Drawing on data from a longitudinal study of 204 Mexican-origin adolescent mothers, their mother figures, and their children, the current investigation examined (a) adolescent mothers' educational re-engagement and attainment beginning during their pregnancy and ending when their child was 5 years old; and (b) the influence of the family economic…

Adolescence is characterized as a period of social reorientation toward peer relationships, entailing the emergence of sophisticated social abilities. Two studies (Study 1: N = 42, ages 13-17; Study 2: N = 81, ages 13-16) investigated age group differences in the impact of relationship reciprocation within school-based social networks on an…

This study leveraged data from the Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation (N = 243) to investigate the predictive significance of maternal sensitivity during the first 3 years of life for social and academic competence through age 32 years. Structural model comparisons replicated previous findings that early maternal sensitivity…

This study investigated differences in children's and adolescents' experiences of harming their siblings and friends. Participants ("N" = 101; 7-, 11-, and 16-year-olds) provided accounts of events when they hurt a younger sibling and a friend. Harm against friends was described as unusual, unforeseeable, and circumstantial. By contrast,…

Using social-cognitive domain theory and social identity theory, tolerance judgments of practices by Muslim actors among Dutch adolescents (12-17) were investigated. The findings for Study 1 (N = 180) demonstrated that participants evaluated 4 practices using different types of reasons: personal, social-conventional, and moral. In Study 2 (N =…

Classic theories of self-development suggest people define themselves in part through internalized perceptions of other people's beliefs about them, known as reflected self-appraisals. This study uses functional magnetic resonance imaging to compare the neural correlates of direct and reflected self-appraisals in adolescence (N = 12, ages 11-14…

This meta-analytic review of 148 studies on child and adolescent direct and indirect aggression examined the magnitude of gender differences, intercorrelations between forms, and associations with maladjustment. Results confirmed prior findings of gender differences (favoring boys) in direct aggression and trivial gender differences in indirect…

Neural correlates of social-cognition were assessed in 9- to- 17-year-olds (N = 34) using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Participants appraised how unfamiliar peers they had previously identified as being of high or low interest would evaluate them for an anticipated online chat session. Differential age- and sex-related activation…

Developmental changes in interpersonal perceptions in older siblings were studied in children in grades K, 2, 4, 6, 8. Older children used more abstract and more nonegocentric modes of description. (ST)

A stable ordered dominance hierarchy was found via observational and sociometric methods for a group of 13-year-old boys during a 5-week camp. (SB)

Children in the second, fifth, and eighth grades rated the importance and extent of companionship and intimate disclosure experiences in social life in general and in each of eight types of relationships. (PCB)

Investigates 8-, 11-, 14- and 17-year-old students' choices of either a familiar adult or peer, or an adult or peer expert to provide counsel. The findings support the conceptualization that adult-child relations are transformed from unilateral dependence in childhood to increasing mutuality in adolescence. (RJC)

National Health Survey data of 12- to 17-year-olds were used to determine links between dating behavior and level of sexual maturation as well as age. Analyses indicated that individual levels of sexual maturation add very little to the explained variance in dating after age has been taken into account. (Author/DB)

Children ranging from fifth to twelfth grade, and their parents, were presented with items pertaining to family transgressions and asked to judge the legitimacy of parental jurisdiction, justify its wrongness or permissibility, and assess its contingency on parental authority. (PCB)

Two studies are reported which demonstrate a positive relationship between sociometric status (after two weeks of intense social interaction) and social acceptance judged from photographs by an independent group of peers. Acceptance was found to be related to physical attractiveness. (ST)