ARE ANXIOUS WITHDRAWN CHILDREN INHIBITED IN THE CONTEXT OF NOVEL SOCIAL SITUATIONS

Two theoretical perspectives may be invoked to explain social withdraw al in early childhood. The first casts the concept of behavioral inhib ition toward the unfamiliar as a temperamental predisposition with tem poral stability, and situational consistency. The second concerns the quality of adaptation of the child to his habitual environment and sug gests that social withdrawal arises from mother-child or child-child r elationships. In the present study, no relation was found between thes e two measures of inhibition in novel social situations and anxious-wi thdrawn behavior in the child's preschool environment. We view this re sult as confirmation of the conceptual distinction between an initial response to the unfamiliar and the habitual response to the everyday e nvironment. The finding that maternal behavior was coherently related to the child's social inhibition suggests that exogenous as well as en dogenous factors are involved.