流动儿童的人格特点对主观幸福感的影响

该文探讨大五人格、乐观和掌控感对流动儿童主观幸福感的影响。运用幸福感自我评定量表、积极情感／消极情感量表（PANAS）修订版、学生总体生活满意度量表（SLSS）、学生多维生活领域满意度量表（MSLSS）、人格五因素问卷、生活取向测验修订版和掌控感量表对1018名流动儿童和319名城市儿童进行调查。结果：1）流动儿童的总体幸福感为7、0,正性情感多于负性情感,总体生活满意度为2、9;2）在正性人格特征（外向性、宜人性、谨慎性、开放性乐观和掌控感）得分上：打工校流动儿童〈混合校流动儿童〈公立校城市儿童,在负性人格特征（情绪性）则相反;3）对主观幸福感的分层回归分析显示外向性、神经质、开放性、掌控感和乐观对主观幸福感有着稳定且显著的影响作用,其中人格五因素起着主要的预测作用。结论：流动儿童的主观幸福整体偏上,打工校流动儿童的人格健全状况最差,人格五因素对主观幸福感起着主要的影响作用。     

The Problem of Second-generation Decline: Perspectives on Integration in Canada

Recent studies in North America have produced mixed results on the socioeconomic success of second-generation immigrants. This study contributes to this debate by analysing the data of the 1999 Equality, Security, and Community Survey. The analysis reveals that children of immigrant parents are not performing as well as most theories of linear assimilation suggest. Their performance varies depending on whether one or both parents are foreign-born. Specifically, there is a marked similarity between the outcomes of native-born children and second-generation children with only one immigrant parent, and between immigrant children and those of the second generation with two foreign-born parents.     

Shyness as a risk factor for second language acquisition of immigrant preschoolers

The aim of this study was to examine whether shyness is a risk factor for second language acquisition in immigrant preschoolers. Results from studies on first language acquisition indicate that shy children show less favorable language development; however, it remains unclear how shyness affects second language acquisition. As second language skills are often acquired in interactions outside the family where shyness is more evident, we postulate that shyness has a strong negative effect on second language acquisition. This hypothesis was examined using standardized tests and parental ratings in a sample of 330 immigrant preschoolers cross-sectionally and with 130 immigrant preschoolers longitudinally. The analyses revealed lower second language competence as well as slower language development in shy immigrant children compared to their non-shy counterparts. The present study highlights that not only contextual but also personality factors need to be considered for a comprehensive understanding of second language acquisition in immigrant children.     

From peers to policy: how broader social contexts influence the adaptation of children and youth in immigrant families

This chapter provides an overview of non family contexts that shape the development and adjustment of children and youth from immigrant families. It also describes the four chapters in this special issue that focus on peer, network, legal, and institutional contexts that influence the lives of immigrant parents and their children. Directions for future research on the social contexts of development in immigrant families are discussed.     

Parental Health and Children’s Functioning in Immigrant Families: Family Roles and Perceived Treatment at School

Although parents’ health condition is generally thought to be related to their involvement in their children’s functioning, the possible dynamics behind the scenes in school contexts with immigrant children has received little attention. This study examined the association between parents’ health condition and their children’s academic and behavioral functioning, as well as the mediation effects of parents’ school engagement and children’s perceived treatment at school among 607 immigrant families with 10- to 12-year-old children. Using structural equation modeling, the results indicated that parents’ poor health condition was associated with children’s increased behavioral problems. Parents’ school engagement fully mediated the association between parental health condition and children’s academic achievement and partially mediated the association between parental health condition and children’s behavior problems. Notably, higher levels of parents’ school engagement were associated with increased behavior problems, demonstrating a unique feature in these immigrant children’s developmental functioning. Higher levels of perceived harsh treatment by peers at school due to children’s immigrant identity were associated with these children’s greater risks of behavior problems. The results suggested what may lie behind the scenes in these children’s behavioral problems is that many of these children who act out and are brought to the school office for disciplinary issues may suffer from perceived discrimination and bad treatment by their peers. The findings provide important implications for researchers, healthcare practitioners, and educators seeking to understand this subpopulation and to design and implement family support and prevention programs for young adolescents from immigrant backgrounds.     

