Mother–Child Reminiscing About Peer Experiences and Children's Peer‐related Self‐views and Social Competence

This study examined mother–child reminiscing about children's experiences with peers and its relation to children's peer‐related self‐views and social competence. Sixty‐three mothers and their preschool‐aged children discussed at home two specific past events involving the child and his or her peers, one event being positive and one negative. The children's self‐views in peer relationships were assessed at school during individual interviews, and their social competence was rated by mothers. Both maternal and child participation in the reminiscing, in terms of reminiscing style and content, were uniquely associated with children's peer‐related self‐views and social competence. The results suggest the important role of family narrative practices in children's social development.     

Children's awareness of which peers like them and which peers dislike them

The present research examined children's awareness of the specific same-sex peers who like or dislike them. Awareness was evaluated in relation to children's peer sociometric status. All children in grades one through six provided same-sex peer sociometric nominations and same-sex peer sociometric ratings to determine their sociometric status. In addition, each child indicated the nominations and ratings they believed they received from same-sex peers. Children's sociometric status was associated with their awareness of liking and disliking from peers. Rejected status children were the least accurate in their judgments of who like them and popular status children were the least accurate in their judgments of who disliked them. These findings support and extend prior research documenting that rejected status children a) demonstrate a lack of awareness of their social competence, yet b) report more loneliness than children in other status groups.     

Pathways between Parent–Child Interactions and Peer Acceptance: The Role of Children's Social Information Processing

This study examined the links among parents' interaction styles, their children's social information processing, and peer acceptance. Fourth‐grade children (N = 159) and their parents were observed during family discussions. One year later peer acceptance and children's information processing choices (goals, strategies, and attributions) in response to social dilemmas involving their parents and peers were assessed. Fathers' interaction styles with their children predicted both girls' and boys' information processing in regard to their fathers and peers, which, in turn, were related to peer acceptance. Mothers' interactive styles with their children predicted children's social information processing in regard to parents and peers and peer acceptance in similar ways, but only for girls. This study provided evidence that parent–child interaction is linked to children's information processing concerning their relationships with parents and peers and in turn with children being liked by peers. The implications of a social information processing approach for understanding family–peer links are emphasized.     

The Influence of Gender and Ethnicity on Children's Inferences About Toy Choice

By 4–5 years of age children can make gender‐congruent inferences about toys. Not only do they respond differentially to gender labels attached to toys, even without such labels they make inferences about toy choice that reflect an awareness of and identification with their gender in‐group. However it is unclear how far inferences about toy choice extend to other aspects of a child's social identity. The present study explored the influence of both gender and ethnicity on children's judgements on toy choice for themselves and others. Eighty‐four children in three age groups (5, 6–7, 8–9 yrs) were shown photographs of unfamiliar toys and unfamiliar children from three ethnic groups (white, black, Asian) and were asked to rate how much they and these children would like each toy. Boys consistently predicted that Asian children would like the toys less than other ethnic groups. Ethnicity influenced inferences from 6–7 years old where children predicted that white, black and Asian peers would like the toys differently from each other. Children at 8–9 years old predicted that Asian peers would like the toys less than both white and black peers. Analysis of differences between children's own liking and predictions for same‐ and opposite‐sex others revealed that they were gendercentric. That is, children predicted that a same‐sex child would like a toy more similarly to themselves compared to an opposite‐sex child. Analysis between white and Asian children's own liking and predictions for same‐ and other‐ethnic others found that only 6–7‐year‐olds made ethnocentric inferences. That is, same‐ethnic peers’ liking was rated more similar to children's own compared to that of other‐ethnic peers. Findings are discussed in light of cognitive developmental theories and previous work on the development of perspective‐taking skills.     

The school experience of children in residential care: A multiple case study

Children in residential care are the out‐of‐home population group with the lowest rate of access to postsecondary education. Research aimed at understanding their situation within the school context suggests that besides learning progress and outcomes, subjective experiences should be taken into account. Qualitative research based on a multiple‐case study was designed and carried out in Spain with the aim of deepening the understanding of the individual school experiences of three children in residential care. Each case was analysed from the perspective of the child, the educators and the teachers. Semistructured, one‐to‐one interviews were carried out, and children's files were consulted. The results pointed to emotional distress and accumulated educational delay as common traits of the three children in the study. In shaping each particular school experience, the key themes identified included (1) individual characteristics, (2) the children's academic aspirations and strategies, (3) relationships with peers and teachers, (4) response experienced in school, (5) the complex structure of the residential centre, (6) the sense of belonging to the residential centre, (7) team work and (8) political action and investment in inclusive education.     

