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Parenting by Your Toddler's Personality Type

Experts share tips for handling the different personality types of toddlers.

By Diane Lore
WebMD Feature

Reviewed by Renee A Alli, MD

Less than 2 years old, Kira Wales was completely obsessed with digital clocks. Able to count to 10, she would intently stare at the clock reading, say, 6:53. And then she would turn to her dad, Jimmy Wales, and say conspiratorially, "I think it's gonna be a four next."

And then she would stare. And stare, according to Wales, founder of Wikipedia. "Until finally ... 'four!' she would say, throwing her arms in the air as if she had scored a Super Bowl touchdown."

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And then, staring back at the clock, she would look sideways at her dad and whisper, "I think it's gonna be a five next ..."

Inquisitive like her father, Kira, now 8, was merely expressing her toddler temperament, according to pediatrician Harvey Karp, MD, author and creator of the best-selling book and DVD series, The Happiest Toddler on the Block. Kira had discovered the joy of patterns and took great pleasure, for about a week, in being able to predict numbers.

If babies are angels, then toddlers are cavemen, according to Karp. Rambunctious, mobile, and caught in a riptide of emotion, toddlers are the uncivilized, pedal-to-the-metal humans, matched only by the older edition called teenagers, experts (and parents) say.

"They eat light bulbs. They shove Legos in their noses," says Lara Zibners, MD, an ER pediatrician in New York City. "Toddlers are egocentric, emotionally labile, indecisive, and oblivious to danger."

Layer in their limited ability to communicate and their individual temperaments, says Zibners, author of If Your Kid Eats This Book, Everything Will Still Be Okay. "It's no wonder that many parents can't wait for their child to outgrow this difficult, yet often delightful, phase of childhood."

Yet parents can master understanding these little creatures. The first step: figure out your toddler's personality. Karp writes in The Happiest Toddler on the Block: "Temperament explains why some of us can sleep with the TV on while others go nuts with the tiniest noise, why some forgive easily and others just can't let go. Knowing your child's temperament helps you know when to pamper and when to push."

Toddler Personality Types

Generally, toddler personality is divided into three broad categories, experts say:

Easy or happy, but not full-tilt constantly
Shy or slow to warm -- often thoughtful and quiet.
Spirited (a nice term for "Get down off the refrigerator right now!")

The Easy Child: About half of kids are easygoing -- waking up on the "right side of the bed," cheerful and ready for a new day, Karp says. They're active, tolerate change, and basically like new people and situations. They don't anger easily but aren't pushovers, experts say. Parents need to just use common sense if this is their toddler's personality, with a couple of caveats. Easy children sometimes can be lost in the crowd -- spending too much time left alone with the television, or not enough time with their parents because other children demand the attention. Make sure that a child who is easy doesn't become a neglected child.