Examination of infant vocalization patterns across interactive and noninteractive contexts may facilitate better understanding of early communication development. In the current study, with 24 infant-parent dyads, infant volubility increased significantly when parent interaction ceased (presenting a "still face," or SF) after a period of…

This study examined how parents' own learning affected their support for their children in a school-based Family Literacy Programme. Seventy-two children in junior kindergarten (4-year-olds) and senior kindergarten (5-year-olds) and their parents participated in the programme; complete data were available for 52 parents. Comparisons of pre- and…

Despite calls for adoption and use of triadic early intervention practices, remarkably little research has prospectively compared this approach with traditional, provider-led service delivery. The aim of this study was to compare the actions of providers and caregivers within triadic and provider-led interactions with regard to the following: (1)…

This article summarizes an evaluation of the Safe Babies Court Teams Project. The study compared children in the Court Teams Project at the four initial sites (n = 298) with a nationally representative sample of young child welfare participants (n = 511) from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being (NSCAW). The Court Teams Project…

A wide body of literature documents the important role that parents play in supporting children's academic success in school (Houtenville & Conway, 2008; Barnard, 2004; Fan & Chen, 2001). Drawing on this literature, national taskforces and federal legislation consistently identify increased parental involvement as a central goal of…

This study compared 120 Chinese immigrant parents and 127 non-Chinese parents from New Zealand preschools on their level of involvement in preschool-based activities, as well as key predictors of parental involvement. Results showed that Chinese immigrant parents had a lower level of involvement than non-Chinese parents across three forms of…

This paper analyses the descriptions of families of children with disabilities as contained in introductory special education texts over the last 50 years. These text books are typically used in pre-service teacher education courses as surveys of the education of "exceptional children". The textbooks reflect the mainstream professional…

This paper reports research that investigated parental support for children's reading of English in an inner-city school in the developing country context of an Indian city, Ahmedabad. Children had oral proficiency in the regional language but were beginning to acquire conventional forms of literacy in English. Sociocultural mediation theory…

This study evaluated Children's Friendship Training (CFT), a manualized parent-assisted intervention to improve social skills among second to fifth grade children with autism spectrum disorders. Comparison was made with a delayed treatment control group (DTC). Targeted skills included conversational skills, peer entry skills, developing friendship…

Parental expectations have long been studied as a factor in increasing adolescent educational aspirations, often linking these expectations to parental level of education and involvement in academic endeavours. This study further explores this relationship in a statewide Midwestern sample of parents and their adolescent children. Regression…

The present study provides a comparative analysis of sexual-minority and heterosexual emerging adult women's experiences seeking support for sexual issues from parents and friends. Participants included 229 college women (88 sexual-minority women; 141 heterosexual women), ranging from 18 to 25 years of age, who provided written responses to an…

Interventions that aim to promote social competence, reduce problem behavior, and improve school climate are common at all levels of schooling. This whole-school focus, coupled with researchers' concerns about contamination or spillover effects in evaluations that randomly assign classrooms or students to conditions, as well as advances in…

We tested the efficacy of a social skills training program for the parents of school-aged children experiencing socio-emotional problems. Participating families (N = 42) were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: parent social skills training; parent plus parallel child social skills training; or no-treatment control. The two treatment…

Coping styles of 50 learning-disabled and non-learning-disabled adolescents and their parents were compared. Learning-disabled adolescents showed less ability to appraise a source of stress and to seek information about their stressful situations and showed greater pessimism about academic concerns. Coping patterns of parents did not clearly…

Used constant comparative analysis to examine written summaries of stresses encountered by 58 mothers and 54 fathers at the third to fifth postpartum months. Four categories of stress emerged: demands of parent, spouse, and worker roles; infant care; interactions with spouse; and interactions with other family members. (Author/NB)