kindergarten). In contrast to most other countries, children with physical and/or mental disabilities are not separated from the other children, but attend regular groups or classes in public kindergartens and schools.

Childcare is an important arena for language development and learning and for preventing and coping with mental health issues, regardless of the child’s functional level. Because most children in Norway participate in childcare we have opportunities to learn about what the best arrangements are for learning, as well as how best to cope with daily challenges for children with different levels of functioning. The significance of different types of childcare for children’s development is frequently discussed in many research groups as well as in the preschool education sector. 

The aim of this report “Barnepass fram til 18 måneder. Sammenhenger mellom barnepass fram til 18 måneder og språklige ferdigheter og psykisk fungering ved fem år” (English: Childcare up to 18 months. Relations between child care up to 18 months and language skills and mental function at five years) has been to provide more knowledge about the use of different childcare arrangements and how they affect children’s functioning as well as the impact of starting in childcare at an early age.

The report provides an overview of the current status and is based on data from the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. Part one of the report presents information about childcare arrangements based on questionnaire data from more than 60 000 children in MoBa aged 18 months, in the period between 2001 and the end of 2009. Then impact of childcare (up to 18 months of age) was studied in the context of language skills, language-related difficulties and psychological function in 13 000 children who had reached five years by the end of 2010.
What works for whom?

Overall, the report shows that neither the language skills nor the psychological function of most children varies with the type of childcare, their age when starting in childcare outside the home, whether they used a combination of childcare arrangements or just one type, or how many hours per week they were in childcare.

“For most children there is no evidence from our findings to suggest that it is harmful to begin in centre-based childcare at 12 months,” said Synnve Schjølberg, researcher and specialist in clinical psychology. “The small effect sizes of the findings indicate that the differences between children attending childcare at an early age and those starting later have no clinical implications for most children” she explains.

“Neither do the findings suggest that most children who are cared for at home up to 18 months of age are better prepared than children cared for by others in the same period,” said Schjølberg.

“It is possible that the small differences found could be attributed to some children’s particular vulnerability. Low quality childcare could be hypothesised as another explanation,” said Schjølberg. “We will investigate these relationships further. The debate around centre-based childcare needs to be more nuanced and now rather focus on what works for whom” she added.

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