Toddler Peers: From Nonverbal Coordinated Action to Verbal Discourse

Twenty-four toddlers (24 months of age) interacted with an adult play partner who experimentally created two different nonverbal interactive contexts surrounding her speech to the toddlers. One, a nonverbal imitation game, mimicked that hypothesized to facilitate toddlers' discourse with one another. The second mimicked another frequent form of toddler peer interaction, parallel play. After establishing the nonverbal context, the adult verbally described her own or the child's nonverbal action. Being engaged in nonverbal imitation games facilitated toddlers (1) responding verbally to the adult's speech in a topically well-connected way and (2) maintaining topically-connected responses over successive turns. Using nonverbal imitative acts, toddlers appear to nonverbally negotiate a topic for their interactions that facilitates their skill in verbal discourse.     

Speech Content and the Emergence of Inequality in Task Groups

We examine how the content of actors' speech and the frequency with which they make contributions affect the emergence and legitimation of inequality in task groups. Previous research has focused on classifying acts, the smallest meaningful units of speech, such as providing opportunities to others to speak, making task relevant suggestions, and positively or negatively evaluating the contributions of others. We also employ a classification scheme based on the cognitive complexity of spoken language in the turn. This scheme is based on an interpretation of the cognitive development model posited by Piaget. In addition to the complexity of language, we analyze speech group members employ to organize to solve the task. These classifications rely on the entire content of the turn rather than the more atomistic act. Data analyzed are from 33 groups of students performing different types of tasks. We employ structural equation models to identify how acts and content are related to one another in the observed interaction patterns in groups. Applications of these insights are explored in the discussion.     

Communicative or strategic action – an examination of fundamental issues in the theory of communicative action

The study focuses on two types of social action – communicative and strategic – and examines whether they have different effects on the competence to act. Competence is understood here as a feeling of being able to handle a situation, which includes the participants' interpretation of the situation at hand, 'concealing of their action' and the intention to perform the act. Communicative action is a consensus–oriented process built upon the parties' mutual definitions of how to reach a goal. Strategic action is a way to more directly reach a goal where influencing and manipulating the other can take place. This thesis was investigated by means of an experimental study. The results indicate that communicative action seems to be connected with openness to diversity and individual experiences. It was also shown how the subtle expression of unaccepted power can disturb feelings of being capable and disturb the balance between one's self–respect and the other person's authority. This disturbance is caused not only by the content of the dialogue but also by the manner in which the encounter takes place. The results give partial confirmation to the thesis underlying the theory of communicative action.     

Inter‐parent Aggression as a Precursor to Disengagement Coping in Emerging Adulthood: The Buffering Role of Friendship Competence

Using multi‐informant data drawn from a prospective study involving 184 youth, mother‐perpetrated and father‐perpetrated partner aggression during early adolescence (the age of 13) was examined as a predictor of five types of disengagement coping strategies in emerging adulthood (the age of 21): behavioral disengagement, mental disengagement, denial, substance use, and restraint. The ability to develop close friendships, or friendship competence, was examined as a moderator of these links. Results suggest that inter‐parent aggression in early adolescence can predict reliance on disengagement coping 8 years later, but that friendship competence can buffer against the reliance on disengagement coping. Moreover, close friendship competence was not directly related to partner aggression by mothers or fathers, suggesting that friendship competence develops along an independent developmental track and thus may truly serve as a buffer for young adults with a history of exposure to inter‐parent aggression.     

The Use of Emotion Explanations by Mothers: Relation to Preschoolers' Gender and Understanding of Emotions

Mothers’ emotion talk, children's emotion talk, and children's understanding of emotion were examined in 50 mother–child dyads at 41 months. Language measures included total emotion words, unique emotion words, labels, explanations, and different types of explanations. Children's emotion understanding was assessed for labeling, situation, and role‐taking knowledge, as well as an overall score. There were different patterns of relations between mothers’ emotion talk and boys’ and girls’ emotion talk, with mothers’ emotion talk related more strongly to boys’ emotion talk. Mothers’ emotion talk for boys and girls was differentially related to the subparts of the emotion understanding test. Specifically, mothers’ total emotion talk predicted boys’ performance on the situation knowledge test and their use of causal emotion explanations predicted boys’ overall score, but none of the maternal variables predicted girls’ performance. This finding may result from differences in variability of maternal speech to boys’ and girls’, and it may be due to differences in maternal speech in earlier years.     