Peer and Friend Influences on Children's Eating

Peers and friends are perceived as important role models for the formation of children's attitudes and behaviours. A wealth of research has aimed to establish the contribution of peers and friends to children's developing eating behaviours, and their attitudes towards eating. This review describes and evaluates such research. Experimental research examining peer modelling of food consumption and liking is reviewed, and several individual child factors that are suggested to make children more or less receptive to peer and friend influences are discussed. The influence of children's perceptions of their peers’ and friends’ eating behaviours upon their own eating practices is also explored. The benefits of future longitudinal research to improve understanding of peer and friend influences on children's eating are emphasized.     

Family relations, adjustment and well-being in a longitudinal study of children in care

The article reports on a longitudinal study of children placed in a children's home during the first two years of the 1980s. The 26 children placed when younger than 4 years of age and staying more than 4 weeks were followed up 3 and 9 months after leaving the children's home and 5, 10, 15 and 20 years later. The children's family relations, including early attachments and later parental relationships and the perception of who is their family, have been one of the predominant themes in the recurrent studies. None of them had lived with both parents after leaving the children's home and 20 of them had been in foster care for periods or permanently. At the time of the last study the children were young adults, aged 20–25. They are categorized in three rather distinct categories, one for those with a ‘good’ and one for those with a ‘moderate’ social adjustment and well‐being and one for those with a ‘bad’ social adjustment and well‐being insofar as involvement with drugs, criminal behaviour and legal sanctions are concerned. Their contacts and relationships with birth parents and foster parents and the perception of who is their family are analysed by use of attachment theory and developmental psychopathology.     

Parental Depressive Symptoms, Children's Representations of Family Relationships, and Child Adjustment

This study extends the investigation of family process models of parental dysphoria and child adjustment, by examining depressive symptoms in both fathers and mothers, and by examining children's representations of family relationships as possible explanatory mechanisms. Participants were 232 children (Time 1 mean age: 5.99; 105 boys, 127 girls) and their cohabiting parents, who participated for three consecutive years. Children's internal representations of multiple family relationships were assessed by means of a story stem completion task. Structural equation modeling indicated that children's inter‐parental and attachment representations are part of the process whereby parental depressive symptoms influence child externalizing symptoms. Maternal depressive symptoms also predicted changes in children's representations of marital and attachment relationships over time. The implications for family process models of relations between parental depressive symptoms in community samples and child development are discussed.     

Family Relations and the Adjustment of Young Children of Mexican Descent: Do Family Cultural Values Moderate These Associations?

This study examined the role of family cultural values as moderators of the association between family relations and the adjustment of young children. Fifty‐five families of Mexican descent with young children enrolled in Head Start programs in the Southwest participated. Mothers provided information about closeness of the mother–child relationship, warmth in the sibling relationship, child behavior problems, and familism and simpatía, or two cultural values associated with families of Mexican origin. The children's preschool teachers provided information about child emotional adjustment and social functioning with peers six months later. Familism was found to act as a moderator, whereby warmth and closeness in family relationships coupled with the endorsement of a family cultural value that complements these relationship characteristics was associated with more optimal functioning in preschool classrooms. Results demonstrate the need to evaluate family cultural values or beliefs systems in conjunction with qualities of family relationships as determinants of children's developmental outcomes. Specifically, familism emerged as a family characteristic capable of promoting young children's adjustment within and beyond the family context.     

Child well-being in the context of family harmony: Parental marital relationship as mediator and parent–child attachment style as moderator

Extant research in Western countries have indicated that children's well-being may be influenced by children's own resilience, parent–child attachment, and parental marital relationship. Yet, there is very little research in Malaysia on how these factors may influence well-being among children in middle childhood. The aim of this study, therefore, was to explore the relationships among children's self-efficacy—a resilience factor—and well-being, parental marital relationship, and parent–child attachment style. The study used a quantitative, cross-sectional survey method. Participants were 955 Malay-Malaysian children aged 11 years from intact families. They responded to a questionnaire on demographic background, self-efficacy, well-being, parental harmony and conflict, and parent–child attachment style. Moderated mediation analysis indicated that (i) parental harmony was a significant mediator for the relationship between children's self-efficacy and well-being; (ii) parental conflict was not a significant mediator for the relationship between children's self-efficacy and well-being; and (iii) parent–child attachment style was a significant moderator for the relationship between children's self-efficacy and well-being. These findings are discussed within the frameworks of optimal child development and family relationship. These findings may also inform policies such as Malaysia's Sustainable Development Goal 3 (SDG 3) and National Family Policy.     