Immigrant Children in Austria

ABSTRACT

As a consequence of worldwide waves of immigration there is a permanent increase of ethnically mixed school classes in countries all over the world. However, there is a lack of empirical studies on interethnic relationships which differentiate immigrant children based on their countries of origin. The present paper focuses on these topics and provides data of both negative and positive aspects of interethnic interactions. Direct and indirect forms of bullying, friendship patterns, and peer acceptance in 326 native and 242 immigrant children aged 11 to 14 (57% native Austrian, 22% former Yugoslavian, 14% Turkish/Kurdish, 7% rest group) in 29 ethnically mixed school classes (6th and 7th grades) were examined. Bullying was measured via the Olweus Bully/Victim Questionnaire and via peer nomination techniques, friendship patterns via self-ratings. Peer acceptance was defined by social preference scores on positive and negative sociometric items. According to peer ratings Austrian children were found to be more often victims (9%) and bullies (12%) of direct bullying than immigrant children. Prevalence rates in immigrant children varied depending on their country of origin between 2% and 8% for victims and 3% to 7% for bullies. Results suggested that Turkish/Kurdish children are at risk concerning their social integration in class (e.g., they had the fewest number of friends in class, reported higher levels of loneliness at school, and were less accepted by their peers compared to Austrians and former Yugoslavian children). Friendship patterns differed considerably between native children and children of the three immigrant groups. Findings are discussed concerning differences in integration strategies of immigrant children depending on their country of origin.     

Participation des familles immigrantes à l’école: points de vue des parents congolais à Edmonton (Alberta)

Economic development in Alberta during the last decade has attracted a large number of immigrant families to the province. It is important to understand the role that immigrant parents play on the schooling process of their children. The objective of this study was to identify factors limiting the involvement of some immigrant parents in their children’s education. Field data describe how parents perceive their relationship with school teachers.     

The longitudinal association between internalizing symptoms and academic achievement among immigrant and non‐immigrant children in Norway

The aim of this study was to explore the longitudinal relation between internalizing symptoms and academic achievement, as two processes of children and youth development, among children in Norway, and whether having an immigrant background moderated this association. Data collected from 4,458 students in Norway in four waves over three years were analyzed with multi‐group latent growth curve modeling (LGM ). Results showed that internalizing symptoms level remained unchanged over time both for immigrant and non‐immigrant children, while levels of academic achievement increased only for children of immigrants with both parents born outside of Norway. Further analyses supported a reciprocal relation between internalizing symptoms and academic achievement and revealed that the initial level of academic achievement predicted the rate of change in internalizing symptoms over time, but not vice versa. Moreover, immigrant background did not moderate the associations in the model, however, children of immigrants with both parents born abroad initially had lower levels of academic achievement, but showed an increase in academic achievement, compared to their non‐immigrant peers as well as to peers with one native‐born parent after controlling for gender and their grade at the first observation. The implications for policy and practice were discussed.     

The Moderating Role of English Proficiency in the Association Between Immigrant Chinese Mothers' Authoritative Parenting and Children's Outcomes

The authors' objective was to investigate the association between Chinese immigrant mothers' authoritative parenting and their children's socioemotional and behavioral difficulties. Participants were 136 first-generation Chinese immigrant mothers with 3–5-year-old children residing in the United States. Authoritative parenting was associated with lower socioemotional and behavioral difficulties in children as reported by preschool teachers. Further moderation analyses revealed that immigrant mothers' English proficiency moderated the association between authoritative parenting and children's difficulties. Specifically, authoritative parenting was significantly associated with fewer total difficulties only for children with mothers who reported higher English proficiency.     

Parental Influence on Children during Educational Television Viewing in Immigrant Families

It has been suggested by researchers that educational television programmes may support the language and literacy development for children, especially those in immigrant families. In an immigrant family, many family characteristics appear to be related to educational television programme viewing of children at home, for example, parental acculturation (the process of adapting to the new culture) and parental mediation (supervision and guidance) of television viewing. In the present work, the parental influence on children during educational television viewing was studied quantitatively, based on a sample (n = 171) of immigrant families with children aged 3–6 years collected across the U.S. The results have revealed that significant differences existed between Asian and Hispanic groups in coviewing mediation and in their children's educational television viewing. Furthermore, language in parental acculturation significantly predicted instructive and restrictive parental mediation, and parental occupation significantly predicted language in parental acculturation. This study initiates the attention to the topic of educational television viewing in immigrant families, which warrants further investigations in the future as the Asian and Hispanic immigrant population increases rapidly in the U.S. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Immigrant children's peer acceptance and victimization in kindergarten: The role of local language competence

