Toddler Social Development

What Happens In a Toddler’s Social Development

The toddler-period plays a highly important role in every aspect of a child’s development. In this stage before the actual childhood, the toddler learns and recognizes some basic rules of social interaction, grows physically and mentally.

The toddler’s social development is linked to the toddler’s emotional development, as exactly in the early stage of being the toddler, the child recognizes that he is a separate being from his mother, he is learning the way the world around him works, is reaching for independence for the first time, to be repeated in the time of adolescence. Thus, the environment and the conditions that surround the toddler will have a long-term effect even on the social interactions of adulthood.

The Toddler’s Social Development – An Outline

From the age of 12 months, the kids will begin to explore the world around them independently, realizing that they are independent identities in a way from their caregivers, and though there is not a high degree of social interaction yet, exploration will start, away from the parents.

Some kids, though will perhaps not start this independent exploration this early, every parent should rest assured, that they will eventually do, and that there are significant differences in the toddlers’ social development as well. As an important step in recognizing other people, from 15-18 months, the toddlers may also start addressing others with greetings. Between 18 and 24 months, toddlers, when socially interacting with other, unfamiliar toddlers, may still show anxiety.

At the same time, the toddler will want to be independent more and more.  The toddler will also mimic some social behavior, in play, like hugging teddy bears for example, and will display social attachment to some people. From the age of two, toddlers will engage more and more in plays, imitating in these the social skills they have seen, with the help of these games of pretend, children try to sort out their way in the world and their social relation to others.

Parallel play is also characteristic of the two-year old toddler’s social development. Toddlers will be playing sitting next to each other, though they may not yet interact with each other in the games they are playing. These parallel plays, even if they do not seem to involve much social interaction, are the basis for cooperative play in the future.

Toddlers in this period, will also be generally able to know the difference between boys and girls. Toddlers may push and shove in the course of these plays which are usually not hostile as they still have a limited social behavior, however these are all important milestones in the toddler’s social development, which mainly consists of exploring the self and recognizing others to an extent.