幼儿在集合比较中运用数数的实验研究

本研究中运用了两个实验探讨数数干预和测查条件对儿童在集合比较中运用数数的影响。干预对3岁儿童(M=3：9)没有影响。在平均年龄为4岁4个月时．干预组儿童比控制组儿童更倾向于用数数比较集合．自然组儿童也比传统组更倾向于用数数。许多4岁儿童在无干预时不用数数可能是因为,1)不知数数比视觉性比较更有效,或2)他们在集合比较中的数数极易受测查情景因素的影响。儿童在集合比较中的数数运用与他们的数数水平密切关联。     

Social interactions among teachers, handicapped children, and nonhandicapped children in a mainstreamed preschool

The emotional tone and social integration of two mainstreamed preschool classes were studied to determine whether or not the findings of an earlier study would be repeated. Although most variables showed no differences between handicapped and nonhandicapped children's peer-directed and teacher-directed behaviors, result did suggest that, particularly in one class, nonhandicapped children tended to selectively interact with other nonhandicapped (as opposed to handicapped) children when engaging in more complex (associative) social play. Handicapped children did not show the same tendency to interact more within their own group. At the same time, handicapped children received more help and affection from peers, and were more effectionate towards peers, than nonhandicapped children. Teachers refused handicapped children's requests and corrected their behavior more often; however they also gave them more help and more affection than nonhandicapped children. The results were generally congruent with those of an earlier study but did show more segregation on the part of nonhandicapped children.     

Developmental Changes in Pretend Play from 22- to 34-Months in Younger Siblings of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Developmental trajectories of children’s pretend play and social engagement, as well as parent sensitivity and stimulation, were examined in toddlers with an older sibling with autism spectrum disorder (ASD, high risk; HR) and toddlers with typically-developing older siblings (low risk; LR). Children (N = 168, 97 boys, 71 girls) were observed at 22, 28, and 34 months during free play with a parent and elicited pretend play with an examiner. At 28 and 34 months, children were asked to imagine the consequences of actions pantomimed by the examiner on a pretend transformation task. At 36 months children were assessed for ASD, yielding 3 groups for comparison: HR children with ASD, HR children without ASD (HR-noASD), and LR children. Children in all 3 groups showed developmental changes, engaging in more bouts of pretend play and obtaining higher scores on the elicited pretend and transformation tasks with age, but children with ASD lagged behind the other 2 groups on most measures. Children with ASD were also less engaged with their parents or the examiner during play interactions than either LR or HR-noASD children, with minimal developmental change evident. Parents, regardless of group, were highly engaged with their children, but parents of HR-noASD children received somewhat higher ratings on stimulation than parents of LR children. Most group differences were not accounted for by cognitive functioning. Instead, lower social engagement appears to be an important correlate of less advanced pretend skills, with implications for understanding the early development of children with ASD and for early intervention.     

Improvement of arithmetic self concept through combined positive reinforcement, peer interaction, and sequential curriculum

This study investigated the development of arithmetic self concept and achievement among seven- to nine-year-old children who had problems or who were at the bottom of the lowest track of a third grade. Ss were two girls and two boys from a class of 24 low track children, who completed a one-dimensional five-point scale for self concept and were administered 20-item tests for achivement in arithmetic repeatedly throughout eight weeks of instruction. Formation of small groups, peer interaction, individual curriculum adjustment, and positive reinforcement both at individual and group level were applied. Effective, correlated results were recorded along both scales for each child, and the gains for the four target children were shown in comparison to the class as a whole.     

Processes of Belonging for Citizen-Children of Undocumented Mexican Immigrants

In this article, we focus on the developmental contexts of middle childhood and early adolescence to explore the lives of citizen-children living with undocumented Mexican parents. We draw on the concept of belonging to highlight the distinct situation of citizen-children and the ways in which they come to understand their place in a world. To capture the experiences of citizen-children born to undocumented Mexican immigrant parents and their sense of belonging to place and community, we conducted in-depth interviews with 83 citizen-children in late childhood and early adolescence in three groups. One group of citizen-children lived in Mexico after their parents’ deportation. Another group remained in the U.S. after parents were detained or deported. The third group did not have a parent in deportation proceedings. Qualitative analyses of children’s recorded interviews revealed their experiences of discovery of parents’ undocumented status; political, social and material exclusion; and rupture of family ties. Children were keenly aware that birthright citizenship afforded them numerous privileges unavailable to their parents, but that it did not extend to the very privilege, they valued most: an intact family. The loss of parents through detention or deportation forced some children to consider existential questions about who they were and where they belonged, sometimes pitting family members against one another. Our findings suggest that belonging is intimately tied to broader forces of legal persecution that go beyond individualized notions of illegality and have deep, possibly lasting psychological effects.     

