Examined mothers' demands during mothers' interactions with their 1.5- to 3.5-year olds. Mothers with authoritative child-rearing attitudes emphasized proactive, competence-oriented demands and avoided regulatory control. Maternal demands for competent action predicted fewer behavior problems in their children at age five; maternal demands focused…

Observed parents' coparenting of 15-month-old sons to test 2 hypotheses: (1) greater differences in parents' demographic factors, personality, styles of relatedness, and child-rearing attitudes would forecast more unsupportive coparenting; and (2) the adverse effects of spousal differences would be amplified by family stress. Results supported…

Toddlers were shown flawed and whole objects. Later, in a "mishap" condition, toddlers were led to believe they had damaged the examiners' valued possessions. Toddlers expressed a preference for whole objects but showed more interest in flawed objects. Manifestations of sensitivity to flawed objects were associated with behavioral and affective…

Observed infants' stress responses to a well-baby examination and inoculation at two, four, and six months. Found an increase in salivary cortisol level over baseline in response to the procedures and that the cortisol response decreased with age, indicating a developmental shift in adrenocortical functioning between two and six months of age. (BC)

Interviewed second through sixth graders to assess parameters of worry. Found that girls reported more worries than boys, and African American students reported more worries than white or Hispanic students. The three most commonly reported areas of worry were school, health, and personal harm. Anxiety was significantly associated with worry. (BC)

Young children watched videotaped fairy tales that involved child or adult control over frightening events. Subsequently, they watched a videotape of a child having a medical exam. Children who had watched the child control fairy tales showed an enhancement, whereas children who had watched the adult control fairy tales showed a deficit, in…

Eighty kindergartners predicted and explained protagonists' emotional responses to hypothetical events. Children predicted anger most often when they believed protagonists could change undesirable situations and reinstate their goals and when they focused on persons or conditions that caused undesirable situations. Children predicted sadness most…

To assess how they compared themselves to peers, elementary school students were observed in class and interviewed over a three-year period. Found that overt forms of social comparison were most frequent among younger children, and subtle forms among older children. With increasing age, children were likely to see subtle forms of social comparison…

Assessed child behavior, maternal depression, and family socioeconomic status and observed mother-child interactions for 376 first graders and their mothers. Found that the quality of mother-child interactions mediated the relationship between maternal depression and child behavior problems for boys, girls, and Caucasians but not for African…

Obtained peer nominations and observed peer contacts for three-, four-, and five-year-old preschoolers from fall to spring. Found that children's sociometric ratings became increasingly negative, especially for cross-sex peers; the frequency of cross-sex contacts decreased; and four-year olds spent more time in large groups than three- and…

For a sample of 398 middle grade students in a rural area, found that youth from homes in which adults were employed in low-income occupations had lower levels of school achievement than other students and that youth from families in which neither parent had graduated from high school exhibited worse socioemotional and academic adjustment than…

For a sample of 96 adolescents, found that, when the affective nature of the parent-adolescent relationship was positive, adolescent adjustment was more likely to be positive when adolescents reported less rather than more emotional autonomy. When family environments were stressful, emotional autonomy was positively associated with adolescent…

The mother, father, and adolescent siblings from 675 families were observed interacting in problem-solving sessions. Siblings were monozygotic twins, dyzygotic twins, or full siblings in nondivorced families and full, half, and unrelated siblings in stepfamilies. Results suggested a greater genetic component to adolescent behavior than to parent…

Interviewed 11th-grade students in the United States, Taiwan, and Japan. Studying, interacting with peers, and watching television were the most frequently reported activities in each location. Chinese students spent more time in academic endeavors, and Japanese students spent more time attending school, than did American students. American…

Pooled data from previous studies in which autistic, mentally handicapped, and normal young children had been tested on theory of mind tasks. Found that normal children at a verbal mental age of four years, but autistic children at a verbal mental age of more than nine years, had a 50% chance of passing the theory of mind tests. (BC)