Anger and Approach Motivation in Infancy: Relations to Early Childhood Inhibitory Control and Behavior Problems

The relations among infant anger reactivity, approach behavior, and frontal electroencephalogram (EEG) asymmetry, and their relations to inhibitory control and behavior problems in early childhood were examined within the context of a longitudinal study of temperament. Two hundred nine infants’ anger expressions to arm restraint were observed at 4 months of age. Infants’ approach behaviors during play with an unpredictable toy and baseline frontal EEG asymmetry were assessed at 9 months of age. Inhibitory control during a Go/No‐Go task and parent report of behavior problems were evaluated at 4 years of age. High anger‐prone infants with left, but not right, frontal EEG asymmetry showed significantly more approach behaviors and less inhibitory control relative to less anger‐prone infants. Although a link between anger proneness in infancy and behavior problems in early childhood was not found, a combination of low approach behaviors and poor inhibitory control was predictive of internalizing behaviors.     

Prenatal Maternal Anxiety and Depression Predict Negative Behavioral Reactivity in Infancy

The effects of maternal antenatal and postnatal anxiety and depression on infant negative behavioral reactivity were examined in a sample of 22 mother‐infant pairs. Maternal anxiety and depression were assessed by standardized measures during the third trimester of pregnancy and postpartum. Infant negative behavioral responses to novelty were assessed using a previously validated measure at 4 months of age. Maternal anxiety and depression during the prenatal, but not the postnatal period, were related to infant negative behavioral reactivity to novelty. These data illustrate that prenatal maternal psychological state can exert persisting influences on human infant behavior.     

Infancy and Childhood in India: A Critical Review

Empirical studies of childhood in India have been rare. Guided by universalistic theories of child development, developmental psychologists have seldom examined cultural variations in child-rearing patterns with Indian samples. Psychoanalytic studies of Hindu childhood have been influenced by therapeutic observations with segmented middle-class populations that are generally Westernized and educated, inviting a lively debate about the transferability of psychoanalytic individualism to non-Western contexts. Anthropological studies, invariably focused on cultural variation, have not searched for consistent cultural patterns in ethnographic materials on Hindu socialization. Based on fieldwork conducted in a village near Delhi, this article presents one of the first systematic quantitative and ethnographic studies of patterns of child care in Hindu extended families during the preschool years. The findings are discussed in terms of achieving a consensus between developmental, psychoanalytic, and anthropological observations of Indian childhood.     

The Infant Orienting With Attention Task: Assessing the Neural Basis of Spatial Attention in Infancy

Infant visual attention develops rapidly over the first year of life, significantly altering the way infants respond to peripheral visual events. Here, we present data from 5‐, 7‐, and 10‐month‐old infants using the Infant Orienting With Attention (IOWA) task, designed to capture developmental changes in visual spatial attention and saccade planning. Results indicate rapid development of spatial attention and visual response competition between 5 and 10 months. We use a dynamic neural field (DNF) model to link behavioral findings to neural population activity, providing a possible mechanistic explanation for observed developmental changes. Together, the behavioral and model simulation results provide new insights into the specific mechanisms that underlie spatial cueing effects, visual competition, and visual interference in infancy.     

Parenting Supports for Early Vocabulary Development: Specific Effects of Sensitivity and Stimulation through Infancy

Growing recognition of disparities in early childhood language environments prompts examination of parent–child interactions, which support vocabulary. Research links parental sensitivity and cognitive stimulation to child language, but has not explicitly contrasted their effects, nor examined how effects may change over time. We examined maternal sensitivity and stimulation throughout infancy using two observational methods—ratings of parents’ interaction qualities and coding of discrete parenting behaviors—to assess the relative importance of these qualities to child vocabulary over time and determine whether mothers make related changes in response to children's development. Participants were 146 infants and mothers, assessed when infants were 14, 24, and 36 months. At 14 months, sensitivity had a stronger effect on vocabulary than did stimulation, but the effect of stimulation grew throughout toddlerhood. Mothers’ cognitive stimulation grew over time, whereas sensitivity remained stable. While discrete parenting behaviors changed with child age, there was no evidence of trade‐offs between sensitive and stimulating behaviors, and no evidence that sensitivity moderated the effect of stimulation on child vocabulary. Findings demonstrate specificity of timing in the link between parenting qualities and child vocabulary, which could inform early parent interventions, and support a reconceptualization of the nature and measurement of parental sensitivity.     