The study investigates peer acceptance and victimization of immigrant and Swiss children in kindergarten classes. Our first aim is to compare peer acceptance and victimization of Swiss and immigrant children. Secondly, we explore the role of their local language competences (LLCs). The sample was drawn from kindergartens in communities in the German‐speaking part of Switzerland. A representative sample of 568 boys and 522 girls (mean age 5.8 years) took part in the research. Teachers completed questionnaires on children's victimization, bullying, and LLC. The nationality background of parents was indicated by teachers and parents. To assess peer acceptance, a peer nomination method was used. Immigrant children showed less acceptance by peers and were more often victimized than their Swiss peers. There was a significant interaction effect for LLC and national background of mothers, showing that LLC was positively associated with peer acceptance for children of an immigrant background but not for Swiss children. Furthermore, peer acceptance mediated the effect of national background of mothers on victimization. Results are discussed in terms of the need to improve immigrant children's LLC.     

Gendered Processes of Adaptation: Understanding Parent–Child Relations in Chinese Immigrant Families

Drawing on 5-year longitudinal interview data on 72 Chinese immigrant children and their parents in the U.S., this paper addresses the following research question: How does Chinese immigrant fathers’ and mothers’ adaptation after migration influence their relations with their children? Guided by grounded theory, data analyses show that parental adaptation difficulty, particularly among fathers, influences their physical and psychological presence in their children’s lives. This, combined with parents’ exceedingly high academic expectations, could result in estranged parent–child relations in families. This paper also illustrates how parental efforts to be good providers for their children and children’s hope for parents as a source of emotional support can lead to parent–child alienation in immigrant families.     

The Relation of Emotion Knowledge to Coping in European American and Chinese Immigrant Children

Emotion knowledge contributes to emotion regulation and coping among adults, but few studies have investigated its role in children’s coping development, especially in a cross-cultural context. We examine relations between children’s emotion knowledge and coping in European American and Chinese immigrant families. One hundred and three 7- to 10-year-old children and their mothers from European American and Chinese cultural background participated in this study. Children's emotion knowledge was assessed using emotion-situation knowledge production task. This task examines their understanding of situational antecedents o discrete emotions. Children’s use of coping strategies was reported by mothers using the Children’s Coping Strategies Checklist. Results showed that Chinese immigrant children had greater emotion knowledge of fear and pride but were reported using less variety of coping strategies than European American children. The relationship between children’s knowledge of self-conscious emotions and their use of distraction coping strategies was moderated by culture, whereby knowledge of self-conscious emotions was negatively associated with the parent-reported distraction strategies only for European American children but not for Chinese immigrant children. The importance of culture in both theory and practice related to emotion knowledge and coping is discussed. Findings in this study suggest that family intervention and children’s emotion training programs may need to consider children’s cultural background.     

Child Discipline and Physical Abuse in Immigrant Latino Families: Reducing Violence and Misunderstandings

This article examines common areas of misunderstanding between professionals and low‐income Latino families concerning issues of physical abuse. It argues that low‐income immigrant children deserve the same protection from harsh physical punishment as all other children. This ar ticle suggests culturally competent ways for counselors to work with Latino families to eliminate all forms of violence toward children including corporal punishment. Finally, this article argues that the systemic stresses on low‐income Latino immigrant families must be acknowledged and reduced when addressing child discipline and abuse.     

Is elevated risk of child maltreatment in immigrant families associated with socioeconomic status? Evidence from three sources

In this study we tested whether children from Dutch‐immigrant families are at increased risk for maltreatment, and if so, what factors could explain this risk. Three data sources from the second Netherlands Prevalence Study of Maltreatment of Youth (NPM‐2010) were used to answer these questions. First, 1127 professionals from various occupational branches (sentinels) were asked to report each child (including some background information on the child and family) for whom they suspected child maltreatment during a period of three months. Second, we included the 2010 data from the Dutch Child Protective Services and third, 1759 high school students aged 11–17 years filled out a questionnaire on their experiences of maltreatment in the past year. We found that children from traditional immigrant families with a relatively long migration history in the Netherlands (Turkish, Moroccan, Surinamese, and Antillean) and from nontraditional immigrant families (African [except Morocco], Eastern European, Central Asian, and South and Central American; often refugees) were at increased risk for child maltreatment compared to native Dutch families. However, in the professionals’ and CPS data this risk disappeared for the traditional immigrant families after correction for educational level of the parents and for step‐parenthood. Within the group of families with low education or step‐parents, the risk for child maltreatment was similar for traditional immigrant families as for native Dutch families. Nontraditional families remained at increased risk after correction for sociodemographic and family factors. In conclusion, we found that children from both traditional and nontraditional immigrant families are at increased risk for maltreatment as compared to children from native Dutch families. For the traditional immigrants this risk could partially be explained by socioeconomic status. This implies that socioeconomic factors should be taken into account when outlining policies to fight child maltreatment.     

