Needs and Interventions for Children with Developmental Disorders

Early Warning Interventions for Child Development

A set of interventions designed for the child population aged 0 to 6 years, involving family and close friends. The objective is to respond as soon as possible to the transient or permanent needs of children who have developmental disorders, or are at risk of developmental delays or allergies. These interventions must consider the whole child and should be planned by an interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary team.

Target Population

Children identified as being at high biological and socio-environmental risk, presenting developmental changes or losses.

Areas of Action

Health, education, and social services.

Understanding Hearing Impairment and Deafness

Hearing Impaired (Pathological State)

A pathological state of the sense of hearing where significant hearing decrease or deafness occurs, which prevents access to spoken language or produces its progressive forgetfulness.

Hearing Loss (Impairment)

Hearing impairment (35–69 dB) that allows for a functional ordinary life. However, it makes oral language acquisition difficult via the auditory pathway, often requiring prosthetic aids.

Deafness

Hearing that is non-functional for everyday life (70 dB or more), resulting in no possibility of acquiring oral language through the auditory pathway; reliance is placed on the visual pathway.

Classification of Hearing Loss

• Degree of Loss: Mild, moderate, severe, profound.
• Location of Injury: Conductive, perceptive (sensorineural).
• Time of Onset: Pre-lingual, post-lingual.

Defining Developmental Disabilities

Intellectual Disability

A disability characterized by significant limitations in intellectual functioning and adaptive behavior, as expressed in practical, social, and conceptual skills. It starts before the age of 18.

Visual Impairment

A total or partial deficit or decrease in a person's visual efficiency.

Blindness

Visual acuity less than 1/10 of vision, where the individual cannot identify fingers at 2.25 meters, even with optical correction.

Low Vision (Hypovision)

Visual acuity between 1/3 and 1/10, presenting a visual field that does not reach limits considered functional.

Core Concepts in Emotional Development

Authentic Emotions

• Affection: Emotional attraction; giving and receiving caresses; favors approach.
• Joy: Promotes motivation to perform tasks; includes laughter, satisfaction, and enjoyment.
• Power: Defined as personal jurisdiction or control.
• Fear: Activates the alarm system, allowing one to face dangerous situations.
• Sadness: Acceptance of losses (people, situations).
• Anger: Necessary for self-defense, setting limits, and demonstrating discomfort.

Introjected Emotions (Searched)

Inappropriate, pathological emotional behavior, modeled by parents or parental figures during childhood, which replaces a real, disallowed emotion.

Mechanisms of Introjection

• Modeling by Parents: Early learned models of emotional and social behavior.
• Disqualification of Real Emotion: The emotion is ignored, unaccepted, or not allowed in the family context.
• Reinforcing (Caressing): Reinforcing inappropriate emotional responses.
• Expressed Orders: Derived from family ideas, beliefs, and values (e.g., “Boys do not cry”).

Attachment Theory

A first-order bond that ensures the safety and security a child needs, established through interactions with parents or substitutes during the first years of life.