Continuities and Changes in the Friendships of Children with and Without ADHD: A Longitudinal, Observational Study

We examined how the real-life dyadic friendships of 87 children with ADHD and 46 comparison children (76 % boys) aged 7–13 years evolved during a 6-month follow-up period. The methods included friendship quality self-report measures and direct observation of friends’ dyadic behaviors in three structured analogue tasks. At Time 2, the friends of the participants with ADHD reported less positive friendship quality and more conflict with their friends than at Time 1. They were also considerably less satisfied with their friendship than 6 months prior. In contrast, the friends of comparison children reported fewer negative friendship features, more positive friendship features and a slightly greater friendship satisfaction than at Time 1. In sharp contrast with the invited friends’ reports, referred children with ADHD did not report deterioration in their friendship quality over time. Unlike comparison children who significantly reduced violations of game rules between Time 1 and Time 2, children with ADHD broke more game rules during the same period. In negotiating with friends, comparison children, but not children with ADHD, reduced the number of self-centered and insensitive proposals at Time 2. Controlling for Time 1 variance, violations of game rules and a self-centered, insensitive negotiation approach predicted deterioration in friendship quality for children with and without ADHD over time.     

Use of a task-oriented self-instruction method to support children in primary school with poor handwriting quality and speed

Two studies were conducted to investigate the effect of a task-specific self-instruction intervention to improve handwriting ability of children with poor handwriting quality in schools for regular education (Study 1) and children with poor handwriting quality in schools for special education (Study 2). Study 1 showed that children with poor handwriting quality who received handwriting intervention on an individual basis for three months improved on average more on quality of writing than control children without handwriting problems who did not receive intervention. In contrast, the control group improved more in speed of writing after the intervention period. At an individual level, three out of the seven children with poor handwriting quality before intervention were not classified as such anymore after the intervention period. Study 2 showed that after six months of intervention in a group setting children with poor handwriting quality improved their quality of writing more so than children with poor handwriting quality who had not received intervention. On speed of handwriting no significant group differences emerged. We conclude that the task-oriented self-instruction method applied in this study seems to improve especially the quality of handwriting, not speed, of children initially identified as having poor handwriting quality.     

Attributions of behavior in the pediatric mild closed head injury (CHI) population

Forty-one children between the ages of 6 and 11 years with a history of a mild closed head injury and 23 age-, gender-, and IQ-matched typically developing control children participated. All of the children in the CHI sample were referred for a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan at 3 months post-injury and children in the CHI sample were further divided into MRI-Negative (n=31) and MRI-Positive (n=10) conditions according to the MRI results. Parents and teachers completed behavioral checklists at three points, including just prior to the MRI and 6 months post-injury. Prior to the MRI (Time 2), in both samples of children with a CHI, parents reported an increase in externalizing symptoms after the CHI. At 6 months post-injury (Time 3: post-MRI), parents of children in the MRI-Positive group did not report any significant changes in their child's externalizing behaviors when compared with pre-MRI, yet parents of children in the MRI-Negative group reported a further increase in externalizing behaviors. Parent attributions also changed as a function of group membership; whereas no changes were noted in the other two groups, parents of children in the MRI-Negative sample ascribed more controllability at Time 3 when compared with Time 2.     

