Dysfunctional Parenting Behaviors and Parenting Stress Among Mothers of Aggressive Boys

ABSTRACT

The present investigation examined the relationship between dysfunctional parenting and parenting stress in a sample of 54 mothers of aggressive boys in Singapore. Overall dysfunctional parenting at Time 1 significantly predicted Time 2 maternal parenting stress in two subdomains of unrewarding mother-child interactions and poor attachment, over and above the variance accounted for by initial Time 1 maternal parenting stress in these respective subdomains. Additionally, maternal laxness at Time 1 predicted Time 2 maternal stress arising from unrewarding mother-child interactions, while maternal overreactivity at Time 1 predicted Time 2 maternal stress arising from poor attachment. Maternal verbosity at Time 1 did not add unique variance to the prediction of Time 2 maternal stress from both subdomains. These findings have implications for prevention and intervention efforts that attempt to improve parent-child interaction quality and modify coercive operant contingencies within families.     

Time-Out for Sibling Aggression: An Analysis of Effective Durations in a Natural Setting

Abstract

Time-out is a ubiquitous strategy to reduce problem behaviors. The current study sought to find the shortest effective duration(s) of time-out for sibling aggression in a community sample of girls ages 3–7. All participants reached a minimum reduction in sibling aggression of 60% after experiencing a 1-minute time-out. The majority (75%) of participants also demonstrated clear reversals of behavior when returned to the baseline condition. The current findings suggest that a 1-minute time-out may be sufficient for low-level sibling aggression in children as old as seven. Limitations include the presence of a graduate assistant during sibling play and unclear generalizability.     

集体主义内隐观的访谈和调查研究

在扩充样本的基础上进一步探讨集体主义概念内涵,挖掘“集体”的具体指向,明确“集体”构成.研究一通过40个被试的内隐观访谈和质性分析,得到集体主义概念五个方面内容（集体认同、集体优先、联结信念、责任与义务、发生的条件）,指出“集体”的具体指向为泛集体和关系集体,集体主义程度与冲突情境有关.研究二通过102份问卷调查和聚类分析,得到三类集体,即关系比较亲密集体（由母亲、亲兄弟/姐妹、配偶、好友构成）、关系一般集体（由认识的人、亲戚、同事、邻居构成）和关系疏远集体（由本地陌生人、国外陌生人构成）,并进一步明确了“集体”的具体构成.结论认为：集体主义概念内涵包括集体认同、集体优先、联结信念、责任与义务、发生的条件五个部分;集体主义中的“集体”由泛集体和关系集体构成,其中关系集体又分为关系比较亲密集体和关系一般集体.     

Is Perceptual Priming Affected by Culture? A Study With German Middle-Class and Cameroonian Nso Farmer Children

The authors explored priming in children from different cultural environments with the aim to provide further evidence for the robustness of the priming effect. Perceptual priming was assessed by a picture fragment completion task in 3-year-old German middle-class and Cameroonian Nso farmer children. As expected, 3-year-olds from both highly diverging cultural contexts under study showed a priming effect, and, moreover, the effect was of comparable size in both cultural contexts. Hence, the children profited similarly from priming, which was supported by the nonsignificant interaction between cultural background and identification performance as well as the analysis of absolute difference scores. However, a culture-specific difference regarding the level of picture identification was found in that German middle-class children identified target as well as control pictures with less perceptual information than children in the Nso sample. Explanations for the cross-cultural demonstration of the priming effect as well as for the culturally diverging levels on which priming occurs are discussed.     

Mothers' Management of Adolescent Peer Relationships: Associations With Aggressive,Prosocial, and Playful Behavior

The authors examined the relation between adolescents' reports of mothers' management of peer relationships and adolescents' reports of their own aggressive, prosocial, and playful behaviors. The sample comprised 92 adolescents (M age = 15.41 years, SD = 1.81 years) enrolled in a residential summer camp. Higher levels of consulting were related to lower levels of adolescents' relational aggression, physical aggression, playful teasing, and rough-and-tumble play. Higher levels of consulting were related to higher levels of prosocial behavior. Higher levels of guiding were related to higher levels of adolescents' relational aggression and social inclusion. Higher levels of granting access to peers were related to higher levels of adolescents' prosocial behavior and social inclusion. Moderate levels of granting access to peers were related higher levels of playful teasing.     

