The relationship between temperament and personality: An exploratory study

Although the terms temperament and personality are often used interchangeably in the literature and clearly are conceptually related, there is little empirical data to illuminate their relationship. In this exploratory study we measured temperament (using the Dimensions of Temperament Survey), and personality (using the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire), in young adolescents and in adults. Some age and sex differences in relationships between the measures and their correlations were found. The temperament dimension of adaptability was clearly related to Eysenck's Extraversion factor and reactivity to Neuroticism in females. More substantial relationships emerged in the adult sample than in the adolescent group, Our data, combined with that of a 1984 Australian study using different techniques, provides substantial support for measurable overlap between some dimensions of temperament derived largely from the developmental literature, and Eysenck's personality theory.     

Wraparound care in vermont: Program development,implementation, and evaluation of a statewide system of individualized services

Over the past decade, there has been a dramatic shift in the provision of mental health services to children, adolescents, and their families. This shift has been marked by a movement away from restrictive treatment options toward the development of comprehensive community-based systems of care designed to keep the most challenging children in their homes, schools, and communities. Based on a model of intensive case management referred to as Wraparound Care, Vermont's statewide approach emphasizes aggressive outreach, use of the least restrictive treatment options, and care that is flexible, unconditional, and child- and family-centered. We chart the development of Vermont's Wraparound Care Initiative and present residential, educational, and behavioral outcome data for a cohort of 40 youth receiving Wraparound Care over a 12-month period. The results showed that after 12-months, youth who had been previously removed from their homes or were at imminent risk of such removal, were residing in significantly less restrictive community-based living arrangements and exhibiting significantly fewer problem behaviors than at intake. These results are discussed in light of recent national studies and previous studies on similar cohorts of Vermont youth receiving Wraparound Care.     

A revised teacher rating scale for Reactive and Proactive Aggression

A teacher rating scale of reactive aggression, proactive aggression, and covert antisocial behavior was evaluated in a normative sample of third- to fifth-grade predominantly white lower middle class boys (N= 186). Factor analysis revealed independent and internally consistent Reactive Aggression (six reactive items), and Proactive Aggression (five proactive items, five covert items) factors. Although the factors were intercorrelated (r= .67), and each factor was significantly correlated with negative peer social status (r= .26 for each, controlling for grade), the independence of the factors was supported by the unique relation of Reactive Aggression with in-school detentions (r= .31), controlling for Proactive Aggression and grade. These results supported the reliability and validity of Reactive and Proactive Aggression as rated by teachers, which should facilitate further research of these constructs. This research was supported in part by an NIMH First Award to Marc Atkins (MH4682), and support from an NICHD Mental Retardation Research Center Core Center Grant (DH26979). Portions of these data were presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Research in Child and Adolescent Psychopathology, Sarasota, Florida, in February 1992. The authors are grateful to Paul McDermott and Tom Power for editorial comments, and to Gail Apfel, principal, and the teachers, staff, and students of Stonehurst Elementary School for their enthusiastic participation in this research.     

Development of manipulatory skills and the deployment of attention

Two independent tasks, object manipulation and auditory-visual matching, were used to examine the relationship between developing manual action skills and attention to intermodal object properties in 3.5- and 5.5-month-olds. Although handling skills improved with age, with older infants demonstrating more varied manipulation, there were no age differences for the matching task. When grouped by handling skills, a significant interaction between skill and event type was found for the two age groups combined and for 5.5-month-olds alone. Auditory-visual matching of social events did not vary with handling skills, whereas auditory-visualmatching of object events did. Infants at higher skill levels responded similarly to social and object events, whereas less skilled infants' matching preferences were weaker for object events. These findings indicate that infants increase their attention to auditory and visual properties of objects as this information becomes useful for guiding new actions. This effect is independent of age due to considerable individual variability in the development of object handling skills.     

The effects of word class on children's reading and spelling

Children's oral language functioning has been shown to be affected by word class (i.e., content vs. noncontent words). The present study reveals comparable effects on children's written language performance. In spelling and reading, third and fifth graders show faster and more accurate responses to nouns and verbs than to noncontent words of matched length and frequency. Further, when the children's performance is examined in relation to level of reading skill, it is found that the less-skilled readers exhibit a greater content/noncontent differential than do the more skilled readers. The results are discussed with reference to differential access for the two word classes and its implication for both oral and written language functioning.     

Effect of preconditioning unconditioned stimulus experience on learned taste aversions.

One taste-aversion study using male Long-Evans rats in which ethanol was the unconditioned stimulus (UCS) and six studies in which lithium chloride (LiCl) was the UCS demonstrate that (a) exposure to the UCS prior to conditioning retards subsequent acquisition of learned taste aversions; (b) a single preconditioning UCS exposure is sufficient to attenuate conditioning; (c) the preconditioning UCS exposure must occur within a limited period prior to conditioning to attenuate learning; (d) repeated conditioning trials will override the effect of prior exposure to the UCS; (e) tolerance to the UCS is not a necessary condition for the attenuation effect to occur; (f) pairing the preconditioning UCS with a novel flavor other than the CS does not remove the preexposure effect, although it may reduce its magnitude; and (g) the degree of disruption is a positive function of preconditioning UCS dosage and an inverse function of conditioning UCS dosage.     

A developmental study of semantic effects on recognition memory

Three experiments evaluated color specificity knowledge and related semantic effects on recognition memory. Experiment I provided the necessary baseline data to show that preschool and college students know the appropriate color of objects. Experiment II revealed semantic effects on recognition of children but not adults. In Experiment III a delay was introduced and adults showed semantic effects as well. The chroma of color-specific and non-color-specific items was remembered relatively well, although chroma recognition for these item types was somewhat different. The semantic effects on very young children's memory suggest deep level interpretive processing in children younger than those generally showing deliberate deployment of memory strategies.