The italian determiner system in normal acquisition, specific language impairment, and childhood aphasia

The paper presents a comparison of the development of the Italian determiner system in three different populations: normally developing children, a child recovering from childhood aphasia from the age of 3 years, 9 months, and 11 specific language impairment (SLI) children. Data from Italian normal children provide evidence for the hypothesis (1) that no prefunctional stage exists as far as the determiner system is concerned and (2) that the syntactic properties of determiners play an essential triggering role early on. The analysis of the determiner system in the aphasic child has a double interest. On the one hand, it may help to shed light on some of the intriguing questions concerning this type of disorder; on the other, it may be relevant for the discussion of the notion of agrammatism. Results of the morphosyntactic analysis reveal that, apart from timing differences, recovery from childhood aphasia shares important features with normal development. Differently from mean length of utterance (MLU)-matched normal controls and the aphasic child, SLI children omit determiners significantly more often than almost any other functional category or free morpheme. We will argue that the reasons for the SLI children's atypical behavior have to be sought in the nonaccessibility to or in the misappreciation of one fundamental syntactic property of determiners: their role as elements that assign argumenthood to nominal expressions (Szabolcsi, 1987; Longobardi, 1994).     

Mother-child emotional availability in ecological perspective: three countries, two regions, two genders

This study used a cross-national framework to examine country, region, and gender differences in emotional availability (EA), a prominent index of mutual socioemotional adaptation in the parent-child dyad. Altogether 220 Argentine, Italian, and U.S. mothers and their daughters and sons from both rural and metropolitan areas took part in home observations when the children were 20 months old. In terms of country, Italian mothers were more sensitive and optimally structuring, and Italian children were more responsive and involving, than Argentine and U.S. dyads. In terms of region, rural mothers were more intrusive than metropolitan mothers, and boys from metropolitan areas were more responsive than boys from rural areas. In terms of gender, mothers of girls were more sensitive and optimally structuring than mothers of boys, and daughters were more responsive and involving than sons. Understanding how country, region, and gender influence EA exposes forces that shape child development, parent-infant interaction, and family systems.     

Disfluency data of German preschool children who stutter and comparison children

This study compared the disfluencies of German-speaking preschool children who stutter (CWS, N = 24) with those produced by age- and sex-matched comparison children who do not stutter (CWNS, N = 24). In accordance with Yairi and Ambrose's [Yairi, E., & Ambrose, N. (1992). A longitudinal study of stuttering in children: A preliminary report. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, 35, 755-760] guidelines the CWS group had a narrow age range (2-5 years) and were seen close to the reported time of their stuttering onset (average of 8 months). Furthermore, over 95% of the CWS group had not received any type of speech therapy intervention. Consistent with previous findings for English-speaking preschool children, 'stuttering-like' disfluencies (prolongations, blocks, part- and one-syllable word repetitions) were significantly more frequent in CWS (mean = 9.2%) than in CWNS (mean = 1.2%), whereas no significant group differences occurred with respect to 'normal' disfluencies. The number of iterations in stuttering-like disfluencies was also significantly higher in CWS (mean = 1.28 iterations) than in CWNS (mean = 1.09 iterations). In contrast to previous findings, a sub-group of children who have been stuttering for a shorter time (1-5 months) did not differ from a sub-group who had stuttered for a longer period (8-22 months). EDUCATIONAL OBJECTIVES: The reader will be able to: (1) describe how German-speaking preschool children who stutter and who do not stutter display stuttering-like and normal disfluencies including number of iterations; (2) explain how powerful classification measures for the diagnosis of stuttering are for German-speaking preschool children; (3) discuss how disfluency patterns of native English- and German-speaking children close to onset of stuttering differ.     

Godly play: an intervention for improving physical, emotional, and spiritual responses of chronically ill hospitalized children

An experimental two-group comparison pilot study of forty chronically ill hospitalized children was carried out at Wolfson Children's Hospital in Jacksonville, Florida. Three Godly Play interventions were given to participants in the experimental group. Children in the control group did not participate but received a fairy tale book as a control. The sample was evenly distributed with twenty (20) males and twenty (20) females. Ages ranged from six (6) to fifteen (15) years and all participants were chronically ill. Five (5) variables were studied. Of the five (5), three (3) showed significant differences before and after Godly Play: the Staic-Trait Anxiety Scale (p = .049), the Children's Depression Inventory (p = .011), and the McBride Spirituality Assessment (p = .033). A marginal difference in parent satisfaction with hospital care of children in the experimental and control groups was also determined (p = .058). Findings suggest that Godly Play had a significant effect on anxiety, depression, and spirituality of children and support the idea that the parents of children who participated in Godly Play were more satisfied with hospital care than those parents whose children did not engage in Godly Play.     

