Little is known about how children's value priorities develop over time. This study identifies children's value priority profiles and follows their development during middle childhood. Australian children (N = 609; ages 5-12 at Time 1) reported their values over 2 years. Latent Transition Analysis indicated four profiles: Social-Focus, Self-Focus,…

Character strengths are an integral component of positive youth development that can promote flourishing. Developmental principles posit constructs become increasingly complex with age, yet this process has not been examined with character. Using a socioeconomically and ethnically diverse sample of 2,467 youth ages 9-19, bifactor models were…

Healthy Indigenous child development is grounded in Indigenous ways of knowing and being. Attachment theory has been influential in understanding the significance of parenting for infant development in Western science but has focused on child-caregiver bonds predominantly within the parent-child dyad. To bring forth Indigenous perspectives…

Living in complex social worlds, individuals encounter discordant values across life contexts, potentially resulting in different importance of values across contexts. Value differentiation is defined here as the degree to which values receive different importance depending on the context in which they are considered. Early and mid-adolescents (N…

Examined social, emotional, and cognitive characteristics of American and Chinese 6-year-olds' narratives. Found that, compared to American children, Chinese children showed greater orientation toward social engagement, greater concern with moral correctness, greater concern with authority, a less autonomous orientation, more expressions of…

This study sought to assess the ontogenetic course of three classes of size-value phenomena. Size-value phenomena refers to the observation that valued and neutral objects physically equal in size are judged as unequal. Results are discussed in terms of perceptual development. (ST)

Children aged two and one-half to five years gave moral evaluations, attributions of parental affect, and personal liking evaluations of both standard (motive and outcome) moral episodes and simplified (motive only) episodes. (JMB)

Kindergarten, third- and sixth-grade children indicated verbally that giving in response to dependency cues was more meritorious than giving in expectation of reciprocity. When provided an opportunity to choose between giving to dependents or those who could reciprocate, children chose to help others who could reciprocate. Further experimentation…

Studied perceptions of self-competence and task values, documenting domain-specific growth trajectories for 761 children from grade 1 through 12. Found that self- perceptions of competence and subjective task values declined as children got older, although extent and rate of decline varied across domains. Found significant gender differences in…

This experiment was designed to explore the effects of simple and remedial altruism upon children's subsequent self-reinforcement, generosity, and performance quality estimates. (CS)

Latent growth models estimated developmental trajectories for adolescents' math and English self-perceptions (perceived talent, success expectancies), values (intrinsic, utility) and task perceptions (task difficulty, effort required). A longitudinal cohort-sequential study included 1,323 participants spanning Grades 7 to 11, with Occasion 1 mean…

Assessed parents' beliefs about former Head Start children's abilities and values in academics, sports, and social skills during their kindergarten year. Found that there were ethnic differences in parents' beliefs about children's abilities and future prospects in different areas. Parents' beliefs related to children's attitudes toward school and…

Notes that commentators unanimously support Rothbaum et al.'s general orientation to culture and development and their developmental pathways. Views commentators' suggestions as relating to trade-offs: between theories that highlight generalization or exceptions; between methods that rely on one-, two-, or multiculture studies; and between values…

Examined relations among parenting dimensions and adolescents' occupational aspirations related to academics and sports. Found that parents' values predicted youths' values directly in the academic domain. Fathers' behaviors mediated the relation between parents' and youths' sports values. Identification was directly related to adolescents'…