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| Physocologu Lecturer University of Muhammadiyah Malang (UMM) Prof. Dr. Iswinarti, M.Si.(Photo : Special) |
The 'Sad Beige Mom' parenting trend has recently become a hot topic of conversation on various social media platforms. This term is often associated with parents who use soft (neutral) colors such as beige, white, and cream, as a mecca for aesthetic style in parenting. Claimed to have a classic and clean feel, this trend has spread to various circles of the global community, including Indonesia. Although considered 'aestethic', this trend still raises big questions about its impact on children's psychological development. Responding to this phenomenon, Psychology Lecturer at University of Muhammadiyah Malang (UMM) Prof. Dr. Iswinarti, M.Si. emphasized the importance of color selection and variation in supporting visual stimulation and cognitive development of children, since infancy.
“When babies are 2-3 months old, the movement of objects and sounds are very influential in stimulating the baby's vision and hearing (eyes and ears). Meanwhile, with all the limitations, babies' vision tends to capture brightly colored objects or those with high contrast, such as black, white, red, yellow, and so on,” she said.
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Then after that, the child is in the developmental stage of cognitive stimulation. At this stage of development, the child will begin to be able to classify colors. In general, parents will introduce basic colors to children, such as red, yellow, and green. So, in the next stage, children are able to classify colors created from a combination of these basic colors or commonly known as rainbow colors. In addition, he also revealed that color psychology also represents emotions, such as bright colors depict joy and enthusiasm, black means deep sadness, and others.
“Usually children will tend to recognize basic colors and their combinations or rainbow colors from the development of cognitive stimulation. So, when the child is only given one color and the color does not attract the child's attention, then the possibility of cognitive stimulation is lacking,” she explained.
Regardless of this trend phenomenon, Iswinarti views that the difference in one's taste in color, style and so on is a natural thing. As for the use of the diction 'sad (sadness)' with the intention of convicting in this trend term, it is considered quite excessive. However, she also emphasized that mothers or parents should not be selfish by imposing their will or thoughts on their children. In effect, it can interfere with the child's psychological and cognitive development.
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“Indeed, parents should not force children to obey their will or passion for children. Because one element that is no less important in optimizing child development is the element of emotional stimulation that is reflected in the patterns and methods of parenting parents to children,” he said.
Finally, she emphasized that during the stimulation period of child development, color variations are important. He also hopes that the community, especially parents, will be wiser in choosing something related to parenting. (din/wil/ind)
