Reports on an experiment that examined the independent effects of television content (violence) and television formal features (action) on preschool boys' attention to programs and their postviewing social behavior. Shows rapid character action facilitated visual attention to the programs and that television action level had no systematic effects…

Thirty preschool children whose parents had shown congruence or lack of congruence in their attitudes toward adult control were observed in naturalistic settings. The children exhibiting the lowest level of prosocial behaviors had mothers with scores representing a high need for adult control and fathers whose scores were below the factor mean.…

Children often come to school with undesirable social skills. To help the classroom operate more smoothly, good manners are necessary. Activities and ideas to help teachers develop acceptable behaviors in students are offered. (DF)

Highlights findings from three research studies. These studies focused on: (1) a comparison of various types of preschool day care; (2) infants as young as 14 months old who performed deferred imitation; and (3) a behavior modification technique called "guided mastery." (DH)

Examines the interaction of teachers and learners in their various activities along a continuum that extends from instructional to natural discourses and is determined by the way participants present themselves to one another and negotiate turns-at-talk, topics, and repairs. Suggests ways to broaden and diversify discourse options in the…

An investigation of the process of language teaching as communication in a cross-cultural context shows that there is potential for misunderstanding. Examples of types of errors that are pragmatic rather than grammatical are discussed. A model is presented to help understand the pragmatic error. (DF)

Researchers are investigating how emotions affect the ways in which children think and interact with others. The Minnesota Preschool Project used observation measures for general types of positive, negative, and inappropriate emotional expression. "Social competence" was found to be highly correlated with the number of positive expressions minus…

In this overview of literature pertaining to professionalization of attitudes toward play, the author argues that research does not prove (a) that differences in value orientation can be attributed to participation in athletics, and (b) that involvement in competition socializes an athlete into the value system of the work world. (Author/MT)

Examines the attempts of the New York Manumission Society, a white anti-slavery group, to monitor and influence the behavior of free blacks in the decades following the Revolution. Identifies chief characteristics of the Society's relationship to New York's black community. Argues that the Society's wealthy white leadership probably imposed its…

A study was conducted to compare relative effects of an every day, half-day, and an all-day, alternate day, kindergarten schedule on academic achievement, classroom social behavior, and attendance. Results and implications for kindergarten programming are discussed. (Author/DF)

Compared the behavior of 48 preadolescent boys with and without peer adjustment problems in a naturalistic school setting. Analyses provided general support for the reciprocity hypothesis, which posits that individuals tend to match the affective quality of a response to that of the previous response. (LLL)

This study examines the effects of cooperative versus competitive goal structures on the subsequent intra- and interpersonal behavior of fourth-grade children. Results indicate that the effects of competitively structured environments differ for winners and nonwinners and for boys and girls. (Author/SB)

Privacy is conceptualized as a dynamic, interpersonal boundary control process which regulates access to the self. Coupled with desired and achieved privacy levels, a series of social interaction cases are described involving satisfactory and unsatisfactory input-output relationships with others. Mechanisms used to implement desired levels of…

It was predicted that the amount of satisfaction following an interpersonal exchange will be higher when the resource given is similar to the one reciprocated and lower when they are dissimilar. Interpersonal exchange situations were experimentally created in which two independent variables were manipulated. (Author)

Although it is perfectly responsible and permissible for scientists to disagree in interpretations about the meaning of a body of data, to suppress or cover up harmful effects data is highly unethical, irresponsible, and contrary to most canons of the scientific community. (Author/RK)