Injury risk among children of low-income U.S.-born and immigrant mothers.

The number of immigrants in the United States is at an all time high, yet psychologists have largely ignored the domain of immigrant health. This article considers 1 aspect of immigrant health, risk for pediatric injury. A sample of over 5,000 5-year-old children from impoverished families was studied; approximately 13% had immigrant mothers. Children of immigrants had a significantly lower rate of injury in the prior year. This was particularly true of non-White children of immigrants. Three possible mediators for this finding--assistance with parenting, parenting style, and health care accessibility--were considered, but none explained the difference. The need for further research on the topic and implications of results for injury prevention are discussed.     

Conceptualizing Culturally Infused Engagement and Its Measurement for Ethnic Minority and Immigrant Children and Families

Despite the central role culture plays in racial and ethnic disparities in mental health among ethnic minority and immigrant children and families, existing measures of engagement in mental health services have failed to integrate culturally specific factors that shape these families’ engagement with mental health services. To illustrate this gap, the authors systematically review 119 existing instruments that measure the multi-dimensional and developmental process of engagement for ethnic minority and immigrant children and families. The review is anchored in a new integrated conceptualization of engagement, the culturally infused engagement model. The review assesses culturally relevant cognitive, attitudinal, and behavioral mechanisms of engagement from the stages of problem recognition and help seeking to treatment participation that can help illuminate the gaps. Existing measures examined four central domains pertinent to the process of engagement for ethnic minority and immigrant children and families: (a) expressions of mental distress and illness, (b) causal explanations of mental distress and illness, (c) beliefs about mental distress and illness, and (d) beliefs and experiences of seeking help. The findings highlight the variety of tools that are used to measure behavioral and attitudinal dimensions of engagement, showing the limitations of their application for ethnic minority and immigrant children and families. The review proposes directions for promising research methodologies to help intervention scientists and clinicians improve engagement and service delivery and reduce disparities among ethnic minority and immigrant children and families at large, and recommends practical applications for training, program planning, and policymaking.     

Links between local language competence and peer relations among Swiss and immigrant children: the mediating role of social behavior

The primary aim of this investigation was to evaluate a model in which children's social behaviors, including prosocial behavior, setting limits, and social withdrawal, were hypothesized to mediate the links between local language competence (LLC) and peer acceptance and victimization. Longitudinal data were collected via teacher and peer reports on 541 (286 boys and 255 girls) immigrant and Swiss native 5-to-6 year-old kindergarteners. Results showed the immigrant children were less fluent in the local language compared to native Swiss classmates. Moreover, results from structural equation models, with bootstrap tests of indirect effects, indicated that social behaviors mediated the link between LLC and the quality of children's peer relationships. Implications of these findings for school professionals are discussed, such as the need to help immigrant children make a smoother transition to their host communities by providing additional language and social supports while children acculturate and acclimate to their new surroundings and peer group.     

Sticks and stones can break my bones, but ethnophaulisms can alter the portrayal of immigrants to children

An archival study examined the portrayal of ethnic immigrants to children as a function of the prevailing cognitive representation of those ethnic immigrant groups in ethnophaulisms. The complexity in ethnophaulisms (and, to a lesser degree, the valence in ethnophaulisms) predicted the portrayal of ethnic immigrant groups. Overall, ethnic immigrant groups characterized in terms of ethnophaulisms of low complexity were less frequently present in children's literature, children from these ethnic groups were described more in terms of physical appearance than in terms of personal traits, fictional child characters from those ethnic groups were portrayed with smaller heads and with lower verbal complexity, and the folksongs attributed to these groups had a more negative affective tone. The implications of these results for approaches to intergroup relations are considered.     

Intrafamilial Separations in the Immigrant Family: Implications for Cross-Cultural Counseling

A structural family therapy (SFT) approach is combined with the paradigm of acculturation to increase counselors' sensitivity to a subcase of immigrant families, namely those whose members arrive at different times in the United States. The focus is on those families in which parents have preceded children in the immigration experience, which creates the challenging scenario of parents being more adapted to the host culture than their children. Written primarily for family counselors working with immigrant children and their parents, the article provides culturally sensitive counseling strategies based on a structural conceptualization of families, as well as suggestions for future research directions.