Autobiographical reasoning has been found to be a critical process in identity development; however, the authors suggest that existing research shows that such reasoning may not always be critical to another important outcome: well-being. The authors describe characteristics of people such as personality and age, contexts such as conversations,…

This study investigates the significance of adult children's individuation for the adult child--parent relationship. Following Youniss, individuation was assessed via its dimensions of both connectedness and individuality. A sample of 349 participants between 20 and 47 years of age were given questionnaires containing scales from the Network of…

Sociologists have long recognized the relationships between family background and social class attainment. However, by neglecting the multiple ways in which families and parents provide advantages and the extent to which these advantages extend into adulthood, they may still be underestimating the role of families in the reproduction of class…

In childhood, family conflict themes focus on children's failure to meet social obligations, inadequacy of parental helping behaviors, and children's disappointment in the frequency of contact between parent and child. Themes of family conflicts that take place during adolescence are also discussed. (RH)

Observed the behavior of 37 infants in response to their mothers' normal and still face. Infants reduced their smiling and increased their gazing away from mother during the still face condition compared to normal face condition. Compared to three month olds, six month olds were more likely to use hand activities while gazing away from mother. (MM)

Based on Schaie's (1965) general developmental model, various data-driven and theory-based approaches to the exploration and disentangling of age, cohort, and time effects on human behavior have emerged. This paper presents and discusses an advancement of data-driven interpretations that stresses parsimony when interpreting the results of…

Forty 3.5- to 4.5-year-olds discussed past events with their mothers and completed tasks indexing their ability to reason about conflicting mental representations and understanding of knowledge. Found that theory-of-mind scores were related to memory conversation participation, independent of age and linguistic skill, and to the frequency of…

A sample of seventh, ninth, and eleventh graders generated self-descriptors for the role of the self in the classroom, with friends, with parents, and in romantic relationships. Findings revealed that the self becomes increasingly differentiated into role-related multiple selves with age. (GLR)

Adolescents and young adults (three age groups: 12-15, 16-19, and 20-28 years) reported their use of parents, and peers to fulfill attachment functions (proximity-seeking, safe haven, and secure base.) The use of each target figure varied with age and attachment function. Mothers were an important source of security across this age range. They…

Infants' orienting of attention undergoes marked development in the first six months of life. Changes in attentional control appear to be related to infants' susceptibility to distress. (Author)

Risk factors for early adolescents' (700 between the ages of 10 to 13) delinquency were compared between groups of children high and low in childhood adversities. The samples represented young people from the two former Germanies (200 from former East and 500 from West Germany) who were interviewed in person. Additional information was gathered…

Examined infant facial expressions at two, four, and six months of age during face-to-face play and a still-face interaction with their mothers. Contrary to differential emotions theory, at no age did proportions or durations of discrete and blended negative expressions differ; they also showed different patterns of developmental change. (MM)

Used time-lapse video to record sleep/wake states of preterm infants for three 24-hour periods at 33 and 35 weeks conceptional age. Found that very-low-birthweight preterm infants showed marked stability and developmental change in the organization of sleep/wake states from a very early age, and their states were related to demographic variables…

A population of 12-19 year-old adolescents (n = 994) was selected from a pool of 7264 students in order to study adolescent's perception of autonomy. Eleven behavioural autonomy items were elected by the adolescents and used to evaluate the frequency of desire, achievement and disobeying parents in early (12-13 year-old) and late (18-19 year-old)…

Notes that Grusec and Goodnow's model of discipline encounters as context for children's internalization of parental values seems best suited for middle childhood and adolescence. Suggests that processes such as social referencing, sensitivity to standard violations, emergence of self, and self-regulation may be important antecedents and signs of…