Questioning others is one of the most powerful methods that children use to learn about the world. How does questioning develop? How is it socialized? And how can questioning be leveraged to support learning and education? In this volume, some of the world's leading experts are brought together to explore critical issues in the development of…

This study explored stability in cognitive and motivational functioning of children from 3 months old to 3.5 years old, as well as stability in the quality of care provided by parents during this time. The purpose was to determine the locus of continuity over time--whether it is within the child or the caregiving environment. A total of 37…

Examines the differences in parental reasoning about child development along a dimension ranging from categorical to perspectivistic in a group of Mexican-American mothers and a group of Anglo-American mothers of comparable SES. Results emphasize the importance and usefulness of examining within-culture diversity in developmental research.…

Data were collected in 1956 and in 1983 to determine if parental perceptions of children's potential contribution to household work have changed over the past 25 years. Results indicate that parental perceptions have changed very little, with the exception that parents in the 1983 sample estimated older ages for children performing tasks involving…

Discusses ways in which Myron Hofer's work (1987), which draws on studies of rodents and primates, alters the traditional perspective on human attachment. Emphasizes the importance of the component of attachment that does not develop in explaining attachment in the first six months of life. (PCB)

This study found that mothers (n=40) of extremely high-risk infants (averaging 1000 grams birthweight and 28 weeks gestational age) called upon the same experiences and sources of information as mothers of full-term infants. Infants of mothers with above average knowledge about infancy scored significantly higher on tests of infant development at…

Most research into interactions between mothers and their infants with hearing impairments focuses on mothers' and infants' behaviors separately, speculating about the interplay among these behaviors and their effects on child development. In the present article, an intersubjective developmental theory focusing on the development of the…

Explores whether transactional/interactional, environmental, or developmental status models best represent growth from infancy to early childhood. Attempts to identify features of the social environment important for specific developmental outcomes. Observations of interactions between 40 mothers and their three-month-old infants were used to…

This study documented communication behaviors of 18 hearing mothers and their infants with hearing loss, at 12 and 18 months old, and compared these behaviors with those of 18 mothers and infants without hearing loss. Both groups were similar in quantity of gestural and vocal expressive prelinguistic communication behaviors but not in formal…

Interactions between 25 mothers and their developmentally delayed children (ages 2-5) during 15 minutes of semi-structured free play were coded independently with a global rating scale and a behavior count coding scheme. Correlational analyses were performed around three central themes: (1) the nature of the relationship between maternal…

Mothers' speech directed to their children (N=61) from three groups --nonretarded, Down Syndrome, and language-impaired--was examined to evaluate the ways mothers adjust their speech to the child's developmental condition and linguistic competency. Mothers showed differences in mean length of utterance, use of total imperatives, evaluative…

Using a data sample from the New York Longitudinal Study, this study tests the hypothesis that the relation between maternal role satisfaction and child adjustment is mediated by the quality of the mother-child relationship. Results illustrate use of a process model in the explanation of the relation. (Author/NH)

This study of 18 mothers and their legally blind children, aged 20-36 months, found that the overall home environments were favorable. Home environments were not significantly related to any developmental scores except for the positive relationship between the emotional and verbal responsiveness of some mothers and the expressive pragmatic…

Families in which one or both parents are diagnosed as being depressed are observed in this ongoing study of how the behavior of depressed parents relates to the child's present and long-term development. Each family which enters the study has a child approximately two years old and a child between five and seven years old. Families are initially…

Reviews studies of the effects of maternal employment on marital relations, child development, and the mothers themselves. Concludes that employment is not the major issue in either marital relations or child development, but family circumstances, attitudes and expectations of both parents, and the distribution of available time have important…