Interactions between Learning Sets in Monkeys

Relationships between stage of moral judgment and antecedent social experiences are presented for a non-Western sample of young adults. Cross sectional data are presented for two groups of Kenyan students: 52 University of Nairobi students; and 40 fourth form secondary school Ss. Critical variables are (a) family modernization, (b) attending ethnically pluralistic secondary schools, and (c) living independently away from home. The correlations between moral judgment stage and these three variables are controlled for, and compared to, correlations between stage of moral judgment and age, sex, race, and academic ability (as measured by standardized achievement tests or by grades). The evidence demonstrates associations between moral stage and all three critical variables, though in different ways for the two age levels of Ss.     

Alcohol Reverses Religion's Prosocial Influence on Aggression

The relationship between religion and violence is controversial. Discrepant findings exist between survey studies and the limited number of experimental investigations of religiosity's influence on aggressive behavior. We have attempted to resolve this discrepancy by addressing previous limitations in the literature and assessing a heretofore‐untested moderator of religiosity and aggression: alcohol intoxication. This investigation included a community sample of 251 men and 269 women randomly assigned to either an acute alcohol intoxication condition or a placebo condition. Participants completed a series of questions drawn from standardized instruments of religiosity and spirituality prior to competing on an aggression laboratory paradigm in which electric shocks were received from, and administered to, a fictitious opponent under the guise of a competitive reaction‐time task. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed a significant beverage‐by‐religiosity interaction. Religiosity predicted lower levels of aggression for participants in the placebo group and higher levels of aggression for intoxicated participants. Results indicated that high religiosity coupled with alcohol intoxication may be a risk factor for aggression. This novel finding may help to clarify previous discrepancies in studies of religiosity and aggression.     

Elaboration of Cognitive Knowledge of Biology from Childhood to Adulthood

Fifty-seven stimulus words from general biology were presented to subjects ranging from fourth graders to college students. Their free-word-association responses were analyzed according to the relationships between stimulus and response words. Response patterns provided strong support for the Piagetian sensorimotor, concrete operational, and formal operational stages. They also revealed increasing hierarchical organization of knowledge with increased biology learning.     

“Playful” therapy: working with autism and trauma

This paper proposes that psychoanalytic psychotherapy can be a helpful form of treatment for certain autistic children. Some of the misconceptions surrounding this kind of treatment are discussed. The literature identifying a particular sub‐group of autistic children is then reviewed and the characteristics of this group, and the relationship of their difficulties to early trauma, are described. Using clinical material from work with a child who probably fell within this sub‐group, and who had very marked autistic features, the paper illustrates the importance of the therapist taking an active role in the therapy and how this helped the child to emerge from his withdrawn state. Particular emphasis is placed on the importance of introducing themes of aggression, and of this being done in a playful way. The impact of trauma on children's development, with particular reference to the acquisition of language, is considered. The role of sibling rivalry as a factor is emphasised.     

New approaches to understanding unconscious processes: Implicit and explicit memory systems

Abstract

Freud viewed the unconscious as being roughly equivalent to dynamically repressed wishes, needs, and motivations. Findings from developmental psychology, cognitive psychology, psychoanalysis, and neuroscience over the past 40 years have dramatically changed our views of unconscious processes and the human mind. It is now clear that Freud's dynamic unconscious is only a minor segment of information that is processed at subsymbolic, implicit, and automatic levels. Only a fraction of this information is further processed at explicit conscious levels. Moreover, the vast majority of the information that remains nonconscious is adaptive and has major consequences for development. We examine some clinical implications of these views.