Can young children benefit from collaborative problem solving? Tracing the effects of partner competence and feedback

This research was designed to ascertain the extent to which and the conditions under which 5- to 6-year-olds benefit from collaborative problem-solving. We were interested in the impact of (a) repeated collaborative sessions, with the problem difficulty tied to the current independent ability of the target children; (b) working with a more competent partner, an equally competent partner, or with no partner; and (c) immediate feedback from the materials. The data (obtained from a sample of 81 children) revealed that collaboration with a more competent partner was more beneficial than working alone or working with an equally competent partner, but only when feedback was not provided. With feedback, singletons improved more than those who worked with a partner, irrespective of the partner's relative competence. No benefits were found for repeated collaborative sessions; improvement occurred early and then levelled off. The results are set in the context of Piagetian and Vygotskian theory, and serve to illustrate that with regard to peer collaboration these theoretical positions are complementary rather than in opposition.     

Temperament,mothers' reactions to children's emotional experiences,and emotion understanding predicting adjustment in preschool children

It is expected that both children and their parents contribute to children's development of emotion knowledge and adjustment. Bidirectional relations between child temperament (fear, frustration, executive control) and mothers' reactions to children's emotional experiences were examined to explore how these variables predict children's emotion understanding, social competence, and problem behaviors. Preschool‐aged children (N = 306) and their mothers were assessed across four‐time points. Children's temperament and mothers' non‐supportive reactions to children's emotional experiences were assessed when children were 36 and 45 months of age. Emotion understanding was assessed when the children were 54 months of age and teachers reported on children's problem behaviors and social competence when the children were 63 months of age. Covariates included family income, child cognitive ability, gender, and child adjustment at 36 months. Results from path analyses demonstrated that bidirectional relations between children's temperament and mothers' non‐supportive reactions were not significant. However, mother's non‐supportive reactions directly predicted fewer problem behaviors, and children's emotion understanding mediated the relation between children's executive control and their later social competence. As such, emotion understanding appears to be one mechanism through which executive control might impact social competence.     

简论语言功能

语言的形式与功能之间并非总密切相关。交际实质上是一系列的交际行为或言语行为 ,而任何言语行为由最少两种或典型的三种分行为组成 :非语内表现行为、语内表现行为和言语表达效果行为。分析言语行为以及语言的各种功能有助于第二语言学习者掌握如何利用语言知识来实现语言的各种功能     

Group Work as a Protective Factor for Immigrant Youth

While constructing a cultural understanding of the adaptation process of Hispanic immigrant youth, this article illustrates how social group process acts as a "protective factor" which promotes a capacity for competence and mastery over their new environment.     

A new model of the development of deception: Disentangling the role of false‐belief understanding in deceptive ability

“Deception” is defined predominantly as the intentional attempt to create false‐beliefs in others. However, the intentionality behind early acts of deception and its relation to false‐belief understanding remain unresolved. In this article, we offer a three‐stage theoretical model of the development of deception in human ontogeny. We posit that at any age, human deception is an intentional action, but its form changes according to the level of the deceiver's intentionality. As the primary function of deception is to influence the behaviour of others, we argue that first‐stage deceptions‐in‐action involves only in the analysis of behaviours and perceptual access, not beliefs. In our view, the ability to deceive and false‐belief understanding are eventually inter‐connected, but false‐belief understanding is not essential for the earliest form of deception. Based on empirical findings, which suggest that by observing the results of early deceptions children build their knowledge of mental states as causes of human actions, we claim that the second stage of deception is representational deception. Further, as the understanding of beliefs becomes more advanced, the effectiveness of children's deception increases, and new forms of reflective deception (the third stage) emerge. Future directions for research are outlined, and limitations of the current model are discussed.     

Mutual Intention

This paper takes as its starting point the problem of characterizing, in a precise way, situations in which two people collaborate to achieve a common goal. It is suggested that collaboration is normally based on an apparently paradoxical state of mind which I call "mutual intention". Mutual intention is a concept belonging to the same family as Lewis's and Schiffer's "mutual knowledge". These concepts have the paradoxical feature that they require, for their definition, an infinite series of propositions of the form X knows (or intends, or assumes) p, where X is a single agent and p is a proposition. The source of these infinite series is traced, and it is shown that they can be represented in a plausible and enlightening way by means of a recursive notation. Finally, three applications of the concept of "mutual intention" are given: (i) in the semantic analysis of certain sentences with plural subjects; (ii) in the analysis of agreement and related speech acts; and (iii) in the clarification of the phenomenon of "implicit agreement".     

