Mothers' and Fathers' Use of Internal State Talk with their Young Children

The present study extends previous results demonstrating a relation between maternal discourse and child social understanding to include paternal discourse. Emotion understanding (EU) and theory of mind (ToM) were considered as two distinctive aspects of social understanding. Participants were 106 children (54 boys and 52 girls) studied at 3.5 and 5 years. Discourse measures came from separate parent–child conversations during a picture‐book task; measures of EU and ToM came from children's performance on social cognition tasks. Differences in parental talk translated into important differences in the influence of each parent on children's social‐cognitive understanding. Mothers' references to emotion and emotion causal explanatory language predicted children's concurrent EU. Fathers' use of causal explanatory language referring to desires and emotions predicted children's concurrent and later ToM. These results highlight important differences between mothers and fathers in their use of internal state language and its impact on children's social‐cognitive understanding.     

Demographics, Parenting, and Theory of Mind in Preschool Children

This research examined associations among demographic variables, parenting strategies, and a theory of mind battery including measures of perception, desire, belief, and emotion understanding in 142 preschool‐aged children. In correlational analyses, maternal education and, to a lesser extent, income were associated with a number of aspects of theory of mind. Additionally, mothers’ use of instruction in response to child misbehavior was positively associated with perception and desire understanding whereas mothers’ use of consequences and power assertion were negatively associated with aspects of theory of mind. In regression analyses controlling for children's cognitive ability and age, maternal education continued to be positively associated with perception understanding. Power assertion was negatively associated with belief understanding, but positively associated with emotion understanding. Finally, mothers’ use of consequences in response to child misbehaviors was negatively related to emotion understanding.     

Representing the Mental World in Children's Social Behavior: Playing Hide-and-Seek and Keeping a Secret

This study examined the relationship between children's developing theory of mind and their ability to engage in two social behaviors which have, as their cognitive underpinning, the representation that what one knows may not be accessible to others. Children of 3, 4, and 5 years, in a quasi‐naturalistic setting, played hide‐and‐seek and also were required to keep a secret about a surprise. The ability to play hide‐and‐seek was significantly related to children's ability to refrain from disclosing the secret, and there was a significant relationship between these behaviors and children's social cognition, as measured by theory of mind tasks. The relationship between these social behaviors and tasks measuring executive function was not significant once age was taken into account. With regard to the development of these social behaviors, few 3‐year‐olds, but most 4‐year‐olds, and almost all 5‐year‐olds could successfully play hide‐and‐seek and keep a secret. This study demonstrates the importance of the conceptual understanding of mental states in the young child's social world.     

Theory of Mind, Self-worth and the Mother–Child Relationship

We tested the hypothesis that mother–child warmth and responsiveness would moderate the link between young children's theory of mind skills and self‐worth. Participants included 125 same‐sex pairs of 3.5 year‐old twins and their mothers. A battery of tests was individually administered to measure the children's theory of mind skills and verbal intelligence, and their self‐reported self‐worth was assessed using a puppet interview. Following visits to the families' homes, the observers completed ratings of warm responsive mother–child behavior based on videotaped unstructured and structured observations. As expected, warm responsive behavior moderated the relation between their theory of mind and the child's self‐worth. Their theory of mind was positively associated with self‐worth in warm responsive mother–child dyads, and there was weaker evidence that their theory of mind may be negatively associated with self‐worth in less warm, unresponsive mother–child dyads.     

The Role of Child Emotionality in Child Behavior and Maternal Instruction on Planning Tasks

This study explored the relation of children's emotional functioning to children's behavior during individual planning and mother's and children's behaviors during joint planning. Participants were 118 mothers and their second‐grade children. Mothers rated children on their emotional intensity and children rated themselves on their use of emotion regulation strategies. Children and mother–child dyads were videotaped during planning tasks and independent observers rated their behavior. Child emotional intensity was directly related to children being less engaged in the task and to an emphasis in maternal instruction on regulatory behaviors. Some types of emotion regulation strategies modified these relations. Findings suggest that child emotionality may play an important role in the early school years in children's opportunities to learn during social‐cognitive activity.     