Putting the child at the centre of inter‐professional cooperation in out‐of‐home care

A large part of most children's childhood is about taking part in educational and leisure‐time activities together with other children across various contexts. However, children in out‐of‐home care do not always have easy access to these possibilities for participation. In general, parents coordinate their children's everyday lives, but in the case of children in out‐of‐home care, the responsibility of care is distributed between several professionals and institutions. Research often recommends that inter‐professional cooperation should put the child at the centre and be more child focused. But what does that mean? The paper investigates theoretical understandings of ‘child centredness’ in inter‐professional cooperation. It also includes an empirical example taken from a research project that followed four children in their everyday lives in two residential homes in Denmark. The research explored how professionals work together across contexts in order to support children to take part in school and leisure‐time activities. The overall reasoning leads to the point that for children in out‐of‐home care, the possibility of exercising personal agency in their everyday life constitutes a difficult but vital issue. How children in out‐of‐home care learn how to conduct their everyday lives, is closely related to the ways professionals cooperate across contexts. It points to the need for close inter‐professional cooperation in order to encourage and support children's initiatives and engagements in activities in communities with other children.     

Attachment‐facilitating interactions in non‐kin foster families

This study aims to analyse the interaction between children in foster care and their main caregivers during a microcoded co‐construction task, focusing on the verbal and non‐verbal behaviours that the adults use to promote a secure attachment in the child. It also examines how children and caregivers' socio‐demographic variables relate to the interaction. The sample is made up of 28 Spanish children between 4 and 9 years old in long‐term non‐kin foster care and their foster families. The building task was administered to 28 dyads, composed of the child and the main caregiver in each family. Our results showed that the caregivers' use of attachment‐facilitating behaviours was frequent during the interaction. Moreover, children tended to display a positive attitude when adults used these attachment‐facilitating behaviours. We also found some differences in the interaction according to the caregivers and children's age, the child's gender and the caregivers' satisfaction with the child's development. These results offer us a better understanding of the functioning of the adult–child relationships in foster families, which helps us make more efficient interventions to improve the caregivers' sensitivity towards the children's needs and difficulties.     

Associations between sleep consolidation in infancy and peer relationships in middle childhood

Sleep plays an important role in many aspects of children's development. Research on children's sleep and their peer relationships has begun to emerge in the last years. However, these studies are mostly cross‐sectional. The current study aimed to investigate the associations between infant sleep and peer relationships in middle childhood. The sample comprised 72 children. Sleep was measured at 1 year using a sleep diary completed by mothers. In the second and third grades of elementary school (7 and 8 years of age), mothers and fathers reported on their children's functioning with peers. When they were in third grade, children were interviewed regarding their friendship quality with a best friend. Results revealed negative associations between children's sleep consolidation (i.e., ratio of nighttime sleep) and parent‐reported peer problems, and positive associations between sleep consolidation and perceived friendship quality. These findings suggest that well‐regulated sleep in infancy may help children develop the skills necessary for later appropriate social functioning in peer contexts.     

Peer Contacts of 15-Month-olds in Childcare: Links With Child Temperament, Parent–Child Interaction and Quality of Childcare

Seventy 15‐month‐old children were observed during 90 minutes of free play with their peers in childcare centers. The study aimed to describe individual differences in the children's contacts with peers and to explain the individual differences in relation to: (1) child temperament, (2) the quality of parental behavior toward the child and (3) the quality of the professional childcare environment. Three distinct peer contact factors emerged from our analyses; one reflects children's involvement in peer contacts initiated by peers and two reflect the positive and negative contacts initiated by the target children themselves. Children in groups with more children per caregiver were found to be involved in more contacts initiated by peers. Children with a relatively difficult temperament were less involved in contacts initiated by peers although only in cases of lower quality childcare, as assessed using the infant/toddler environment rating scale. Boys initiated significantly more negative contacts with peers than girls. In addition, more peer‐directed negative initiatives were observed in lower quality childcare.     

