This study examined contributions of maternal personality and infant temperament to infant vocabulary and cognitive development both directly and indirectly through parental stress. Participants were recruited at birth and included 63 infant twin pairs and their mothers. Assessments were completed at 6, 9, 12, and 18 months of age and included…

Aim: We assessed motor and intellectual outcome in triplets at school age and investigated the predictive value of perinatal and demographic factors. Methods: Seventy-one live-born newborn infants (24 triplet pregnancies) were prospectively enrolled at birth. At the age of 6 years, 58 children (31 males, 27 females; mean gestational age 31.2wks…

Objective: Bullying is the act of intentionally and repeatedly causing harm to someone who has difficulty defending him- or herself, and is a relatively widespread school-age phenomenon. Being the victim of bullying is associated with a broad spectrum of emotional problems; however, not all children who are bullied go on to develop such problems.…

The theory-of-mind abilities of twins, children with nontwin siblings, and only children were compared to investigate further the link between number and type of siblings and theory-of-mind abilities. Three- to 5-year-old children with nontwin siblings outperformed both only children and twins with no other siblings, twins who also had other…

A path model of genetic and family environmental transmission was fitted to published twin correlations and to general cognitive ability data from adoptive and nonadoptive families in which children were tested yearly through the fourth year. Longitudinal genetic correlations from infancy to adulthood were modeled explicitly, as were effects of…

Language abilities in two twin pairs, in which one twin suffered perinatal left hemisphere brain injury, were studied from the age of 23-30 months to 41-46 months. Twins performed similarly on tests of mental development, picture vocabulary, and receptive language, but brain-injured twins' scores were lower than controls' on expressive language.…

In this case study, the language and cognitive development of a 4-year 5-month old profoundly deaf girl and her normally hearing identical twin sister were investigated by videotaping the twins in their home interacting with each other, the investigator, and family members. Materials used with the children were designed to elicit spontaneous,…

The use of assisted reproductive technology is increasing rapidly. Research, although sparse, has resulted in inconsistent findings as to the developmental prognosis for infants conceived by assisted reproductive techniques such as in vitro fertilization and the use of fertility drugs. In the present study, the authors compared twins who were…

The explosion in the rate of multiple births has led to new questions about how adequately prepared parents are for the demands of raising triplets and the implications for the healthy development of the infants. The authors examined the relationship between mothering, infant social behavior, and cognitive development in a longitudinal study of 23…

The authors apply descriptive and sequential analyses to a mother's distancing strategies toward her 3-year-old twin sons in puzzle assembly and book reading tasks. One boy had normal hearing and the other a mild hearing loss (threshold: 30 dB). The results show that the mother used more distancing behaviors with the son with a hearing loss, and…