Mother–Child Interaction as a Cradle of Theory of Mind: The Role of Maternal Emotional Availability

The present longitudinal study investigated the relative importance of emotional availability (EA) in 56 mother–child dyads when the child was 7 months and four‐year old as predictors of child's Theory of Mind at 4 years while controlling for early maternal mind‐mindedness (MM). Dyadic EA at 7 months predicted the child's Theory of Mind, even when controlling for child temperamental and cognitive characteristics as well as dyadic EA at 4 years and early maternal MM. Results indicate the specific importance of high emotional connectedness between mothers and infants for preschoolers' Theory of Mind development.     

The Developmental Progression of Understanding of Mind during a Hiding Game

In this longitudinal study, 52 typically developing preschoolers engaged in a hiding game with their mothers when children were 42‐, 54‐, and 66‐months old. Children's understanding of mind, positive affect, and engagement with the task were rated, and mothers' utterances were coded for role and content. Analyses confirmed that some facets of children's understanding of mind developed sequentially; specifically, they expressed an understanding of knowledge access before an understanding of deception and false beliefs, and expressed an understanding of deception before an understanding of false beliefs. Children's understanding of mind increased across visits and positively correlated with false belief task performance. Results suggest that mothers may tailor the content of their utterances to the child's growing expertise, but the role of mothers' utterances did not change. Observing preschoolers engaged in a playful hiding game revealed that children's understanding of mind not only increased with age but also developed sequentially.     

Stability in Center Day Care: Relations with Children's Well‐being and Problem Behavior in Day Care1

Mothers and primary professional caregivers of 186 children, aged 6–30 months, participated in this study in which a new measure for daily stability in center day care was developed, describing staffing, grouping, and program features. Relative contributions of infants’ daily experiences of care stability, quality of care, and mother's daily stress to the child's adjustment to day care were analyzed with hierarchical regressions. The child's adjustment was assessed with the Child Behavior Checklist ( Achenbach, 1997 ) and with the Leiden Inventory for the Child's Well‐being in Day Care. Children enrolled in fewer care arrangements showed less internalizing behavior and more well‐being in the day care setting. Children had higher well‐being scores when trusted caregivers were more available. Mother's family management stress was related to more internalizing problem behavior. Interactions between mother's daily stress and stability in care were found to affect the child's adjustment to day care.     

Preschoolers' Mind‐related Comments During Collaborative Problem‐solving: Parental Contributions and Developmental Outcomes

Preschool children's mind‐related comments were analyzed during collaborative problem‐solving interactions with mothers and fathers, and in relation to parental mind‐mindedness (MM) and children's concurrent theory of mind (ToM). Seventy‐two parents (36 fathers, 36 mothers) and their four‐year‐olds participated. Parents' comments to encourage independent thinking and children's own mind‐related comments were expected to mediate, in serial, the relationship between parental MM and children's ToM. The proposed model of mediation received empirical confirmation. In addition, mothers and fathers were found to perform similarly on two measures of MM and in their usage of autonomy promoting and control comments. Finally, no differences were found in the frequency of children's mind‐related comments during interactions with fathers and mothers.     

Mother–infant Interaction Quality and Infants' Ability to Encode Actions as Goal‐directed

The current study investigated the relationship between mother–child interaction quality and infants' ability to interpret actions as goal‐directed at 7 months in a sample of 37 dyads. Interaction quality was assessed in a free play interaction using two distinct methods: one assessed the overall affective quality (emotional availability), and one focused on the mother's proclivity to treat her infant as an intentional agent (mind‐mindedness). Furthermore, infants' ability to interpret human actions as goal‐directed was assessed. Analyses revealed that only maternal emotional availability, and not maternal mind‐mindedness, was related to infants' goal‐encoding ability. This link remained stable even when controlling for child temperament, working memory, and maternal education. These findings provide first evidence that emotionally available caregiving promotes social‐cognitive development in preverbal infants.     