PREDICTORS OF WOMEN'S RETURN TO VIOLENT PARTNERS

The study aimed to prospectively assess the variables which predict women's intention to return and actual return to violent partners. A questionnaire was developed and administered to 78 women who were taking refuge in a women's shelter after leaving a violent partner. After a two month period it was determined whether or not the women had returned to their partner. Intention to return was significantly predicted by the frequency and severity of violence, the age of the woman's youngest child, her belief the partner had changed, subjective norms and external locus of control. Actual return was predicted by the intention to return to partner, number of times a women had previously left her partner, commitment to relationship, subjective norms and allocation of responsibility for violence. It was argued that therapeutic interventions that address the attitudinal predictors of intention to return or actual return could aid some women and their children to remain away from a violent living situation.     

“I feel recycling matters… sometimes”: The negative influence of ambivalence on waste separation among teenagers

This study uses the theory of reasoned action to examine how measures of subjective and indirect ambivalence affect the separation of paper and packaging for recycling. The relationships between recycling beliefs and recycling attitudes and between recycling intention and behavior are stronger for lower levels of subjective ambivalence. Indirect ambivalence moderates the relationship between ecological self-identity and recycling behavior in the same way. One exception is that the relationship between recycling intention and behavior is stronger for higher levels of indirect ambivalence. Moreover, indirect ambivalence mediates the effect of subjective ambivalence both on recycling intention and behavior. However, this mediation is imperfect, which suggests that there is a need to measure the two types of ambivalence when studying conservation practices.     

The Effects of Early Institutionalization and Foster Care Intervention on Children's Social Behaviors at the Age of Eight

The present study compared the social behaviors of eight‐year‐old previously institutionalized Romanian children from the Bucharest Early Intervention Project (BEIP) in two groups: (1) children randomized to foster care homes (FCG), and (2) children randomized to care as usual (remaining in institutions) (CAUG). Children were observed interacting with an age‐ and gender‐matched unfamiliar, non‐institutionalized peer from the community during six interactive tasks, and their behavior was coded for speech reticence, social engagement, task orientation, social withdrawal, and conversational competence. Group comparisons revealed that FCG children were rated as significantly less reticent during a speech task than CAUG children. For CAUG children, longer time spent in institutional care was related to greater speech reticence and lower social engagement. Using an actor–partner interdependence model, CAUG children's behaviors, but not FCG, were found to influence the behavior of unfamiliar peers. These findings are the first to characterize institutionalized children's observed social behaviors toward new peers during middle childhood and highlight the positive effects of foster care intervention in the social domain.     

Complex belief-desire reasoning in children

Previous research concerned with children's belief-desire psychology has examined the capacity to predict or interpret action on the basis of the implicit proposition that ‘when an actor desires a particular end and believes that a particular action will achieve that end, he or she will undertake that action’. The limitations of this formulation for understanding acts of omission are outlined and an elaborated version of belief-desire psychology introduced. This version holds that ‘when an actor desires a particular end and believes that a particular action will achieve that end, and when it is believed that there are no co-occurring outcomes of that action whose avoidance is desired more highly than is the originally conceived end, then the actor will undertake the action which will satisfy the original desire’. An experiment is reported which examines 4-, 5, and 7-year-olds' ability to predict story characters' actions on the basis of either their true or false beliefs concerning undesirable outcomes associated with the pursuit of a desired end. Children of all age-groups provided evidence of understanding the elaborated version of belief-desire psychology. However, a significant improvement was noted between the ages of 4 and 7 years in the ability to understand circumstances involving false beliefs.     

A prospective study of adolescent mothers’ social competence,children's effortful control and compliance and children's subsequent developmental outcomes

Previous work has established that caregiver and child temperamental characteristics are associated with child compliance. Given the critical role that parents play in this process, and that children of teen mothers are at risk for poorer developmental outcomes, it is important to understand the development of compliance in the context of at‐risk parenting such as adolescent motherhood. The current study examined child compliance (Wave 5; W5) as a mediator of the association between adolescent mothers’ social competence (Wave 4; W4) and children's behavioral and academic outcomes (Wave 6; W6), and whether this mediation varied depending on children's effortful control (W4) in a sample of 204 Mexican‐origin adolescent mothers (M_age at W4 = 19.94, SD = .99) and their children (M_age at W4 = 36.21 months, SD = .45). Adolescent mothers reported on their own social competence and their children's effortful control and externalizing problems; compliance was assessed using observational methods; and academic readiness was assessed using standardized developmental assessments. Findings based on structural equation modeling revealed that adolescent mothers’ social competence was positively related to children's compliance among children with high effortful control, but not among those with low effortful control. Moreover, child compliance mediated the longitudinal association between adolescent mothers’ social competence and child externalizing problems and academic readiness. Discussion focuses on the importance of considering the role of child temperament in understanding how adolescent mothers’ social competence is subsequently associated with children's social and academic adjustment.     

