By Andy Dolan
Many working parents feel guilty about leaving their children in nursery school, but they may not need to worry. According to one academic, children can actually benefit by spending hours away from home each day.
Kathy Sylva, professor of educational psychology at Oxford University, said that in creches of an average to high standard, children who start attending under the age of two go on to form better relationships at primary school.
She said her research shows that nursery does the "vast majority" of children under two no harm at all.
Sylva bases her claims on data from the Effective Provision of Pre-School Education project, the largest study in Europe on the impact of early education and care on development. It has followed the progress of 3 000 children since 1996.
The findings will come as a relief to guilt-ridden parents after previous research suggesting a link between early nursery attendance and aggression in later childhood.
Sylva said: "A lot of parents worry unnecessarily about this issue, but my research shows that the vast majority of children are not impaired on any measure by attending nursery under the age of two."
She received regular calls and e-mails from parents anxious about the possible negative effects of nursery school on their child.
"They say that they both have to work and that they need both incomes, but they worry that one of them should stay home to look after their 15-month-old rather than use a nursery school.
"I tell them that the research shows that the vast majority of children under two in nursery schools are fine.
"I tell them there are many things parents can do to make sure that their child is part of that majority.
"They can check the quality of the nursery care, speak to other parents, visit the nursery school unexpectedly, make sure staff turnover isn't high and talk to the people actually caring for their child, not just the director."
Her standpoint leaves her at odds with other experts such as Dr Penelope Leach, who claims that children under two develop better, both socially and emotionally, at home, preferably with their mother.
Sylva admits her own research shows that some children placed in nurseries before the age of two show "slightly higher" levels of aggression at primary school.
Three years ago, she was involved in UK government-funded research which found that children at nursery full-time were "more likely to display anti-social behaviour" the longer they had been attending.
But she said recently that any higher aggression levels disappeared by the time the children reached 11. - Daily Mail