Child Development: Myths and Misunderstandings

“A wonderful way to look more deeply into issues in child development.”

 - Sarah Jane Anderson, Mount Ida College

“With its emphasis on critical thinking about child development, Mercer’s text is unique and timely. . . . Mercer has done an admirable job in selecting and tackling the topics that she does.”

 - Nancy Dye, Humboldt College

In Child Development: Myths and Misunderstandings, 2e, Jean Mercer uses intriguing vignettes and questions about children and families to guide readers in thinking critically about 59 common beliefs. Each essay confronts commonly held misconceptions about development, encouraging students to think like social scientists and to become better consumers of media messages and anecdotal stories. The book can be assigned to parallel either chronologically or topically organized child development texts.

Features and Benefits:

• Presents 59 short essays about child development that challenge readers to reconsider their pre-conceived notions
• 14 new essays in the second edition confront topics like language acquisition, adoption, discipline, and nature versus nurture.
• Includes carefully developed critical thinking questions at the end of each essay
• Offers examples of research to help students make the connection between research designs and conclusions
• Intrigues and engages students with the theme of dispelling myths and misconceptions and challenges them to find out if their own beliefs are correct or incorrect.