Daily practice of Won-Buddhism: insights from the mind diaries of early childhood teachers in South Korea

This article explores the self-reflection and introspection practised by Korean teachers in early childhood institutions from the perspective of Won-Buddhism. With a phenomenological research methodology, it observes the internalised dialogue experienced by teachers while writing a ‘mind diary’ to reflect on the emotions, thoughts, actions, and relationships they encounter in their daily lives. The findings of data collected and analysed from in-depth interviews and from examining the mind diary writing processes of eight teachers were as follows. First, writing the mind diary enabled teachers to identify their state of mind when they encountered problematic situations. Using the ascetic method of stopping to reflect critically upon the situation and to observe it in context, they recovered their psychological stability and experienced changes in their way of thinking. Second, while writing mind diaries, teachers were able to observe each other’s internalised thoughts and changes in behaviour, which had not been possible for them earlier in their professional lives. On this basis, the processes of practice-oriented teacher education were reconsidered in this study to help teachers develop their abilities to reflect upon and practise these processes in their daily lives.     

Rendering theology with 2-year-old children: a Godly Play and grounded theory combination

Research conducted with a specialized population such as very young children is fraught with issues not faced by research conducted with older participants. While researchers have conducted interviews with adults regarding their perceptions of young children and researchers have observed young children, this study was designed to allow 2-year-old children to be in a setting that offered the needed backdrop of language and play interaction in order capture theological understanding from the child’s point of view. Using Godly Play with grounded theory allowed the emergence of the concept of rendering theology with 2-year-old children. The sub-themes included: Eager Receptiveness, Pretend to the Read the Bible Play, and Jesus Play. This study highlighted not only a theory regarding very young children’s theological ideas, but also a spiritual qualitative methodology that may be used for future research with 2-year-old children.     

The role of sensorimotor experience in the development of mimicry in infancy

During social interactions we often have an automatic and unconscious tendency to copy or ‘mimic’ others’ actions. The dominant view on the neural basis of mimicry appeals to an automatic coupling between perception and action. It has been suggested that this coupling is formed through associative learning during correlated sensorimotor experience. Although studies with adult participants have provided support for this hypothesis, little is known about the role of sensorimotor experience in supporting the development of perceptual‐motor couplings, and consequently mimicry behaviour, in infancy. Here we investigated whether the extent to which an observed action elicits mimicry depends on the opportunity an infant has had to develop perceptual‐motor couplings for this action through correlated sensorimotor experience. We found that mothers’ tendency to imitate their 4‐month‐olds’ facial expressions during a parent‐child interaction session was related to infants’ facial mimicry as measured by electromyography. Maternal facial imitation was not related to infants’ mimicry of hand actions, and instead we found preliminary evidence that infants’ tendency to look at their own hands may be related to their tendency to mimic hand actions. These results are consistent with the idea that mimicry is supported by perceptual‐motor couplings that are formed through correlated sensorimotor experience obtained by observing one's own actions and imitative social partners.     

The melody of surprise: maternal surprise vocalizations during play with her infant

Two groups of mothers and their infants (24 infants, mean age=3.5 months and 24 infants, mean age=5.5 months) were video‐ and audio‐taped in their homes while playing with a Jack‐in‐the‐box. The mean fundamental frequency of spontaneous surprise exclamations of mothers when opening the toy were analysed, and infant and maternal facial expressions of surprise were coded in three regions of the face. A t‐test established that significantly more of the older children in comparison with younger children showed surprise (t=?2.96, df=46, p<0.005, 2‐tailed). Twenty‐nine per cent of the younger infants, in comparison with 67% of the older children showed facial expressions of surprise. A t‐test of maternal pitch height (Hz) indicated that mothers exclaimed in surprise with a higher pitch when the child did not show a surprise facial expression (mean=415.61 Hz) in comparison with the child showing surprise (mean=358.97 Hz; t=2.9, df=46, p=0.006, 2‐tailed). A multiple regression established that infant's expression was a stronger predictor of maternal vocal pitch than was the age of the infant. These results are discussed in terms of maternal use of emotional expressions as ‘social signals’. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

儿童2-4岁的行为抑制性对其陌生同伴交往的预测

该研究用纵向追踪的实验室观察研究了儿童2岁、4岁时的行为抑制性,及其4岁时与陌生同伴交往特征的关系。结果发现：儿童2岁时的抑制性能预测其在4岁时的社交发起行为缺乏,但不能预测各种游戏活动类型。儿童4岁时的行为抑制性与其单独一被动活动、平行活动及社会互动活动呈显著负相关;与交往中的抑制行为呈显著正相关;儿童4岁时的抑制性分数能预测儿童交往的主动性的缺乏。稳定极端抑制儿童和稳定极端非抑制儿童在抑制行为、平行游戏、社会互动游戏、社交发起和玩新奇玩具方面存在显著差异。     

Perfectionism is multidimensional: a reply to Shafran,Cooper and Fairburn

provided a cognitive-behavioural analysis of perfectionism that focused primarily on self-oriented perfectionism. They argued against studying perfectionism from a multidimensional perspective that they regard as inconsistent with prior work on perfectionism as a self-oriented phenomenon. We respond to by offering historical, empirical, and theoretical support for the usefulness and the importance of a multidimensional model of perfectionism involving both intrapersonal processes and interpersonal dynamics. It is concluded that a multidimensional approach to the study of perfectionism is still warranted.     

Effects of video modeling on social initiations by children with autism

We examined the effects of a video modeling intervention on social initiation and play behaviors with 3 children with autism using a multiple baseline across subjects design. Each child watched a videotape showing a typically developing peer, and the experimenter engaged in a simple social interactive play using one toy. For all children, social initiation and reciprocal play skills were enhanced, and these effects were maintained at 1- and 3-month follow-up periods.