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It was a socially accepted practice in ancient times. It had collective causes such as revenge of the sectors of power towards a part of the population or individual causes such as extreme poverty, hiding sexual misconduct or getting rid of infants who didn't have adequate physical conditions for practices such as war.
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The practice in which parents delegated the care of infants from an early age to third parties and emotionally disassociated themselves from them. Moreover, within this period infants were used as war intermediaries and the sale of children was legal and common. For example, as cited by Demause,Child sale was legal in Babylonian times, and may have been quite common among many nations in antiquity.
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The conception of the infant still relapsed into an image of a mysterious being with dangerous projections. However, there was a closer child-father relationship, but with the idea that children should be corrected and physically trained by their parents. One of the methods used to get in line children was swaddling; consisted of depriving the infant of total use of his limbs by enveloping them in an endless length of bandage and compressing the trunk and head to whatever shape one desired.
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It is the stage where empathic relationships between infants and parents began to be created. Children were not considered as beings with dangerous projections, which allowed parents to take care of them more closely. As cited by CYC web page, as empathic reactions emerged, paediatrics was born and child rearing manuals, which first appeared in the previous period, became increasingly common. The general trend was towards improved child care and reduced infant mortality.
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Empathic relationships between parents and children grew and the parenting style focused on a process of training the child, guiding him into the right direction and socialising him.
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The child is considered an autonomous and independent being, capable of expressing their needs at each stage of their growth. Physical punishments are almost non-existent due to the empathetic and sincere relationships between parents and children; the result is reportedly a gentle, sincere, independent child with a strong will and little fear of authority.