The ongoing evolution of communications technologies and systems creates significant challenges for any effort to understand the role of media in the lives of children and adolescents. The dominant paradigm in studying the relationship between children and media has been one of media effects. However, we propose a reciprocal relationship in which…

This essay comprises testimony to the Congressional Committee on Government Reform. The Committee's concern was the possibility of exposure to pornography when children and teens participate in peer-to-peer file-sharing networks, which are extremely popular in these age groups. A review of the relevant literature led to three major conclusions:…

A request from the National Academies to prepare a presentation for a Workshop on Non-Technical Strategies to Protect Youth from Inappropriate Material on the Internet occurred before much was known about children, youth, and the Internet. The author's strategy was to investigate websites that cater to children and adolescents. The developmental…

Three experiments explored determinants of two-year olds' perseverative errors in a search task. Found that active search, even in the absence of observation, produced perseveration on post-switch trails, but mere observation did not. Results indicated that active search is required to elicit perseveration, which points to failures of response…

Two experiments examined preschoolers' ability to apply multiple labels to representational objects and to people. Found that preschoolers reliably produced or accepted several words per entity and accepted a high percentage of class-inclusive and overlapping word pairs. The mean number of words produced in labeling task was related to receptive…

Compared 6-month-old hearing infants' responsiveness to infant-directed and adult-directed signing. Results replicated those found with deaf infants, namely that infants showed greater attentional and affective responsiveness to infant-directed sign than to adult-directed sign, suggesting that infants are prepared to detect sign motherese…

Compared interstimulus interval (ISI) eye movements of 3-month-olds viewing an alternating picture sequence with those of infants viewing an irregular sequence. Found that all infants exhibited shifts during ISIs. Repetitive saccades declined while alternating and anticipatory saccades increased in alternating sequences. ISI shift frequency did…

Examined object concept development in 2- to 4-year olds with a partial replication of a study by Spelke and Kestenbaum (1986). Found that children judged identical entering and exiting figures as involving one object and different figures as involving two objects. Continuity of movement failed to affect judgments of numerical identity. Findings…

Two studies examined fathers of preschool boys with and without clinic-referred behavior problems. Found that clinic fathers differed from fathers of matched comparisons on life stress, psychological symptoms, parenting attitudes, positive involvement, and harsh discipline. Harsh discipline contributed uniquely to clinic status. Teacher, mother,…

Used least squares analysis and simultaneous structural equation modeling to examine the bidirectional relationship between day-care teachers' lax, overreactive discipline and young children's behavior problems. Found that teachers' laxness strongly influenced child misbehavior and child misbehavior influenced teachers' overreactivity and laxness.…

Examined whether links between the marital relationship and sibling interaction were directed or mediated by the mother-child relationship. Found that older siblings' negative behavior was linked with negative dimensions of the marital and mother-child relationship. Younger siblings' negative behavior was linked with the mother-child and…

Tested hypotheses that low self-regard contributes over time to peer victimization and that behavioral vulnerabilities are more likely to lead to victimization when children have low self-regard than when they have healthy self-regard. Found that both hypotheses were supported with third through seventh graders, especially when self-regard was…

Investigated age differences from early childhood to adulthood in the capacity to understand--in a psychologically meaningful way--traits in stories wherein main characters perform actions based on a positive, negative, or incidental motive that result in an emotional consequence for another character. Found that even 5- to 6-year-olds made trait…

Two experiments examined the development of extended identity in children between 5 and 11 years. Findings indicated that only older children judged that they would be evaluated negatively through their association with a wrongdoer and that they would feel embarrassment. Responsibility for a younger child's actions was associated with an earlier…

Examined preschoolers' ability to distinguish innocent and negligent mistakes from lies. Found that, when asked to identify a mistake or lie about a food's contact with contaminants and identify a bystander's reaction, children distinguished mistakes from lies; they could also discriminate between lies and both negligent mistakes that generate…