Emotional,Cognitive, Behavioral,and Temperament Characteristics of High-Empathy Children

Recent research has suggested that individual differences in young children's capacity for empathy and altruism has heritable components and may be related to early temperament. These individual differences, like other human capacities such as intelligence, may be distributed normally. Thus, high-empathy children may exhibit cognitive, emotional, and behavioral precocity in empathic and altruistic responding, and begin expressing these capacities early in life. Twenty-seven 2- to 8-year-old (M = 53 months), primarily Euro-American high-empathy children (10 male) were identified by childcare center staff. Ethnographically oriented interviews of their mothers provided detailed accounts of the children's empathic and altruistic responding in everyday interactions at home and school. As a group, the children were described as emotionally positive, especially sociable individuals whose empathic and altruistic responses were highly spontaneous, occurred more frequently, and differed from peers in depth, intensity, and persistence. Parallels were drawn between these capacities and temperamental dispositions for self-regulation and emotional reactivity. Limitations of the methodology and directions of future research are discussed.     

Training and practice of school psychologists in reading assessment and intervention

A national sample of school psychologists was randomly surveyed to assess (1) training practices in reading assessment and intervention, (2) their involvement with reading-disabled students, (3) the degree of importance they place on knowledge of assessment and remediation of reading problems, and (4) their perceptions of their expertise in these latter areas. The results revealed major discrepancies between preparation and job responsibilities. The respondents indicated (1) that they had received limited training in reading, (2) that 77% of referrals involved reading problems, (3) that they frequently made reading recommendations, but felt they lacked adequate expertise, and (4) that they supported the need for more expertise in reading. The implications for training and practice are discussed.     

Experimental manipulation of infant temperament affects amygdala functional connectivity

In this functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study we examined neural processing of infant faces associated with a happy or a sad temperament in nulliparous women. We experimentally manipulated adult perception of infant temperament in a probabilistic learning task. In this task, participants learned about an infant's temperament through repeated pairing of the infant face with positive or negative facial expressions and vocalizations. At the end of the task, participants were able to differentiate between “mostly sad” infants who cried often and “mostly happy” infants who laughed often. Afterwards, brain responses to neutral faces of infants with a happy or a sad temperament were measured with fMRI and compared to brain responses to neutral infants with no temperament association. Our findings show that a brief experimental manipulation of temperament can change brain responses to infant signals. We found increased amygdala connectivity with frontal regions and the visual cortex, including the occipital fusiform gyrus, during the perception of infants with a happy temperament. In addition, amygdala connectivity was positively related to the post-manipulation ratings of infant temperament, indicating that amygdala connectivity is involved in the encoding of the rewarding value of an infant with a happy temperament.     

AIDS and intimate relationships: Adolescents’ knowledge and attitudes

The knowledge level about HIV/AIDS among American adolescents aged 16 to 19 has been assessed on several occasions, showing that in recent years their knowledge base has improved. The knowledge bases of British adolescents and of adolescents younger than 16 have been largely ignored. In attempting to assess the likely impact on present or future behaviors of increasing adolescents’ knowledge base about AIDS it is important to also know something of adolescents’ attitudes to intimate relationships and to sex within those relationships. Previous studies have not linked these two aspects. In this study two hundred London schoolchildren aged 14 and 15 years completed a questionnaire tapping both their knowledge about HIV infection and its transmission and their attitudes to intimate relationships. Their answers revealed that they had absorbed the simple media messages about AIDS, that it kills and that use of a condom during sex offers protection. However they were less well informed on detailed aspects of prevention, although, worryingly, they believed that they knew all that they needed to about preventive measures. The majority had attitudes to intimate relationships that were compatible with the message of restricting their number of sexual partners; however, a significant minority did not. The latter were more likely to deny the risk associated with promiscuity. It is suggested that school-based AIDS education programs should help individuals to develop new attitudes to intimate relationships that are compatible with risk avoidance.     