Family Talk about Internal States and Children's Relative Appraisals of Self and Sibling

This study investigated associations between preschoolers' conversations about internal states and their spontaneous appraisals of self and sibling. Thirty‐two preschoolers (M age = 3.9 years) were observed during naturalistic home interactions with mothers and younger siblings. Various features of mothers' and children's internal state language were coded. Children who talked about internal states to the baby and who talked more about the baby's perspective tended to appraise their sibling negatively relative to self. In contrast, mothers' references to internal states, as well as their promotion and encouragement of the child's own internal state talk, were negatively related to the differences between children's negative appraisals of self and sibling. These results support the social‐constructivist notion that the quality of children's interactions with family members is related to how they construe themselves in comparison to their siblings.     

Early socialization of hostile attribution bias: The roles of parental attributions,parental discipline,and child attributes

The goal of this study was to examine child and parent predictors of children's hostile attribution bias (HAB) with a particular focus on exploring the associations between parents’ early attribution of child misbehavior and children's HAB in the transition to school age. Participants were 241 children (118 girls) of middle‐income families who were at risk for school‐age conduct problems. Multi‐method, multi‐informant data were collected on maternal attributions of child misbehavior, parental use of corporal punishment, and child attributes (i.e., verbal IQ, effortful control, theory of mind, and emotional understanding) at 3 years, and child HAB in ambiguous situations at 6 years. Results indicated that mothers’ internal explanations for children's misconduct may either reduce or increase children's later HAB depending on the specific content of attributions, such that mothers’ belief that children misbehave because of their internal state (i.e., emotional state or temperament) was associated with lower levels of child HAB, whereas attributing power‐based motives (i.e., manipulative, controlling intentions) in children was associated with higher levels of HAB. The findings are discussed with respect to appreciating the complexity of parents’ explanations for children's behavior, and considering parental cognition as a potential target for early identification and prevention of child HAB and related problems.     

Is there a Gender Difference in False Belief Development?

The contribution of children's social environment to their acquisition of theory of mind skills, combined with the well documented advantage for girls in mental state talk with siblings, peers and mothers, might lead to a female advantage on false belief tasks. We present a post‐hoc analysis of large datasets from two independent laboratories. A slight advantage for girls on false belief task performance was found in both datasets and was only apparent in younger but not older children. Language ability could be controlled for only in a smaller subsample of one dataset and cannot be ruled out as a potential mediator of this effect. However, if there is an age‐specific advantage for girls in false belief acquisition it is a weak effect only.     

Does parenting correspond with children's defending behavior? Examining linkages in the context of peer social preference

Bullying intervention research points to the important role of children standing up for victims (defending behavior). This study provides an initial look at how certain parenting practices may be generally related to the socialization of defending behavior among children. Defenders typically enjoy significant social status, allowing them the social capital to intervene. With this in mind, we also assess how parenting and children's social preference scores might uniquely or interactively predict defending behavior. This cross‐sectional study employs a sample of 219 (101 boys) fourth‐grade children living in the Western United States. Both mothers and fathers self‐reported their authoritative, authoritarian, and psychologically controlling parenting practices. A peer sociometric assessment provided each child's social preference score. Peer nominations provided each child's reputation for defending behaviors. Multiple regression results showed that a few of the parenting dimensions significantly predicted girls’ defending behavior above and beyond peer social preference. In contrast, the defending behavior scores of boys were unrelated to parenting. Finally, we used interaction analyses to probe whether the association between defending and parenting meaningfully varies according to children's levels of social preference. We did not find evidence to support this. We discuss the ramifications of these findings for future research.     