Contribution of Motion Information to Maternal Face Discrimination in Infancy

The contribution of motion and feature invariant information in infants' discrimination of maternal versus female stranger faces was assessed. Using an infant controlled habituation–dishabituation procedure, 4‐ and 8‐month‐old infants (N = 62) were tested for their ability to discriminate between their mother and a female stranger in 4 different conditions varying whether motion or feature information about the faces was available. The faces were presented in a still or dynamic video image with either a positive or a negative contrast. In each condition, infants habituated to a stranger's face and then viewed, in 3 pairs of alternating novelty test trials, either a new stranger or their mother's face. Results show that motion information contributes to the 8‐month‐old infants', but not the 4‐month‐old infants' discrimination of maternal faces. These results are interpreted in relation to recent findings and models in the adult literature suggesting that there is an enhanced contribution of dynamic information in face recognition when the face is familiar. Our data confirm that from the outset, there is a complex interplay of feature and motion information in the discrimination of the mother's face when the viewing condition is not optimal.     

The Effects of Early Maternal Employment on Later Cognitive and Behavioral Outcomes

This article investigates the long‐term impact of early maternal employment on children's cognitive and behavioral outcomes. Non‐Hispanic White and African American children aged 3 to 4 in the 1986 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth were followed longitudinally to see whether the effects that prior studies found at age 3 to 4 persist into the school‐age years (ages 7 to 8) or whether those effects attenuate over time. The empirical results indicate that maternal employment in the 1st year of a child's life has significant negative effects on White children's cognitive outcomes. These effects persist to ages 7 or 8 for some children but not for others. We also found some negative effects of maternal employment in the 1st year on behavioral problems as assessed at age 7 or 8, but again these effects are found only for White children.     

Maternal Positive and Negative Interaction Behaviors and Early Adolescents' Depressive Symptoms: Adolescent Emotion Regulation as a Mediator

This study examined the relation between mothers' positive and negative interaction behaviors during mother–child interactions and the emotion regulation (ER) and depressive symptoms of their adolescent offspring. Event‐planning (EPI) and problem‐solving interactions (PSI) were observed in 163 mother–adolescent dyads, and adolescents also provided a self‐report of ER responses and depressive symptoms. Sequential analyses of mother–adolescent behaviors during the interaction tasks indicated that adolescents with more depressive symptoms were more likely to reciprocate their mothers' negative affective behaviors. Adolescents whose mothers displayed less positivity and more negativity (i.e., less frequent positive and more frequent negative behaviors) during the EPI displayed more emotionally dysregulated behaviors in the PSI and reported more frequent maladaptive ER responses. Adolescents whose mothers behaved negatively toward them more frequently during mother–adolescent interactions also reported more depressive symptoms. The frequency with which adolescents engage in maladaptive ER responses mediated the association between maternal negativity and adolescents' concurrent depressive symptoms.     

Maternal Employment and Parenting Through Middle Childhood: Contextualizing Factors

The authors used data from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development (N = 1,364) to examine maternal work hour status and parenting (sensitivity and learning opportunities) from infancy through middle childhood. Work hour status was conceptualized as nonemployment, part time, and full time. Adjusting for covariates, mothers employed part time had higher sensitivity scores and higher provision of child learning opportunity scores than did mothers who were not employed, and these differences characterized families during early childhood rather than middle childhood. Mothers' provision of child learning opportunities was greater when she was employed full time (vs. part time) during early childhood. In addition to child age, mothers' ethnic minority status and partner status moderated the association between maternal work hour status and mothers' parenting. In general, the findings supported ideas forwarded by role expansionist theory.     

