Impact of Day Care on Peer Relations

Attachment 
Secure attachment is better for peer relations. Sroufe linked insecure attachment to greater difficulty with peer relations. Belsky and Rovine found that childern who had reccieved 20 hours or more of day care per week before they were 1 year old were more likely to be insecurely attached compared with children at home.

Social Development: Clarke-Stewart 
Studied 150 children and found that those who were in day care were consistently more advanced in their social development than children who stayed home with mothers. These advances were insocial development, independence, dinnertime obedience, compliance requests and social interacton with peers.

Social Strategies: Field 
Conducted a correlational study and found a positive correlation between the amount of time spent in full-time day care and the number of friends a child had once they went to school. 

Lack of Causal Relationship
Other factors may explain the link between day care and increased sociability. For example, mothers who are shy by nature may prefer to stay at home and look after their children. Their children may have inherited the tame temperament, therefore is mainly socially outgoing children who attend day care. 

Day Care Has No Effects
Day care is not the only influence on a child development. It is difficult to identify the direct effects of day care when they are among others. Clarke-Stewart concluded that, while day care programmes may have some direct effects on development they are not opporating alone.