How well do early school entrants adjust socio-affectively when compared to their regularly admitted peers? Despite numerous publications on the subject, much controversy remains, mainly because of methodologically fragile studies. To assess the impact of a new early entrance policy in Quebec, 36 kindergarten and 42 Grade 2 teachers who had at…

The aim of this study was to investigate the degree and content of negative meaning (i.e., negative evaluations, motivations, feelings) in four different age groups of men and women in East- and West-Germany. A sample was drawn from 290 cities in Germany which was stratified according to four age groups (18-25, 40-54, 55-69, and 70-85), gender and…

This study examined the effects of one unfamiliar adult's warm, responsive interactions or cold, aloof, unresponsive interactions on child emotion and subsequent social initiatives to a second adult. Participants were 32 4 1/2- to 5 1/2-year-old preschool children. Nurturing, responsive caregiving and non-nurturing, unresponsive caregiving were…

This study examined the extent to which children and parents have concordant views about parental differential treatment (PDT) and whether such concordance is linked with variations in sibling relationship quality. Seventy-four 11- to 13-year-old children, their older siblings, and their parents were interviewed about their experiences with PDT…

This study hypothesized that teacher nonverbal immediacy and credibility interact to impact student motivation and affective learning. Utilizing an experimental 2 x 2 (immediacy high/low, credibility high/low) factorial design, 586 students were exposed to one of four written scenarios and completed motivation and affective learning scales.…

This study extends priming research in political communication by focusing on an alternative political information source (i.e., Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9-11), affect rather than cognitions, and the existence of intra-affective ambivalence. In addition, two moderator variables are analyzed: political party identification and need for closure.…

In this study, we examined the effects of sweat therapy on group dynamics and affect. Sweat therapy is the combination of intense heat exposure with psychotherapy or counseling (Colmant & Merta, 1999; 2000). Twenty-four undergraduates were separated by sex and randomly assigned to eight sessions of either a sweat or non-sweat group counseling…

The current study was designed to investigate whether reported [J. Learn. Disabil. 31 (1998) 286; J. Psycholinguist. Res. 22 (1993) 445] difficulties in language-impaired children's ability to identify vocal and facial cues to emotion could be explained at least partially by nonparalinguistic factors. Children with specific language impairment…

Adolescents' (N=292) relational aggression and outcome expectancies for relational aggression in three different relationship contexts (acquaintanceship, friendship, and dating) were assessed. With respect to each type of relationship, adolescents were questioned about the emotional and dyadic consequences of relational aggression, and about…

Relationship satisfaction, affect, and stress were examined in 313 same-sex couples who had had civil unions in Vermont during the first year of this legislation. Similarity between partners on age and on positive/negative affectivity was related to relationship satisfaction whereas there was no association with similarity in income, education,…

The study uses an alternating treatment design to evaluate the functional effect of teacher's affect on students' task performance. Tradition in special education holds that teachers should engage students using positive and enthusiastic affect for task presentations and praise. To test this assumption, we compared two affective conditions. Three…

Management education programs often rely on collaborative learning, which requires high levels of openness and interpersonal support. We describe how one program accomplishes this and offer a theory to explain why it works. We propose that the activity is successful because it addresses in a repeating sequence (a) the alignment of affect with…

The goal of the study was to identify and differentiate subgroups among mothers whose infants were diagnosed as having a developmental disability. The sample consisted of 80 mothers from intact families whose infants had such diagnoses, most of whom were diagnosed with Down syndrome. All mothers were receiving early intervention services.…

From birth children are labeled, motivated and sometimes stifled by words. In the home, community ore school, it is obvious that children cannot escape words and their influence. This article describes the processes and the effects of words on children's journey to adulthood and underscores the importance of educators' understanding of positive…

This article aims to describe informal learning as it might apply to the early professional development of inexperienced teachers in the first three years of their career, working in secondary schools in England and Wales. An attempt has been made to move the debate on from a narrowly conceived competencies agenda based on a formalised approach to…