Linkages between parent—child interaction and conversations of friends

In this study we examined how mothers' and fathers' parenting behavior during parent—child interaction related to children's ability to successfully interact with peers. Children's ability to engage in coordinated interaction, and their negativity and positivity towards peers were examined. Observational data were collected on 56 families in both parent—child and peer interaction settings. Results suggested that father's emotional volatility was related to children's tendency to play at a low level of engagement with their best friends (e.g. engage in parallel play or monologue). Both mother's and father's affective communication were related to children's tendency to play at a higher level of engagement, such as through establishing common ground activities, exchanging information, and self-disclosing personal information or feelings. Parental intrusiveness, low engagement and use of derisive humor was also related to children's negativity during peer interaction. Results support the hypothesis that both fathers and mothers provide a context for children's development of the ability to engage in and maintain interpersonal interaction, and mothers' parenting may influence the amount of positive affect children express during dyadic play.     

Dialogic literary gatherings and out‐of‐home child care: Creation of new meanings through classic literature

Research on out‐of‐home child care has revealed that foster care programmes focused on educational attainment and reading have the potential to improve the academic outcomes of children in care. However, no studies have examined which elements of these programmes positively benefit children's emotional well‐being. This article presents evidence of the positive effects of implementing a successful educational action, dialogic literary gatherings, in a children's residential care institution. A qualitative study using a communicative‐oriented methodology was conducted and involved five participant observations and eight daily life stories with children in out‐of‐home care in Catalonia (Spain). The children's reflections demonstrated that reading classic books, such as Dickens' Oliver Twist, deeply influenced their feelings and self‐conceptions and created new and exciting meaning in their lives.     

‘You've got to trust her and she's got to trust you’: children's views on participation in the child protection system

Participation by children in child protection remains a complex area of practice. This paper presents findings from a qualitative study exploring the views of 26 children, aged 6–17 years, about their participation in the child protection system in England. All of the children were subject to a child protection plan and were living at home at the time of interview. The children's understanding of the child protection process was categorized, and the majority of children, including the youngest, were found be at least partially aware of the child protection process, often struggling to make sense of the professional intervention in their families on the basis of partial information. It is argued that decisions about children's involvement should take into account not only children's age and understanding, but be seen in the context of wider family dynamics. Participation in formal processes such as child protection conferences was experienced as difficult and emotive. The child's relationship with their social worker was central to meaningful participation.     

Children's accounts of moving to a foster home

Little is known about how children themselves understand their moves to and between foster homes. The data presented in this paper come from a study that sought children's views on becoming and being a foster child. A key finding of that study was how children's accounts of being fostered illustrated a high level of anxiety and concern about their moving to live with a foster family. This paper firstly explores the key issues about looked‐after children's moves. It then describes the research study undertaken, before exploring the data generated from children's accounts of their moves to a new foster home. Lastly, there is a discussion of the implications for social work practice in this area.     

Positive Peer Relationships and Risk of Victimization in Chinese and South Korean Children's Peer Groups

This study examined the moderating role of positive peer relationships in the relation between behavioral or academic risk factors and victimization in Asian children's peer groups. We recruited 296 children (161 boys, 135 girls) from Tianjin, China (mean age of 11.5 years) and 122 children (66 boys, 56 girls) from Seoul, South Korea (approximate mean age of 11 years). The children's behavioral, academic and social functioning were assessed with a multi‐informant approach. Their behavioral and academic vulnerabilities were associated with their victimization by peers. However, these effects were mitigated for children who were able to establish positive relationships with their peers. Taken together, our findings highlight the potential buffering role of peer relationships in the cultural contexts examined.     

Crafting Child‐friendly Cities: Evidence from Biratnagar Sub‐metropolitan City,Eastern Nepal

Our cities are increasingly becoming the sites where children socialize, observe, and learn how society functions and many local and global activities have impacted children's health and well‐being. The Child‐friendly Cities initiative, launched by the United Nations Children's Fund and the United Nations Human Settlements Programme in 1996, draws in diverse stakeholders to place children at the center of the urban agenda. Based on social work research, this article analyzes the acclaimed status of Biratnagar Sub‐metropolitan city, Eastern Nepal, as a child‐friendly city. Despite its efforts, the city of Biratnagar is yet to meet the required criteria to claim itself as a child‐friendly city. Further improvements by the city administration in achieving children's participation in decision‐making, child‐friendly legal environment, and code of conduct are essential. Based on the evidence, the authors advocate for bottom‐up approaches that include children's voices and their real participation in city governance and a strong political will to craft child‐friendly cities, not as a policy rhetoric but for real. Enabling children to fulfill their potential as equal participants in crafting child‐friendly cities will require adults to relinquish some of their hegemonic powers of decision‐making on behalf of children.