A Joint Interactive Storybook Intervention Program for Preschool and Kindergarten Children

The effectiveness of a joint interactive storybook reading program delivered by class teachers to develop literacy skills is examined in Hebrew-speaking preschool and kindergarten children. Post-intervention, both groups achieved significantly higher gains in language and print concept skills than age-matched comparison groups that did not have the intervention. However, motivation to read improved significantly more in the experimental group than the comparison group in kindergarteners. Results suggest that intervention program using stories and embedded activities can enhance language and print concepts in young children. Also, motivation to read should be part of every intervention program aimed at enhancing literacy skills.     

ADAPTIVE BEHAVIORS IN YOUNG CHILDREN: A UNIQUE CULTURAL COMPARISON IN ITALY

On account of a series of unique historical events, the present-day denizens of South Tyrol inhabit a cultural, political, and linguistic autonomous region that intercalates Italians and Austrian/German Italians. We compared contemporary Italian and Austrian/German Italian girls' and boys' adaptive behaviors in everyday activities in this region. Using the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales, we first interviewed mothers about their children's communication, daily living, socialization, and motor skills. Main effects of local culture (and no interactions with gender) emerged: Austrian/German Italian children were rated higher than Italian children in both adaptive daily living and socialization skills. Next, we explored ethnic differences in childrearing. Austrian/German Italians reported fostering greater autonomy in their children than Italians, and children's autonomy was associated with their adaptive behavior. Children living in neighboring Italian and Austrian/German Italian cultural niches appear to experience subtle but consequentially different conditions of development that express themselves in terms of differing levels of adaptive behaviors.     

Props,not pictures,are worth a thousand words: verbal accessibility of early memories under different conditions of contextual support

When they are tested nonverbally, even young children demonstrate long-term recall. There have been few studies of whether early memories later are verbally accessible; the results of those that exist are mixed. Inconsistencies may be due to differences in the contextual cues provided at the time of recall. In two experiments, children 13–20 months were exposed to multi-step sequences and tested for nonverbal recall after 3–6 months. At age 3 years, they were tested verbally, under varying conditions of contextual support: in the original laboratory with event-related props versus at home with photographs of the props (Experiment 1), and at home with props (Experiment 2). Children younger than 20 months at initial experience of the events did not demonstrate verbal recall. Children who were 20 months at the initial exposure recalled verbally, as long as they had physical props as cues, regardless of whether testing took place at home or in the laboratory. This research informs the conditions under which memories from very early childhood later can be recalled verbally. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Children's Narratives Following Traumatic Brain Injury: Linguistic Structure, Cohesion, and Thematic Recall

Narrative discourse and intellectual functioning were examined 3 years following traumatic brain injury (TBI) in children 1 to 8 years of age at the time of injury. The language-impaired TBI group (n= 9) had language deficits during the subacute stage of recovery; their performance was contrasted with that of a TBI comparison group equated on neurologic and demographic variables that did not show subacute language impairment (n= 8) and a sibling comparison group (n= 9). The language-impaired TBI group had lower Verbal and Full-Scale IQ scores and produced fewer words and utterances than the sibling group on a story retelling task; their stories were characterized by fewer complete referential and lexical ties and more referential errors, indicating difficulty conjoining meaning across sentences. The language-impaired TBI group recalled approximately one-third of the propositions needed to maintain the story theme and made more errors sequencing the propositions than either the TBI or the sibling comparison groups. Group differences were not obtained on the Performance IQ scores or on measures of rate or fluency of speech production, mazes, use of conjunctives, or naming errors. The discourse deficiencies of children with TBI and acute language impairment were most pronounced at the level of cognitive organization of the text reflecting text macrostructure and were least apparent at the level of lexical and sentential organization reflecting text microstructure. Results are discussed in terms of the vulnerability of developing language abilities to disruption by brain injury.     