Social Competence in Children At Risk Due to Prenatal Cocaine Exposure: Continuity Over Time and Associations with Cognitive and Language Abilities

The continuity of social competence between 36 months and first grade was examined in a sample of children at risk due to prenatal exposure to cocaine (N = 92). Parent report data on social competence were collected at 36 months of age and both parent and teacher report data were collected when children were in first grade. Regression analyses indicated that 36-month social competence significantly predicted first-grade parent ratings of social competence, even after controlling for cognitive ability. Thirty-six month social competence also predicted first-grade teacher ratings of competence, but these relations were mediated by child gender and cognitive ability. Early social competence was also a significant predictor of first-grade language ability, after controlling for 36-month language. These findings emphasize the importance of early social competence for later development.     

Executive function and theory of mind as predictors of socially withdrawn behavior in institutionalized children

False‐belief understanding and executive functions are two main sociocognitive abilities reliably linked to child social competence. Although institution‐reared children are especially at risk for behavioral problems and cognitive delays, the role that executive function and false‐belief understanding might play in the social withdrawal of institutionalized children has not been examined. The current study used two‐wave data to investigate the concurrent and longitudinal relations of social withdrawal with executive function and false‐belief understanding in institutionalized children; it also allowed investigation of the directionality between executive function and false‐belief understanding. Data were collected from 66 Turkish children (T1 M = 57.83 months, SD = 9.20; T2 M = 69.58 months, SD = 8.45) residing in institutions, at two time points, approximately 1 year apart. We measured false‐belief understanding and executive function via individual assessments, and social withdrawal via care provider reports at both time points. Results showed that both executive function and false‐belief understanding increased between T1 and T2, while social withdrawal did not show a significant change. Path analysis revealed that when T1 age and language were controlled, T1 executive function predicted T2 executive function, and in turn, T2 executive function predicted lessened social withdrawal at T2. In addition, T1 executive function predicted T2 false‐belief understanding. T1 false‐belief understanding was not related to T2 false‐belief understanding, executive function, or social withdrawal. Findings suggested that executive function is an important predictor of social withdrawal in high‐risk populations.     

Treating the Effects of Interpersonal Violence: A Comparison of Two Group Models

Surveys have shown that one in four women in the United States experiences intimate partner violence in her lifetime. Interpersonal violence has demonstrated negative effects on a victim's health and well-being. Yet research on interventions aimed at treating the psychosocial effects of this experience is limited. The purpose of the research reported here is to deepen our understanding of the impact of group-based interventions for treating this population. Specifically, this study looks at two different group models to determine their effectiveness in treating two widely recognized effects of intimate partner violence: increased depression and lowered self-esteem.     

“The chug is coming through!” “There's two chuggas!”: A longitudinal study of the social function of imitation in children's play with siblings and friends

Imitation is argued to have an important affiliative function in social relationships. However, children's tendency to imitate different play partners during naturalistic play and associations with social understanding have been overlooked. We investigated the frequency and context of imitation in a longitudinal study of 65 focal children (T1: M age = 56.4 months, SD = 5.71) during play with their older or younger sibling and a friend in two separate play sessions. Children were observed again approximately 3 years later (T2: n = 46, M age = 94.6 months; SD = 6.6). We coded focal children's verbal and nonverbal imitation of their play partner, their partner's response to being imitated, the context in which imitation occurred (e.g., pretense), and the focal child's social understanding (i.e., mental state references). Verbal imitation occurred more often than nonverbal imitation and was used most often during the contexts of play negotiations and pretense. Although focal children's imitation of both their siblings and friends increased significantly over time, children imitated friends more than siblings at T1. All play partners responded positively (i.e., smiling, laughing) most often to being imitated. Associations between focal child imitation and mental state talk with friends at T2 approached significance. Our findings provide a deeper understanding of the nature of imitation during children's play interactions and support assertions that imitation is a process whereby children build affiliation, mutuality, and shared meanings in their relationships.