This article analyses the perceptions and conceptions of “what the child is” and gives an account of the evolution of childhood's notion from old times to present days, associating those changes to the social dynamics through the beginning of new familiar structures and historical, social, political and cultural factors. Some child's particularities and his/her cognitive development process according to Piaget's theory are discussed, considering childhood in the large capitalist consuming societies and analysing how the child interprets the information presented by the media through advertisements and other communication ways. This article's goal is to present the evolution of the perceptions concerning the child, evidencing his/heir growing insertion in the consumption market, the peculiarities of his/her age, relationship and communication with his/her parents and how they are significative to the child's autonomy development and critical capacity. The exaggerated consumption is culturally emphasized and generates consequences during childhood, which are products of an alienating process that has been forged by the capitalist system and reproduced by society. The precocity of the relations which are processed in society is evidenced.
Children; Culture; Childhood development; Cognitive development; Consumer behavior
