Genie's Theory Of Feral Children

Feral children are defined to be the human children who had cut connections with the people at a very young age. It is possible that s/he had not experience the tender-loving care, and crucially, learning the human language. Feral children may either: (1) be confined by humans, (2) brought up by animals, or (3) lived in wild due to isolation. I will try to make sense their structures of development starting from their early ages, using the concept of human development. The human development of a child is strongly connected with the conditioning of the environment and its agents (human, animals, and things around him/her). In the case of Genie, his father, Clark Wiley, regulated silence using his fists and wood to his children, ever since the

The answer is an obvious, yes! As stated earlier, the learning development of a feral children who was raised by animals was based on the modeling of the animals involved. However, this case is not trivial for Genie because of the grave abuse and isolation. One theory proposed in Psychology was that young children can learn certain things, such as language, at a certain time, called the critical periods. In this light, it would have been impossible for Genie to learn any languages. In line with this is the Piaget 's Stage Theory with the assumption that the other people were not necessary for the acquisition of new skills and practices. For Genie 's case, this has been reversed (the theory might not be necessarily wrong), with the fact that in her cognitive development started when she was older than 13 years of age. After the transfer of Genie to LA children 's Hospital, pediatricians, psychologists, and linguists treated her. Exposing her outside hospital, everything is a new experience for her, and it had great progresses, as she learned to play, chew, dress herself, and enjoy music. She was enthusiastic, she was learning the words for the things around her, and she engaged with the people around her. As a consequence, she also showed signs of intelligence. Vygotsky 's theory made almost perfect sense since the linguist and the social workers responsible for Genie 's care played a

Apart from her learning is her development of her personality. She tried her best to become close to some people and maintain her cheerful personality, in the social workers ' care. In addition, Susan Curtiss, a UCLA Linguistics Professor, formed attachments with Genie during walks and shopping trips. On the contrary, because of the other people around her not listening to her while she was in the state care, she pleaded with the interveners to consider her great needs. This case also criticizes Erikson 's Psychosocial Development Theory, since for every Erickson 's stages of development, an emotional crisis must be experienced for normal development, but, as an effect of great isolation to Genie, almost all aspects of her development declined (physical - due to the non-stimulation of her cortex and psychological - due to her memorable yet harsh experiences), making her development not normal and unhealthy. As an insight, I have learned that feral children should be taken into consideration, especially when they had terrible experiences. Despite these developments were greatly affected, it is never too late to learn again about the world around them. And most importantly, if I were a parent, who is a primary conditioner of a child, I must treat my child with utmost care, in order for her path not to be broken as a result of