Abstract

Recognition that children need energy not only for health and growth but also for social and economic life in the household suggests that it is important to understand the range of culturally induced variation in the activities of infants and children, how this diversity is regulated, and what purposes it serves. This paper presents a brief examination of the existing cross-cultural literature on children's activities, followed by a review of the 'development niche', a framework for examining the way cultures structure the micro-environments of infants and children. Finally, observations are presented that demonstrate considerable diversity in the levels of activity and arousal in infants from seven different communities on three continents. This diversity is shown to be related to the three subsystems of the developmental niche: the physical and social settings, the customs of child care, and the psychology of the caretakers. Studies of older children do not typically conceptualize activities in a way that indicates their energy costs. It is concluded, however, that a theoretical framework and an empirical methodology exist for constructing a typology of children's activities; and that if energy costs can be attached to paradigmatic examples, the result would be a contextually sensitive, developmentally oriented understanding of the energy requirements for the world's children.

Recent reconsideration of the protein and energy requirements of children has led to the recognition that provision must be made not only for health and growth, but also for the physical activities appropriate to social and economic life in the family and community (e.g., FAO/WHO/UNU, 1985). One could perhaps view this statement as one aspect of the growing appreciation in many circles that the diversity of human life and cultures cannot be reduced to a single dimension such as 'advantaged' versus 'disadvantaged', and that the organization of this diversity pervades all spheres, even the biological requirements for the promotion and maintenance of health. It follows that recommendations can be truly universal only when they include adequate recognition of the structure and meaning provided by local context. In order to afford such recognition in dietary recommendations, as contained in the 1985 FAO/WHO/UNU position, it is necessary to have some understanding of what the culturally induced variation is in the activities of infants and children, how this diversity is regulated, and what purposes it serves.