Background: Increases in externalizing behaviors during the transition to adolescence may put children at risk for developing mental disorders and related problems. Although children's ability to regulate their emotions appears to be a key factor influencing risk for maladjustment, emotion processes during adolescence remain understudied. In this…

Newbery books represent quality literature that has a profound social-emotional impact on its readers, yet these books have not been systematically evaluated for their portrayal of characters with disabilities. Thirty-one Newbery Award and Honor books from 1975-2009 were identified and portrayed 41 main or supporting characters with disabilities.…

Background: Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to determine if oppositional defiant behavior (ODB) toward adults and oppositional defiant behavior toward other children were constructs distinct from each other as well as from attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder-hyperactivity/impulsivity (ADHD-HI), attention-deficit/hyperactivity…

Siblings' constructive and unstructured shared activities were examined as moderators of the links between first- and second-born siblings' adjustment across a two-year period in adolescence. Siblings (N = 189 dyads) reported on their depression, peer competency, self worth during home interviews, and their time together in constructive (e.g.,…

This study highlights the heterogeneity in two-parent families and examines how adolescents fare when they reside in simple two-parent, blended, and stepfamilies. Using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (N= 1,769), we find that shared biological children in blended families have worse outcomes than children in simple two-parent…

The German schooling system selects children into different secondary school tracks already at a very early stage in life. School track choice heavily influences choices and opportunities later in life. It has often been observed that secondary schooling achievements display a strong correlation with parental income. We use sibling fixed effects…

Background: There is very little research on how and when siblings understand that they have a brother or sister with a learning disability. Research regarding young children's understanding of intelligence, suggests that they may not develop a clear understanding of ability until about 7 years of age. Method: Through interviewing parents and then…

Dying and death have become more and more complicated for everyone. Technology and the patient autonomy movement have come together to create a host of possible end of life treatment dilemmas. The introduction of advance directives in medical decision-making has raised further issues about projecting treatment wishes into future, unknowable…

This study examined future concerns conveyed by adult siblings who provided regular caregiving support to their brothers and sisters with traumatic brain injury (TBI). The authors surveyed a national sample of 280 adult siblings of persons with TBI. Using a constant comparative approach to text analysis, the authors analyzed responses to the…

In this paper we assess the presence of assortative mating, gene-environment interaction and the heritability of intelligence in childhood using a twin family design with twins, their siblings and parents from 112 families. We evaluate two competing hypotheses about the cause of assortative mating in intelligence: social homogamy and phenotypic…

This article examines the creation of novel words by two English-speaking male siblings, ages five- and six-years-old, during a fourteen-month period of weekly play sessions. The questions the article addresses are: Did the boys produce novel words? What types of words? Why were these words created? and Did they become a permanent part of the…

Background: Clinical heterogeneity of autism likely hinders efforts to find genes associated with this complex psychiatric disorder. Some studies have produced promising results by restricting the sample according to the expression of specific familial factors or components of autism. Previous factor analyses of the restricted, repetitive…

This paper investigates whether any difference exists in the degree of second language attrition between two siblings in terms of grammatical complexity, grammatical accuracy, lexical complexity, and lexical productivity based on their storytelling data collected over the period of 31 months. The subjects' L1 and L2 are Japanese and English,…

This article explores the extent to which participation in alternative human values education affects students' conceptions of agency amidst the economic and HIV/AIDS crises in Ndola, Zambia. Drawing on the concept of transformative agency as developed by critical research in education, this study examines conceptions of agency based on data…

Contrary to the belief that the Chinese do not share emotionally intense experiences, findings from a cross-sectional study of 292 respondents who lost either a spouse or a parent in the previous 2 years in Hong Kong indicated that only 10% did not share their bereavement experiences with another person. The physical health and emotional state of…