Follow My Gaze: Face Race and Sex Influence Gaze‐Cued Attention in Infancy

Using the eye gaze of others to direct one's own attention develops during the first year of life and is thought to be an important skill for learning and social communication. However, it is currently unclear whether infants differentially attend to and encode objects cued by the eye gaze of individuals within familiar groups (e.g., own race, more familiar sex) relative to unfamiliar groups (e.g., other race, less familiar sex). During gaze cueing, but prior to the presentation of objects, 10‐month‐olds looked longer to the eyes of own‐race faces relative to 5‐month‐olds and relative to the eyes of other‐race faces. After gaze cueing, two objects were presented alongside the face and at both ages, infants looked longer to the uncued objects for faces from the more familiar‐sex and longer to cued objects for the less familiar‐sex faces. Finally, during the test phase, both 5‐ and 10‐month‐old infants looked longer to uncued objects relative to cued objects but only when the objects were cued by an own‐race and familiar‐sex individual. Results demonstrate that infants use face eye gaze differently when the cue comes from someone within a highly experienced group.     

Impulsivity and Sustained Attention in Pathological Gamblers: Influence of Childhood ADHD History

Pathological gambling (PG) has been associated to both impulsiveness and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in different studies. Our objective was to compare different impulsivity and sustained attention variables, using both behavioural tasks and self-administered questionnaires, in a group of pathological gamblers with a history of childhood ADHD (PG-ADHD; n = 16), a group of pathological gamblers without this history (PG-non-ADHD; n = 39), and a control group (n = 40). As instruments of measure, we used the stop signal task (to evaluate inhibitory control/impulsivity), the differential reinforcement of Low Rate Responding Task (delay of gratification/impulsivity) and the Continuous Performance Test (sustained attention). The Barratt Impulsivity Scale (BIS-11) was used as a self-administered questionnaire to measure impulsiveness.Our results show that patients in the PG-ADHD group exhibit a significantly lower capacity to delay gratification than those in the PG-non-ADHD and control groups, and less inhibitory control than patients in the PG-non-ADHD group. On self-administered questionnaires such as the BIS-11 the PG-ADHD group obtained higher scores than the PG-non-ADHD and control groups. However, no differences were found with respect to sustained attention using the CPT.Our results suggest a possible selective implication of the prefrontal cortex in PG, which would be especially evident in those with a childhood history of ADHD.     

Childhood cancer survivors' experiences in school re-entry in South Korea: Focusing on academic problems and peer victimization

Childhood cancer survivors are confronted with numerous problems when they return to school after the completion of treatment. This study investigates the school re-entry experiences of childhood cancer survivors in South Korea. In-depth qualitative interviews were conducted with 31 childhood cancer survivors who were between 15 and 39 years old and had completed all cancer treatments at the time of the study. Participants reported being excited about school re-entry, but also being fearful and concerned about their academic performance and peer relationships. The participants' school re-entry experiences were mostly impacted by their relationships with their peers and teachers. They expressed having had psychosocial problems related to school re-entry, such as feeling a sense of loss and a lack of social skills. Our study findings emphasize a critical need for supporting childhood cancer survivors, both academically and socially, in their transition to school.     

Toddlers' Empathy‐Related Responding to Distress: Predictions From Negative Emotionality and Maternal Behavior in Infancy

This study focused on the predictive contributions of infants' temperamental negative emotionality (proneness to fear, anger), sex, maternal responsivity, and their interaction on toddlers' empathy‐related responding to distress in 3 contexts. Ninety‐eight infants and their mothers participated in a longitudinal study. When the infants were 10 months of age, mothers completed assessments of infant temperamental anger and fear, and maternal behaviors were observed in a free‐play setting. At 18 months of age, toddlers' empathy‐related responding to the distress of a stranger, a crying baby doll, and the mother was assessed. A series of hierarchical and logistic regressions were performed, and results indicated that infant fear predicted higher concerned awareness toward adults and higher personal distress reactions toward the mother. In addition, maternal responsivity predicted higher concerned attention and lower personal distress reactions toward the baby doll and mother. Findings also revealed several interaction effects to predict toddlers' empathy‐related responding to distress.     