On the rate of gain of information in children

Previous studies of the development of information processing in children have frequently been methodologically suspect and inconclusive in outcome. A study was designed to overcome some of the difficulties encountered in earlier studies. Six boys and six girls at each year of age from 5 to 11 inclusive were tested for one week on a serial, numerals-keys choice reaction time task with 2, 4, and 8 alternatives. Results were consistent with Hick's (1952) law. Both reaction time (RT) and the rate of gain of information improved with age, but the intercept constant, a more labile index, did not. These findings suggest that development is largely restricted to the process of response selection within a 4-stage decomposition of RT. Girls consistently exhibited both faster RTs and higher rates of gain of information than boys. These sex differences are interpreted in relation to recent notions of cerebral maturation in males and females.     

Reductions of intimate partner violence resulting from supplementing children with omega‐3 fatty acids: A randomized,double‐blind,placebo‐controlled,stratified, parallel‐group trial

Omega‐3 supplementation has been found to reduce externalizing behavior in children. Reciprocal models of parent‐child behavior suggest that improving child behavior could lead to improvements in parent behavior, however no study has examined whether omega‐3 supplementation in children could reduce intimate partner violence or child maltreatment by their adult caregivers. In this randomized, double‐blind, placebo‐controlled, stratified, parallel group trial, a community sample of children were randomized to receive either a fruit drink containing 1 gm of omega‐3 fats (Smartfish Recharge; Omega‐3 group, n = 100) or the same fruit drink without omega‐3's (Placebo group, n = 100). Child participants, adult caregivers, and research staff were blinded to group assignment. Adult caregivers reported inter‐partner and child‐directed physical assault and psychological aggression at baseline, 6 months (end of treatment) and 12 months (6 months post‐treatment) using the Conflicts Tactics Scale. Caregivers of children in the omega‐3 group reported long‐term reductions in psychological aggression in a group × time interaction. Improvements in adult psychological aggression were correlated with improvements in child externalizing behavior scores. No differences were reported for child maltreatment. This study is the first to show that omega‐3 supplementation in children can reduce inter‐partner psychological aggression among adult caregivers not receiving supplements. Findings suggest that improving child behavior through omega‐3 supplementation could have long‐term benefits to the family system as a whole.

     

Coercive and Face‐Threatening Questions to Left‐Wing and Right‐Wing Politicians During Two Italian Broadcasts: Conversational Indexes of Par Conditio for Democracy Systems1

Indexes of political interviewers' neutrality, proposed in the face model, capture the treatment reserved in televised interviews for politicians or parties. This contribution proposes that they should be introduced in the official survey of political appearances on television and be prescribed by law. The research compares questions of 2 Italian interviewers to the same 13 politicians (7 left‐wing, 6 right‐wing). In over 11 hr of interviews (7 months' sampling), 804 questions were codified. Italian interviewers were less threatening than their Anglo Saxon colleagues, even if just as coercive. They treated the government less coercively than the opposition, even if they were just as threatening; and they seemed sensitive to the prestige of politicians. Implications of the proposal are discussed.     

7岁超常和常态儿童的信息加工速度

该研究以超常和常态儿童各25名(平均年龄分别为6岁10个月和6岁11个月)为被试,以选择反应、图形匹配、心理旋转、和抽象匹配为基本认知任务,对超常和常态儿童的信息加工速度作了比较研究。研究者对被试的正确率和反应时作了分析。结果表明：(1)超常儿童基本信息加工能力显著优于普通儿童,具体表现在反应时更短,或正确率更高。(2)超常儿童与常态儿童信息、加工的差异与任务难度有关,在选择反应和图形匹配任务中,超常儿童的反应时显著短于常态儿童。而且,在图形匹配任务中,任务难度越大,差异越显著。而在心里旋转和抽象匹配任务中,超常儿童的正确率显著高于常态儿童。(3)任务的难度无论对超常组被试还是常态组被试的反应时及反应正确率都有影响,但影响方式不太一样。在反应时上,随着任务难度的增加,两组被试的反应时都明显延长;但在正确率上,则随着任务难度的增加,常态组被试的正确率降低,而超常组被试的正确率基本稳定在一个较高的水平上,即任务难度问的差异不显著。