Differential parenting and children's social understanding

In the current study, a curvilinear association was examined between differential parenting and children's social understanding as measured using standardized assessments and behavioral observations. Social understanding was comprised of theory‐of‐mind and behavior indicating understanding of others’ minds (i.e., cognitive sensitivity and internal state talk and reasoning during sibling interactions). Data came from a community sample of 372 children (51.6% males; M age = 5.57, SD = 0.77), their younger siblings (M age = 3.14, SD = 0.27), and their mothers who were observed in their homes. We hypothesized that in families with higher levels of differential parenting, both favored and disfavored older siblings would display poorer social understanding, but that disfavored children would be more negatively impacted. Results from a hierarchical regression analysis indicated an inverse linear effect, rather than a curvilinear relationship, between being favored by mother and siblings’ social understanding. Specifically, disfavored older children showed higher levels of social understanding when interacting with their favored younger sibling. This relationship remained significant after controlling for variables such as age, SES, and language. Findings suggest that differential parenting plays a role in children's ability to understand others.     

Temperament and Social Problem Solving Competence in Preschool: Influences on Academic Skills in Early Elementary School

The goals of the current study were to examine whether children's social problem solving (SPS) skills are a mechanism through which temperament influences later academic achievement and whether sex moderates these associations. The participants included 1117 children enrolled in the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care. During preschool, mothers and childcare providers rated children's temperamental shyness and inhibitory control, and SPS was assessed using a hypothetical–reflective measure during a laboratory visit. During kindergarten and first grade, teacher‐report of math and language skills was collected. The results indicated that high ratings of inhibitory control in preschool, but not shyness, predicted better kindergarten and first‐grade academic skills. Furthermore, children's SPS competence mediated the relations between both shyness and inhibitory control on later academic skills. The child's sex did not moderate these associations. The results suggest that preventative efforts targeting early SPS skills may buffer against later academic adjustment problems among temperamentally extreme children.     

Linking Maternal Warmth and Responsiveness to Children's Self‐regulation

The present study demonstrated that a more differentiated view of positive parenting practices is necessary in the study of children's acquisition of self‐regulation. Here, the unique contributions of maternal warmth and responsiveness to distress to children's self‐regulation were tested in a sample of 102 German mothers and their kindergarten children (51 girls and 51 boys). Behavior regulation and internalization of rules of conduct were examined as specific components of children's self‐regulation. As expected, maternal warmth was positively related to the child's behavior regulation. Responsiveness to distress was positively linked to the child's internalization of rules of conduct. No significant interactions between maternal parenting and either the child's gender or effortful control were found. The results are discussed with regard to the unique functions that different parenting practices have for children's self‐regulation.     

Divorced mothers' self‐perception of their divorce‐related communication with their children

This is a qualitative study of divorce‐related communication between mothers and children, as recounted by 20 Jewish Israeli mothers. We adopt the communication privacy management theory, focusing on mothers' subjective experiences of communication, their management of dialectic tension between concealment and disclosure – namely, not only what mothers choose to disclose to and hide from their children, but also the feelings, concerns and perceptions that drove their communication. The mothers' reports convey the challenges and dilemmas they faced when communicating with their children about their divorce and its repercussions; the main one being their obligation to maintain a good father image and their wish to preserve a strong maternal figure. The ‘child's well‐being’ was the dominant criterion in the mothers' decision to reveal or conceal divorce‐related information. Clinical suggestions are made.     

Mother–Child Conversations of Emotionally Salient Events: Exploring the Functions of Emotional Reminiscing in European-American and Chinese Families

This study explores the functional variations in mother–child conversations of emotionally salient events in European‐American and Chinese families. Thirty Chinese and 31 European‐American 3‐year‐old children and their mothers participated. Mothers were asked to discuss with their children at home two specific one‐point‐in‐time events in which they both participated. One event was extremely positive to the child, one extremely stressful. American mothers initiated more interactive and elaborative conversations that focused on the child's roles and predilections in the story, and they employed a ‘cognitive approach’ to emotional regulation by providing explanations for the cause of children's feeling states. Chinese mothers took a directive role in posing and repeating memory questions and focusing on social interaction, and they used a ‘behavioral approach’ to emotional regulation by emphasizing discipline and proper conduct to their children. Findings are discussed in light of cultural influences on the functions of emotional reminiscing for self and relationship construction and emotional regulation.     

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.