Novelty as a reinforcer for position learning in children

The stimulus-familiarization-effect (SFE) paradigm, a reaction-time (RT) task based on a response to novelty procedure, was modified to assess response for novelty, i.e., a response-reinforcement sequence. Ninetysix kindergarten children were familiarized on one of two colored lights. Then Ss were confronted with a simple position discrimination task in which they could choose between two response buttons which produced either the previously familiarized light or a new (i.e., novel) light. Results showed that the choice response for the novel stimulus (NS) was facilitated by three variables: number of exposures to and duration per exposure of the familiar stimulus (FS), and degree of change provided by the NS relative to the FS. The parallel between the effective variables of this study and those which produce the SFE was noted, implicating an attention interpretation of the function of novelty as a reinforcer. The potential implications of attention for reinforcement theory and learning in general are discussed.     

Sensorimotor skills and language comprehension in autistic children

The objectives of this study were to examine the level of sensorimotor concepts of young autistic children and to relate these concepts to language comprehension. A sample of 16 autistic children with a mean mental age of 24.8 months was administered a standardized scale of sensorimotor intelligence and of receptive language. The autistic children demonstrated surprisingly sophisticated sensorimotor skills, particularly object permanence. While their initial performance was inferior to that of normal controls matched on mental age, particularly in their use of objects in combination, the difference between groups diminished on the second test administration. On the receptive language measure, the autistic children were less able to identify words correctly. The sensorimotor behavior of autistic children who demonstrated language comprehension did not differ from those who showed no language comprehension, except that the former group tended to use an object as an instrument somewhat more frequently. The fact that the autistic children were so impaired in language even with fairly good sensorimotor skills suggests that these skills, particularly object permanence, play a minor role in their language acquisition.Support for this research was provided by Biobehavioral Research Support Grant 516, Grant 12–41 from the March of Dimes, NIMH Postdoctoral Fellowship No. 1 F32 MH07550-01 (Ungerer), and NIMH Grant MH 33815-01. Subjects were recruited from the UCLA Research Center for the Study of Childhood Psychosis, funded by NIMH Grant MH 30897. We would like to thank members of the CRC, particularly Dr. Peter Tanguay, Dr. Barbara Fish, and Dr. B. J. Freeman, for their support of our research efforts.     

Evaluative communications between affectively Ill and well mothers and their children

Earlier research suggests that the natural verbal discourse of mothers with their children can be important in clarifying, verifying, and evaluating the behavior in which a child is engaged, in attributing qualities to the child, and in influencing the child's self-perceptions. We investigated the potential influences of parental affective illness (bipolar affective disorder and unipolar depression in contrast to no history of psychiatric illness) on such labeling behavior in a sample of 61 mothers and their older (school-age) and younger (preschool-age) children. It was hypothesized that the dispositions characterizing affective illness (specifically, negativity and disengagement) would be reflected in the labeling statements of mothers with a diagnosis as they interacted with their children. Based on videotaped interactions during a visit to a home-like laboratory apartment, labeling statements were identified in terms of speaker and person being labeled (addressee) and coded (positive, negative, mixed, or neutral) for judgmental and affective quality of the statement and reaction of the addressee. Data were analyzed (a) by family unit and (b) my mother to child statements. The general pattern of findings indicated, in relative terms, an excess of negativity on the part of family members in the bipolar group and a dearth of negative affect for mothers in the unipolar group. Negativity in the bipolar group appeared to be especially likely when the setting involved mothers and two male children. Additionally, findings are discussed in terms of sex differences in vulnerability to depression.This work was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health, Bethesda, Maryland, and by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Transition from Infancy to Early Childhood. Appreciation is extended to Nancy Lemos and Marcella Maguire for coding the data. National Institute of Mental Health, Building 15K, 9000 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, Maryland 20892.     

Providing Ongoing Skill Development and Support for Educators and Parents of Students with Emotional and Behavioral Disabilities

Target six of the national agenda to improve outcomes for students with or at risk of emotional disturbance is reviewed. Having discussed this target with multiple stakeholders, the authors present four underlying themes that support ongoing skill development of providers and parents alike. These include building capacity of providers, decreasing isolation of school staff, gaining commitment of all school staff to support students with challenging behavior, and including parents and family members in staff development activities. The four underlying themes are discussed and recommendations given for ensuring ongoing skill development and support in education.