Purpose: Children with poor language tend to have worse psychosocial outcomes compared to their typically developing peers. The most common explanations for such adversities focus on developmental psychological processes whereby poor language triggers psychosocial difficulties. Here, we investigate the possibility of shared biological effects by…

Background: Although emotion is central to most models of children's well-being, few studies have looked at how well-being is related to the ways in which children regulate their emotions. Aims: The aim of this study was to examine the associations among children's emotion regulation strategy choice and their emotional expression, behaviour, and…

The purpose of the study was to assess early literacy skills and examine the presence and stability of challenging behaviors across the critical threshold of the kindergarten school year. Students' (n = 337) literacy performance (letter sound fluency, word attack, and phonological awareness) and challenging behaviors (teacher ratings of…

Despite the growth in school-based mental health services (SBMHS), rates of mental health help-seeking among adolescents remain low, especially for ethnic minority youth. This study examined factors associated with adolescents' help-seeking of mental health services among a sample of 369 racially diverse high school students (age M = 15.5 years,…

The research study reported on was conducted to establish how the walls of quality education for disadvantaged communities can be rebuilt through classroom discipline. Social and economic instability, which has always existed, has been intensified by the recent widespread political unrests, which in turn has eroded discipline in the classroom…

Youth with conduct problems present frequently depressive symptoms. Academic skills are thought to be a mediating variable by which conduct problems could lead to depressive symptoms. No studies have longitudinally compared this model among school-aged boys and girls with different levels of conduct problems. Cascade models were tested to examine…

Purpose: Research is only beginning to address the extent to which evidence-based parenting programmes have utility and merit within populations of children and families with neurodevelopmental disorders (NDD). The purpose of this paper is to evaluate a parent-focused intervention for families who have a child with a NDD and investigate whether…

Students exhibiting challenging externalizing behaviors may benefit from supportive interactions with teachers. However, if students show high levels of externalizing behaviors, this may negatively impact on student-teacher interactions, and vice versa. We therefore examined bidirectional developmental links between student-teacher interactions…

Threat assessment is a violence prevention strategy used to investigate and respond to threats to harm others. In 2013, Virginia mandated the use of threat assessment teams for threats to self and to others, effectively subsuming suicide assessment with threat assessment and raising questions about the distinction between the two practices. In a…

The study examined the psychometric properties of the Children's Emotional Adjustment Scale--Preschool Version (CEAS-P), a new behavioral rating scale completed by parents. The scale measures preschoolers' emotional functioning across three competency-based factors (Temper control, Social assertiveness, Anxiety control) anchored on healthy…

The problem behaviors exhibited by left-behind children occur within multiple contexts, and are influenced by cumulative risk, including family, peer, and school characteristics; however, little is known about the mediating and moderating mechanisms underlying the relationship between such problem behaviors and cumulative risk. A total of 1,313…

The social communicative deficits and repetitive behaviours seen in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) may be affected by altered stimulus salience and reward attribution. The present study used eye tracking and a behavioural measure to index effort expenditure, arousal, and attention, during viewing of images depicting social scenes and…

Social skills and sensory processing were examined in 91 homeless or poor housed preschool children. The Social Skills Rating Scale measured children's social skills/behavior problems and the Short Sensory Profile measured sensory and behavioral responses. Children who were poor housed had better social skills, fewer problem behaviors and better…

The newest edition of the "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders" (5th ed., DSM-5) introduced substantial changes to the diagnostic criteria for autism spectrum disorder, including new severity level ratings for social communication and restricted and repetitive behavior domains. The purpose of this study was to evaluate…

This study examined age-related changes in friend similarity on delinquency to determine whether deviant behavior homophily peaks during mid-adolescence. A community sample of 1,663 male and 1,826 female Swedish youth from Grade 5 (M = 11.21 years) to Grade 10 (M = 16.25 years) provided self-reports of delinquency. Friendships were identified from…