Eric Prewitt and His Family

Chapter 9, “Eric Prewitt and His Family,” describes the older child in a working-class European American family. Mrs. Prewitt, who was divorced, was raising Eric and his younger brother on her own, with very little social support from her family but with help from her church and other local institutions. During the study, she graduated from community college, the first in her family to do so. Eric was a prodigiously curious child who loved music. He was fascinated by vehicles and computers and learned to read early. Although his preschool teachers were impressed by his advanced computer and literacy skills, they (and Eric’s mother) were concerned about his shyness, which they took to be a sign of low self-esteem. Eric was shy in the classroom, but not in the gym, where he was the very picture of exuberance. At his teachers’ urging, Eric began to see a therapist.