The Developmental Origins of Gaze‐Following in Human Infants

During the first year of life, infants develop the capacity to follow the gaze of others. This behavior allows sharing attention and facilitates language acquisition and cognitive development. This article reviews studies that investigated gaze‐following before 12 months of age in typically developing infants and discusses current theoretical perspectives on early GF. Recent research has revealed that early GF is highly dependent on situational constraints and individual characteristics, but theories that describe the underlying mechanisms have partly failed to consider this complexity. We propose a novel framework termed the perceptual narrowing account of GF that may have the potential to integrate existing theoretical accounts.     

Diversity of romantic experiences in late adolescence and their contribution to identity formation

Romance constitutes a central experience in adolescence, which can take several forms including (a) serious romance with a steady partner, (b) casual and short‐lived dating, and (c) pending experiences of romantic thoughts and attempts. Using a three‐way longitudinal design, the present study examined the gender differences and developmental changes of these romantic experiences, and their cross‐lagged associations with identity processes, throughout one year in late adolescence. 389 students (63% girls) filled out questionnaires about their romantic experiences and identity processes. Girls reported more serious romance than did boys, who reported more casual dating and pending experiences. Serious romance increased over the year for both genders whereas casual dating and pending experiences continued to rise only for boys. The cross‐lagged model highlighted that serious romantic experience positively predicted identity commitments and exploration in depth whereas identity exploration in breadth positively predicted casual dating. This pattern was stable over the three time points and across gender and age groups. Overall, this study invites consideration of more diverse romantic experiences than those associated with tangible involvement. We discuss the contribution of romantic experiences to the identity dynamic.     

Links between attachment and theory of mind in childhood: Meta‐analytic review

Theoretical models suggest a relation between children's attachment and their theory of mind (ToM), but existing empirical studies are inconclusive with respect to the existence and magnitude of this association. We present the first meta‐analytic review of available studies on the attachment‐ToM association during childhood. Fifteen research on attachment‐ToM links among typically developed children aged 2 to 6 were reviewed and 12 studies that report correlations between attachment and ToM (N = 629) were included in a quantitative meta‐analysis. Meta‐analytic results showed that the higher attachment security, the better ToM skills; the combined effect size for this association was moderate, r = .30. These findings are discussed in‐depth and future research directions are proposed.     

Management Consulting: Towards an Integrative Framework of Knowledge,Identity, and Power

This paper reviews the past 28 years of scholarship on management consulting to synthesize the field and establish more broadly its contribution to management research. Through a systematic review of 219 articles, we identify three core conceptual themes – knowledge, identity, and power – that have dominated the literature to date. Through a thematic inductive analysis of a subsection of articles, we then investigate how these themes have been defined, used, and linked. This allows us to uncover and problematize the relationships between these themes. In making explicit underlying theoretical assumptions and relationships between knowledge, identity, and power, we induce a unique framework that can guide and support future studies, instigate metaparadigmatic dialogue, and thus help consolidate the field.     

State attachment variability across distressing situations in middle childhood

Contemporary research suggests that attachment has both a trait‐like, stable component, and a state‐like component that varies across contexts. In the current study, we assessed state attachment variability across comparably distressing situations in middle childhood. In two samples, children reported their expectations of maternal support in each situation. Additionally, we administered trait attachment and psychological well‐being measures. Results indicated that, overall, children varied in their expectations across situations: more than half of the variance was explained by intra‐individual differences across situations. Results revealed two components underlying variability: a Signal‐and‐Support component reflecting expectations of support‐seeking and receiving, and a Back‐on‐Track component reflecting expectations of stress reduction and comfort. State attachment variability was related to individual differences in trait attachment: children who are more securely attached at the trait level, overall appear to vary less in their state attachment, likely due to their high mean state attachment scores across situations. When the mean state attachment scores are accounted for, more securely attached children seem to vary more, suggesting that their state attachment expectations are more sensitive to contextual fluctuations. Importantly, degree of state attachment variability explained psychological well‐being over and above trait attachment.     

Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms with sequential proposals

We explore a general framework in Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) sampling where sequential proposals are tried as a candidate for the next state of the Markov chain. This sequential-proposal framework can be applied to various existing MCMC methods, including Metropolis–Hastings algorithms using random proposals and methods that use deterministic proposals such as Hamiltonian Monte Carlo (HMC) or the bouncy particle sampler. Sequential-proposal MCMC methods construct the same Markov chains as those constructed by the delayed rejection method under certain circumstances. In the context of HMC, the sequential-proposal approach has been proposed as extra chance generalized hybrid Monte Carlo (XCGHMC). We develop two novel methods in which the trajectories leading to proposals in HMC are automatically tuned to avoid doubling back, as in the No-U-Turn sampler (NUTS). The numerical efficiency of these new methods compare favorably to the NUTS. We additionally show that the sequential-proposal bouncy particle sampler enables the constructed Markov chain to pass through regions of low target density and thus facilitates better mixing of the chain when the target density is multimodal.

     

Predictors of parenting stress in portuguese adolescents' adoptive parents

Parenting stress is related to the characteristics of both the child and the parents, as well as to parent–child interactions. In adoptive families, parenting stress has been identified as an indicator of the family's adjustment to adoption. The stress experienced by parents of adopted adolescents deserves special consideration, as adolescence is a critical period in the adoptees' developmental pathway. The present study aims to identify the adoptee, parents and family related predictors of the adoptive parents' parenting stress, exploring direct and indirect effects. Fifty Portuguese adolescents' adoptive parents participated in this study. Parenting stress was measured by the Stress Index for Parents of Adolescents, and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire was used to evaluate the adoptees' (mal)adjustment, according to the parents' perspective. Variables related to the parents' experience of adoption were assessed resorting to the Parent's Interview about the Adoption Process. Results showed that parents' satisfaction and adoptees' adjustment were sequential mediators of the relationship between the parents' experience of family life and parenting stress. These findings provide new insights into adoption research in parenting stress, highlighting the importance of adoption‐related variables such as the parents' adoption experience within the family and family relationships.     

Social movement in stages: a reply to Shultziner and Goldberg

This paper is a reply to Doron Shultziner and Sarah Goldberg's article The Stages of Mass Mobilization: Separate Phenomena and Distinct Causal Mechanisms. The article recognizes the theoretical contribution of the study, in particular the re‐introduction of the largely neglected stage approach in social movement studies. It then raises two major concerns related to how the authors narrow their approach to single episodes of mass mobilization and how definitively they distinguish movement stages.