This study explores the cultural construction of "difficult" temperament in the first 2 years of life, as well as the logistical and thematic continuity across infancy and childhood in what mothers perceive as difficult. It extends earlier work regarding older children in six cultural sites: Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden, and the United States. In order to compare temperament profiles across sites, a "derived etic" version of standard temperament scales is constructed, and then examined in relation to mothers' global ratings of how "difficult" the child is to manage. Results are compared to the earlier report. Negative Mood and low Adaptability tend to be problematic in most sites in both age groups. High Activity and Intensity increase in their relevance to difficulty from the first 2 years to early childhood. In some sites, dispositions such as low Approach become less difficult to manage. Of particular note are culturally unique patterns of continuity that appear to be related to larger cultural themes. These results have implications for our theoretical understanding of parenting, as well as for educational and clinical practice.

中文翻译：

---

“困难儿童”文化建构的发展连续性与变迁：西方六种文化研究

这项研究探索了生命的头两年“困难”性气质的文化建构，以及婴儿期和儿童期在母亲认为困难的情况下的后勤和主题连续性。它扩展了有关六个文化场所中年龄较大的儿童的早期工作：意大利，荷兰，波兰，西班牙，瑞典和美国。为了比较各个场所的气质状况，构建了标准气质量表的“派生式”版本，然后根据母亲对孩子要“多么困难”进行管理的总体评分进行检查。将结果与先前的报告进行比较。在这两个年龄段的大多数站点中，负情绪和低适应性都容易成为问题。从头2年到儿童早期，高活动和高强度的人与困难的相关性增加。在某些站点中，“低进阶”这样的配置变得难以管理。特别值得注意的是，文化上独特的连续性模式似乎与更大的文化主题有关。这些结果对我们对育儿的理论理解以及教育和临床实践都具有启示意义。