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Specific child-rearing practices with their appropriate verbal and nonverbal concomitants seem to assure the maintenance (internalization, in the case of
the individual child) of Javanese cultural desiderata regarding status and respect. Interaction outside and inside the home is characterized by patterns of exaggerated formal behavior governed by status hierarchies. The father has the highest status in the family; he is addressed only by circumlocutions; in many families he eats alone, receiving the best food while the other members of the family wait. Until he is weaned and able to walk the infant is handled almost exclusively by his mother and other females in what we would call an overprotective, overindulgent manner, so that he is spared frustration. The infant's every wish is anticipated and he is expected to have no initiative of his own. A Javanese baby misses the crawling stage completely; he is carried about and otherwise physically supported until he can walk. Then he begins to explore his environment, but his formal indoctrination begins at the same time with repeated detailed unemotional instructions and directives, where he should go to do what, what he should say, etc. Threats are used of horrible fates at the hands of outsiders or spirits if the child is bad, but not by members of the family. Actual punishment by parents is rare. The child learns early to trust his mother and immediate family completely, and to fear those in the outside world. Gradually, as the child matures and becomes more independent, the actual fear is succeeded by an acute vigilance masked by a superficially poised, relaxed manner and exaggerated formality in personal relations. There are many other observations of great interest to psychoanalysts, particularly those concerning the unique changing role of the father in child rearing.