Notes that "Loveys," or transitional comfort objects, are an important prop in some children's emotional and intellectual development. Provides developmental information, and describes types of children who typically use loveys, challenges to child care programs when the object comes to school, and how children give up their attachments.…

Evaluated the construct validity of the parent version of the Penn Interactive Peer Play Scale (PIPPS) and compared this version with the teacher version. Findings support the use of the PIPPS parent version. Parent version replicated the three-factor solution found with the teacher version, supporting the following constructs of peer play: Play…

The aim of this longitudinal study was to examine the associations between maternal depressive symptoms and perceptions of children's problems. One hundred and nineteen mother-child dyads were followed from the third trimester of pregnancy for almost 10 years. Depressive symptoms and background factors of the mothers and the anticipated/perceived…

Objective: Middle-school-aged children with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) are poised in development between the dependency of elementary school-aged children and growing independence of adolescence. OCD patients of this age group may differ from older ones in the quality of symptoms and level of insight. We report the results of a…

Background: While a number of studies have examined the development of skills in children with intellectual disabilities (ID), most have been cross-sectional, most have been concerned with particular syndromes such as Down's syndrome or autism and few have attempted to identify factors associated with improvements in skills. Methods: From a sample…

Most accounts of bullying and intervention programs against violence in school deal with aggregate prevalence estimates and outcome measures. Case studies are rare. Bullying occurs regularly within classrooms. Psychological aggression through teasing and harassment is more difficult to detect. Bullying and bullies are relatively persistent,…

Specific relationships between verbal and nonverbal aspects of caregiver attention-focusing events and later verbal IQ were investigated for a risk sample of 26 very low birthweight [VLBW], preterm [PT] children. Videotaped interactions between VLBW, PT children at 2;0 and their caregivers were coded for caregiver attention-focusing speech and/or…

Children with autism display significant learning, social and behavioural difficulties which impact on parents and teachers. Intensive child-focused behavioural interventions have proved to be an effective way of reducing these difficulties. Such programs are expensive to run and are currently not funded in New Zealand. One alternative way to…

Sure Start is a Government project that aims to prevent social exclusion by targeting children between 0 and 4 years of age living in areas of social and economic deprivation. This study examined whether a Tier 2 Behaviour Support Service within a local Sure Start project was able to bring about improvements in children's behaviour and the levels…

Ringeisen, Henderson, and Hoagwood (2003) present a compelling case that: (a) there is a gap between mental health research and the delivery of mental health services in school settings; (b) in order to bridge this gap, mental health professionals must consider contextual factors at the individual, organization, and state/federal policy levels;…

Juvenile fire setting is a serious, dangerous, and costly behavior. The majority of research examining youth fire setting has been cross-sectional. We sought to examine early risk attributes that could differentiate fire setters from non-fire setters, in addition to examining their association with the developmental continuity of fire-setting…

We demonstrate graphical and analytical methods for multilevel (2- and 3-level) models using the analysis of observed microsocial interaction between parent-child dyads as an example. We also present multilevel path diagrams and argue that while not as compact as equations, path diagrams may communicate results better to a wider audience. The…

The present study used general growth mixture modeling to identify pathways of antisocial behavior development within an epidemiological sample of urban, primarily African American boys. Teacher-rated aggression, measured longitudinally from 1st to 7th grade, was used to define growth trajectories. Three high-risk trajectories (chronic high,…

The purpose of the study was to investigate maternal socialization goal-oriented behaviours in Chinese and Canadian mothers. Participants were samples of children at 2 years of age and their mothers in P.R. China and Canada. Data on child autonomy and connectedness and maternal encouragement of autonomy and connectedness were collected from…

An emerging literature suggests that maternal distress during the prenatal and perinatal period may adversely affect offspring development. The association between maternal stress and emotional status in the perinatal period (defined as 1 month after birth) and adjustment of first-grade children was examined in 948 mother-child dyads from the…