What Is Your Baby’s Temperament?

Maya Angelou said, and perhaps rightly, “I have a monument in this world, it is my child”. However, even though this sentence is very beautiful, it is true that in reality we sometimes go completely crazy / mad because they are too rowdy or, on the contrary, too calm. In this sense, each baby is born with a temperament, which we will have to get used to …

Let’s not forget that babies show their temperament from an early age. Despite the fact that upbringing and the characteristics of the social context in which they grow up will gradually define this temperament, their personality will not cease to have much of the character with which they were born and which they have inherited.

Your baby’s temperament

Knowing your baby’s temperament is basic because it can give us valuable information about how, for example, we can better educate him. In fact, we can know very early on how the little one will be in the future (“When he grows up he will have character…” or “How quiet he is!”). Although this may change, some aspects will not change or will change very little.

Thus,  according to science, we find three very specific types of temperaments. On the one hand, we have the “easy kids”. Then we find the “difficult babies”. Finally, there are also those who are “apathetic”.

Of course, to speak in this way is to generalize. In other words,  these three personality types of babies are not absolute. A child may have a high percentage of apathy mixed with a certain percentage of difficult temper, for example.

Thus, your child may be an easy child, a bit rowdy and sometimes apathetic, or apathetic and sometimes very easy to understand, etc. But even if this classification is not absolute, it serves as a guide for us to understand the little one and learn to manage it according to the peculiarities of its temperament.

Children with an easy temperament

According to studies,  40% of babies are easy. That is to say that they are educated with ease, that they do not have temperamental problems, that they acquire healthy habits very simply, etc.

These children adapt very well to change and learn to obey orders from an early age. They are normally very smiling, both with people they know and with strangers. They have the temperament that all parents, in principle, would want for their child.

Children with difficult temperaments

Children with difficult personalities represent 10% of all babies. In this case,  it is necessary that parents arm themselves with patience at all times because these children are very complex. In fact, they are genuine experts in straining the patience of parents.

Usually,  these babies get irritated very easily and don’t just develop healthy habits. It is therefore necessary to set firm limits, use didactics and show love to soften one’s behavior as these children tend not to feel sure of themselves and loved.

“A baby is a blank check to the human race.”

-Barbara Christine Seifert-

Children with an apathetic temperament

Third, we find children with apathetic personalities. They represent 15% of babies and their uniqueness is expressed by their tranquility. It is rare to see them protest and they adapt perfectly to change.

In fact,  this type of baby shows a certain indifference to external stimuli,  which is not necessarily a cause for concern. These are kids who don’t place much importance on the outside world, which they see as predictable and unsurprising (or, at least, more predictable and less surprising than any other child their age). Moreover, their indifference to what surrounds them does not mean that they do not like it: it is rather an indicator of conformity.

So,  these babies should be treated like any other,  trying to contain those aspects of their temper that are more problematic and strengthening those that are not. Knowing their temperament is therefore going to be important when teaching them something. For example, very dynamic children will learn more easily if we let them try and correct them while they are doing it; similarly, we will be more successful at teaching calm children if we explain a few examples to them before and after allowing them to try something.

Finally,  we find 35% of children who do not answer exclusively to these bosses; they are said to have a mixed personality. That is, as we said, they have characteristics of one or the other, at different percentages.

In other words, if it is true that a child can be generally quiet, faced with certain situations or in concrete states, he could react with temperament or be apathetic. There is no such thing as a 100% concrete or static pattern, although we might well identify one that predominates in every child.

“You carry a baby within you for nine months, then in your arms for three years and in your heart until you die.”

-Mary Mason-

Therefore, taking this article as a basis,  could you tell us what your baby’s personality type is? Although this is not absolute data, it can serve as a guide and be very helpful. So learning to understand our babies is essential if we are to contribute intelligently to their growth.