The use of reciprocal behavior contracts with families of behavior-problem adolescents was investigated. Most family contracting to date has involved one-way contracts; that is, the child agrees to certain responsibilities for which he will be reinforced by the parents. A reciprocal contract requires the parents, in addition to the child, to agree…

Journal availability: J. B. Lippincott Company, East Washington Square, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19105.

This document on mother-infant interaction reports differences found between mothers in a parent education program and a control group. The parent education program provided two different informal methods of stimulating mothers' awareness of their influence on their children's learning and development. Both programs stressed maternal responsivity…

This paper traces the history of parent education, the purposive learning activity of parents attempting to change methods of interaction with their children. Parent education will almost certainly receive increasing attention and emphasis within a variety of programs especially in the fields of education and mental health. (Author)

Part of a PhD dissertation submitted to Michigan State University.

The parents of a six-year-old disruptive boy were observed interacting with their son during 20 assessment-oriented, 10-minute experimental sessions. An experimental design consisting of alternately arranged baseline and self-monitoring conditions was utilized. Following the reversal-to-baseline phase, parents were given specialized training in…

A self-rating scale was used with five mothers of preschool children with language impairments to determine whether the mothers' directive interactional style could be changed to a nondirective style without modeling or correction. Preliminary results indicated that viewing a videotape of a play session between the mother and child and completion…

This paper reviews Diana Baumrind's studies of the effect of various types of parental control on children's behavior and concludes that a child is more likely to develop a sense of competence, responsibility, and independence if he or she is given firm and reasonable guidelines. A brief survey of Baumrind's first two studies of preschool children…

The various behavioral phases through which a child passes before he becomes adjusted to school are examined in this report on East Indian children. A program of observation was devised to answer three questions: (1) Do patterns of behavior change as children continue to attend school? (2) Are there different patterns of behavior during the…

The purpose of this exploratory study was to measure the impact of a specific style of parent education on parental behavior with their children. Six families, chosen by invitation from among parents participating in the Carbon County, Utah parent education programs, participated in the study. A BAB-ABBA single case experimental design was…

This paper describes a cross cultural study of face to face interactions between American and Gusii mothers and their infants. Observations of the Gusii people of Western Kenya suggest that the direct expression of intense affect is de-emphasized through an avoidance of direct face to face interactions. The present study investigated (1) how and…

An interactive model of language intervention that targeted specific vocabulary was evaluated in a study of 16 mothers and their preschool children with language delays. Children in the experimental group used more target words and acquired more symbolic play gestures than those in the control group. Mothers in the experimental group reported a…