Prior studies of mother-infant interaction have generally used a variable-centered approach to associate face-to-face communication with psychosocial outcomes. Herein, we use a person-centered approach to identify clusters of infants who exhibit similar behavioral profiles during face-to-face communication with their mothers. Four infant…

The observation that children's activity level (AL) differs between novel and familiar situations is well established. What influences individual differences in how AL is different across these situations is less well understood. Drawing on animal literature, which links rats' AL when 1st placed in a novel setting with novelty seeking phenotypes,…

According to models of differential susceptibility, the same neurobiological and temperamental traits that determine increased sensitivity to stress and adversity also confer enhanced responsivity to the positive aspects of the environment. Differential susceptibility models have expanded to include complex developmental processes in which genetic…

This study examines the role of moral disengagement in fostering engagement in aggression and violence through adolescence to young adulthood in accordance with a design in which the study of individual differences and of their relations is instrumental to address underlying intraindividual structures and process conducive to detrimental conduct.…

Nighttime sleep awakenings and infant and family characteristics were measured longitudinally in more than 1,200 infants when the infants were 6, 15, 24, and 36 months old. By 6 months of age, the majority of children slept through the night, awakening their mothers only about once or twice per week. However, not all children followed this…

The relations of parents' and teachers' reports of temperament anger-irritability, positive emotionality, and effortful control (attention focusing and inhibitory control) to children's externalizing and internalizing problems were examined in Chinese (N = 382) and U.S. (N = 322) samples of school-age children. Results suggested that in both…

The possibility, which is based on the concept of reactive personality-environment transactions, that individuals learn different things from the same experience as a function of personality differences may help explain individual differences in adult developmental trajectories. In an analogue, longitudinal design, business students were taught…

The literature on observer characteristics and imitation was reviewed in an attempt to delineate the role of these variables in the imitative process. (ST)

Studied individual differences in reactivity in 40 newborns. Measures of reactivity were related during the first two months of extrauterine life. (RJC)

Existing developmental models of effortful control focus more on the roles of child characteristics and parenting and focus less on the contributions of poverty-related stressors to individual differences in children's self-regulatory competence. Using a representative sample of low-income, predominantly African American and Latino children (n =…

Data from four studies answer Carey's (1982, 1983) critical questions about the validity of the original Infant Temperament Questionnaire (ITQ). Discussion illuminates the complexity of establishing the construct validity of psychological assessments used with infants. Data suggest that both the original and revised Carey ITQs fail discriminant…

A total of 127 pairs of twins completed a measure of personality at 20 and 30 years of age. Analyses revealed that variance in negative emotionality was the result of diminishing genetic influence; personality stability was the result of genetic factors; and personality change was the result of environmental factors. (BC)

Explored genetic and environmental underpinnings of temperamental differences in 3- to 16-month-old twins and their parents. Found that additive genetic and shared environmental effects best represented smiling, laughter, and duration of orienting. Shared environmental effects fully accounted for co-twin similarity for soothability. Additive…

Assessed temperament of newborn twins using comprehensive neonatal exam that focused on irritability, resistance to soothing activity, and reinforcement value. Some infants were later assessed at 9 months. Emotional activity appeared to be core dimension stretching over ages and is discussed in relation to formulations of infant temperament.…

Data suggest that infants with high vagal tone were more reactive than infants with low vagal tone to positive and negative events at 5 months, and were more sociable at 14 months. Infant reactivity to mildly stressful events seemed to be a stable dimension during the first year. (RH)