Day Care May Aid Behavior, Study Finds

The largest and longest-running national study of child care has found that children cared for in settings with several other children have fewer behavior problems than those cared for by a nanny alone or in very small groups, researchers reported Thursday.

The finding is part of the third installment of a seven-year research project by the National Institutes of Health that is regarded as the most comprehensive look at the effects of day care on the development of children.

The conventional wisdom, based on earlier studies, has been that children watched over in day-care facilities are more likely to be uncooperative and can often pick up bad behavior from other children. That concern has led many parents to hire nannies, assuming that the one-on-one care is beneficial.

This study does not refute that such care may help children develop intellectually or in other ways, but it does suggest that in terms of behavior, these children may be worse off than those in centers.

Researchers said they recognized that all children have occasional temper tantrums or screaming bouts, and that some amount of that is normal behavior. But after observing thousands of children, the researchers said they discovered that the frequency and intensity of those and other problems were higher for children cared for in smaller groups or by themselves.

Ten teams of academics around the country are following 3,100 families from the birth of their children roughly through second grade.