Child psychology as is evident from the nomenclature is the psychology of children.Basically it is an important branch of Psychology.Modern Psychologist define Psychology as the positive science of human behaviour which endeavours to understand man in his environment.And a child is an human being of definite age.the age below eighteen.
Earlier Psychologists maintain the childhood continues till the age of twelve and between the age of twelve and eighteen children are called adolescent.In order to distinguish the first six years of a child’s life from the second stage of development between six and twelve,the term infancy is applied to the former.But development begins when the child is still in his mother’s womb and therefore,the study of the prenatal stage also becomes important.
Modern psychologists,therefore,believed that child psychology should comprehend child’s development almost from the movement of comprehend child’s development almost from the movement of conception,to the time when he enters the adolescent period.So far,we have been concerned with the perfectly literal meaning of the term child psychology and have called in the study(the age not between twelve and eighteen but below eighteen).
Child psychology is an individual and distinct branch of psychology which came into existence in the nineteenth century when psychologists graduaaly realised the importance of studying child’s behaviour in isolation from adult behaviour.So it becomes important to define it with greater precision.In the role of science,Child Psychology has to fulfil the nature of science and its function is to describe,deals and predict human behaviour.it aims at discovering universal laws and principles governing the interaction between the living being and his organism.It uses scientific methods and reaches Psychological conclusions.
Essential elements of Science are as follows-
1.Scientific method
2.Factuality.
3.Universality.
4.Vakidity
5.Define cause-effect relationship.
6.Prediction
In nutshell,we can say that child development follows some principles
