(no subject)

[watertank]

The mothers of children born after World War II and entring the workforce in greater numbers needed surrogate care for their young children. This new form of rearing, discrepant from the tradition of their mothers and grandmothers, evoked uncertainty because of the verity that infants needed the loving care only a bilogical mother could provide.
Jean Piaget's ideas on cognitive development were as second reason for the interest in children. These ideas were not initially popular, either in Europe or in the United States, because Piaget was interested in the growth of logic and reasoning rather than in emotions, morality, and friendships, and he was indifferent to the influcence of caretakers.
Finally, the Soviet launch of a space vehicle, which in the United States provoked a wring of hands over the disheeartening quality of science education in American schools, catalyzed concern with the growth of intellectual talents.
Each of those forces - working mothers, Sputnik, and the writings of Erikson, Bowlby, and Piaget - came together, like the components of a perfect storm, to generate a broadly based curiosity about young children, and private philanthropies and the federal government were ready to provide ample funds for research on children. ibid. 70-71.

this is relevant to the timing problem, and also as a dilemma: a child needs his mother (tradition) and the child doesn't need his mother (Piaget)