Consequences of Pain in Early Life and its Remedy: Maternal Responsibility

ABSTRACT

Neonatal and childhood pain experience is an unavoidable consequence of modern-day medical practice. Repeated exposure to noxious stimuli is not free from adverse consequences in adult life. Therefore it is important to minimize pain if unavoidable in early life. Parents need to be aware of the various measures available to minimize pain in infants and children. They need to be educated about the analgesic efficacy of nonpharmacological agents such as sucrose. Judicious use of these substances is advised to prevent the immediate and late consequences of early pain experience.     

The Effect of Negative and Positive Childhood Divorce Experiences on Professional Performers

The purpose of this study was to provide an in-depth analysis of divorce by comparing levels of depression, anxiety, self-esteem, and availability of resources between professional performers who were children from divorces considered negative, divorces considered positive or neutral, and professional performers raised in 2-parent households. The results of this study indicated that performers raised in divorced families reported more depression, more anxiety, and lower levels of self-esteem than those who were raised in intact families. Additionally, results indicated that those who were raised in neutral to positive divorced families reported less depression, less anxiety, and higher levels of self-esteem than did those stemming from negatively divorced families. Implications for treatment and directions for future research are presented.     

Maternal Punitive Reactions to Children's Negative Emotions and Young Adult Trait Anger: Effect of Gender and Emotional Closeness

The current study tested whether young adult's recollected reports of their mother's punitive reactions to their negative emotions in childhood predicted anger expression in young adulthood and whether emotional closeness weakens this association. Further, a three-way interaction was tested to examine whether emotional closeness is a stronger protective factor for young women than for young men. Results revealed a significant three-way interaction (gender × emotional closeness × maternal punitive reactions). For young men, maternal punitive reactions to negative emotions were directly associated with increased anger expressions. Maternal punitive reactions to young women's negative emotions in childhood were associated with increased anger in adulthood only when they reported low maternal emotional closeness. Findings suggest that maternal emotional closeness may serve as a buffer against the negative effects of maternal punitive reactions for women's anger expression in young adulthood.     

Stress in Childhood and Adulthood: Effects on Marital Quality Over Time

We work from a stress and life course perspective to consider how stress affects trajectories of change in marital quality over time. Specifically, we ask whether stress is more likely to undermine the quality of marital experiences at different points in the life course. In addition, we ask whether the effects of adult stress on marital quality depend on childhood family stress experiences. Growth curve analysis of data from a national longitudinal survey (Americans' Changing Lives, N = 1,059 married individuals) reveals no evidence of age differences in the effects of adult stress on subsequent trajectories of change in marital experiences. Our results, however, suggest that the effects of adult stress on marital quality may depend on childhood stress exposure. Stress in adulthood appears to take a cumulative toll on marriage over time-but this toll is paid primarily by individuals who report a more stressful childhood. This toll does not depend on the timing of stress in the adult life course.     

Child Health and Family Emotional Climate in Early Childhood

This study tied together literature from the fields of family sociology, child development, and social work to investigate the impact of child health and developmental challenges on family emotional climate spanning the first 5 years following birth. To measure emotional climate, three family determinants (interparental discord, parenting concordance, and parenting challenges), which served as either the product or process for six empirical models of interest, were examined. Overall, children’s poor health and development could open up more opportunities for parental discord, undermine parental ability to compromise, and increase challenges in parenting. Practice implications aimed at strengthening family ties were also discussed.