Problem Statement: Increasing the quality of education and educating well-qualified students is one of the most important objectives of formal education. Informal resources are as important as formal resources in improving this efficiency and productivity. In this respect, it can be said that family is the most important informal structure…

Early adolescence represents a particularly vulnerable period of development during which young people are susceptible to establishing lifelong behavior patterns associated with poor life, health, and educational outcomes. Previous research demonstrates older adolescents and young adults often experience negative life events (NLEs) prior to…

Bullying is one type of violence that threatens a youth's well-being in schools and neighborhoods. The impacts of bullying are felt by individuals, families, schools, and society and may result in youths feeling powerless, intimidated, and humiliated by the aggressive acts of other youth(s). This document is designed as a tool to help…

Objective: To clarify the nature and extent of differences in the ways that physically abusive, neglectful, and non-maltreating parents communicate during interactions with their children. Method: A meta-analysis was conducted of 33 observational studies comparing parent-child interactions in families where parents have a documented history of…

Mothers' roles in structuring interactions with their infants during free play was examined when infants were 6- and 9-months-old. Maternal scaffolding of turn-taking exchanges was then contrasted to the forms of turn-taking apparent in sibling-infant and peer-infant observations. Subjects were 26 second-born infants who had a 3- to 6-year-old…

Previous research on parents with a retarded child has been ambiguous; some has demonstrated decreased marital quality and greater depression with a retarded child but other research has found no differences between parents with a retarded child and parents without a retarded child. This study attempts to develop and test a conceptual model…

The purpose of this study was to replicate the "basic training" structural model in Patterson's (1982) coercion theory, extending its scope to single-mother families with younger (six- to eight-year-old) boys. Significance of the successful replication was seen to lie in implications for the generalizability of the model across family…

Investigated effects of a year-long home intervention with a sample of preterm infants randomly assigned to one of three groups: developmental intervention, parent/infant intervention, and a no-treatment control. A full-term no-treatment control was also used. Findings confirm earlier studies and demonstrate changes in behavior and behavioral…

Compared the parenting one year after divorce of 28 joint-custodial fathers and 54 noncustodial fathers. Indicators of fathers' involvement were contact with the children and shared responsibility and decision making. Indicators of paternal involvement showed joint-custody fathers were more involved than noncustodial fathers in postdivorce…

Notes that intergenerational theories of family functioning sparked interest in empirical investigations that test intergenerational relationships. Presents test of difference scores enabling researchers to compare related and unrelated dyads, thus creating comparison group when using only two generations. Contrasts procedure with correlational…

Explores the possibility that differences in compliance between Japanese and American children are the result of culturally distinct child-rearing practices. Child compliance with adult authority was positively associated with providing opportunities for appropriate behavior and negatively associated with reliance on physical discipline in both…

The social context within which home schooling takes place is described, and the ideological frameworks and contexts within which parents (most of them fundamentalist Christians) make schooling decisions are examined. Research involved participant observation and interviews with 16 home schooling families (13 families self-labeled…

Children's responses toward strangers, qualities of mother-child interaction, and maternal stresses were examined in 38 mother-child pairs, with children from single and two-parent families. Responses to female and male strangers were observed in a modified Strange Situation. Mother-child interaction was assessed with a modified version of…

Effects of the Mother-Child Home Program (MCHP) were evaluated with a broad range of measures on cognition, social behavior, and emotion. Findings indicated that children in Bermuda scored above U.S. norms on cognitive tests and were functioning well in the preschool period. The MCHP had few demonstrable effects on any segment of the sample. (RH)

This technical report and user's guide is designed to provide researchers with an overview of the design and implementation of the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), as well as with information on how to access the PISA 2009 data. This information is meant to supplement that presented in Organization for Economic Cooperation…