The purpose of the current preliminary study was to examine the levels of perceived social support by adolescents in the US and Finland. American research has demonstrated that high perceived levels of social support can buffer adolescents against many negative psychosocial symptoms, such as depression, anxiety and low self-esteem and is a…

In this exploratory study we conceptualized and explored socio-cognitive, emotional and motivational regulatory processes displayed in scaffolding interaction between parents and their non-task and task-oriented children. Based on the dynamic systems view and findings from developmental research, we assumed that parents with non-task oriented and…

A survey of 7,476 students 15 to 16 years old was conducted in Finland to determine the prevalence of physical and sexual child abuse. The study found that 0.5% of the girls reported father/stepfather-daughter incest. The girls overwhelmingly indicated negative feelings about the experience. (CR)

Interviewed 57 11-year olds and 56 15-year olds about hopes for the future. Found that high level of family discussion increased interest in future family. Influences of parental control and family discussion changed as adolescents grew older. Adolescents with high self-esteem were more internal in their thinking about future than those with low…

All children tended to view the mother more frequently than the father as a source of understanding and comfort, and all the groups saw the father more often than the mother as dominating, and fear provoking. (Author)

Assessed development of depressive tendencies over a 9-year period in a random sample of 389 Finnish children. Also assessed maternal role satisfaction and child rearing attitudes. Results underline the close interplay of child temperament and mothering factors in the development of depressive tendencies in girls and boys. (Contains 97…

This study focused on the psychosocial aspects of cleft lip and/or palate on maternal emotional reactions and the family, with emphasis on the effect on the maternal-infant bond. Interviews were conducted with 40 mothers of 1-year-old infants with non-syndromic cleft lip and/or palate. The interviews were analyzed using the phenomenological…

The present study was designed to shed light on the relation between parenting stress, father's alcohol use, child characteristics and father's engagement and availability. The study cohort comprised 821 fathers of preschool children in Finland. Parenting stress and child's mood, acceptability and demandingness were related to father's engagement…

A number of studies have shown that parent-child interaction influences the manner in which adolescents see their future. In an investigation designed to determine whether this influence varies according to the child's age and sex, 57 Finnish adolescents were interviewed at ages 11 and 15 about their hopes for the future. The internality,…

This study examined the conceptions of Finnish child care personnel about girls' and boys' work, as well as fathers' and mothers' work education, based on a mail survey of 317 female preschool teachers chosen from the register of the Kindergarten Teacher Association. The subjects were asked to write an essay about the subject "a girl doing…

Part of an ongoing longitudinal research project, a study was made to develop a method and a multilevel model for evaluating at its earliest stages the relationship between a mother and her child. The main hypothesis of the study was that the early mother-child relationship, consisting of maternal responses and a mother's images of her role in…

Examines relationships among parents' age, education, literacy activities and shared reading with children, and children's language skills and early interest in books through a longitudinal study of 108 preschool children. Discusses the role of endogenous and exogenous variables in explaining children's language skills and early book reading…

The present article focused on two types of communicative intent (directing behaviour vs. eliciting talk) expressed by mothers and teenagers during everyday family interactions in Estonian, Finnish, and Swedish mono- and bicultural families. Three monocultural groups consisted of 17 Estonian, 19 Swedish, and 18 Finnish families living in their…

This booklet reports the findings of a study that focused on the well-being and lifestyle of 479 families of children (ages 2-17) with Down syndrome (DS) in Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland. A comparative study of families of typical children in the Nordic countries was also done. The results of the study indicate that bringing up a…

This paper examines whether the relationship between parental work and adolescents' well-being would be mediated through parenting behaviour. The primary focus was on the experiences of adolescents. Questionnaire-based data from families (both parents and one children, n=77) and adolescents (n=126) were collected in Finland in 2000 and 2001,…