This research examined children's interdependent self-construals as manifest in their seeing their relationships with their parents as self-defining. Four times over early adolescence, 825 children (mean age = 12.73 years) in the United States and China reported on their inclusion of their relationships with their parents in their self-construals…

The early noncry vocalizations of infants are salient social signals. Caregivers spontaneously respond to 30%-50% of these sounds, and their responsiveness to infants' prelinguistic noncry vocalizations facilitates the development of phonology and speech. Have infants learned that their vocalizations influence the behavior of social partners? If…

Despite much research into individual differences in social understanding among preschoolers, little is known about corresponding individual differences within younger children. Likewise, although studies of preschoolers highlight the importance of mental-state references, other aspects of talk have received less attention. The current study…

Mechanisms accounting for the effects of mutually responsive orientation (MRO) at 7, 15, and 25 months in 102 mother-child and father-child dyads on child internalization and self-regulation at 52 months were examined. Two mediators at 38 months were tested: parental power assertion and child self-representation. For mother-child relationships,…

This study examined early observed parenting and child-care experiences in relation to functioning of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis over the long term. Consistent with the attenuation hypothesis, individuals (n = 863) who experienced: (a) higher levels of maternal insensitivity and (b) more time in child-care centers in the first…

Adolescents' beliefs about the legitimacy of parental authority and obligation to obey were examined in 568 Chilean adolescents (11-14 years old at Wave 1), followed once a year for 4 years. Adolescents' beliefs about parental legitimacy and obligation to obey declined with age. The steepest decline occurred during early adolescence, particularly…

A meta-analysis examined the relations between children's adjustment and children's cognitive, affective, behavioral, and physiological responses to interparental conflict. Studies included children between 5 and 19 years of age. Moderate effect sizes were found for the associations between cognitions and internalizing and externalizing behavior…

Relations among maternal depression, child attachment, and children's representations of parents and self were examined. Participants included toddlers and their mothers with a history of major depressive disorder (n=63) or no history of mental disorder (n=68). Attachment was assessed at 20 and 36 months and representations of parents and self…

This study examined the additive and interactive effects of temperament and harsh and indulgent parenting on Chinese children's proactive and reactive aggression. Participants were 401 children (M [subscript age] = 9.29 years, 203 girls) and their parents who were recruited from 2 elementary schools in Shanghai, People's Republic of China. The…

Mother-child planning was examined in relation to child emotional functioning and first-grade school performance. Ninety dyads were randomly assigned to the explicit-goal condition (emphasized accuracy and preparation for a child-only posttest) or the no-explicit-goal condition (dyads just asked to work together). In the no-explicit-goal condition…

This study examined the relations among maternal socialization of positive affect (PA), adolescent emotion regulation (ER), and adolescent depressive symptoms. Two hundred early adolescents, 11-13 years old, provided self-reports of ER strategies and depressive symptomatology; their mothers provided self-reports of socialization responses to…

Associations between parenting quality and 3-year-olds' school readiness, receptive, and expressive language were examined in relation to the amount of time they spent in childcare, based on data from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development (N = 1,364). Associations for school readiness and receptive language were stronger among…

This study investigated dopamine receptor genes ("DRD2" and "DRD4") and maternal sensitivity as predictors of infant respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) and RSA reactivity, purported indices of vagal tone and vagal regulation, in a challenge task at 3, 6, and 12 months in 173 infant-mother dyads. Hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) revealed that at…

The current study examined whether adolescents' attachment representations were associated with differences in emotion regulation during the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI; C. George, N. Kaplan, & M. Main, 1996) and during a mother-adolescent conflict interaction task (Family Interaction Task [FIT]; J. P. Allen et al., 2003). Participants…

This multimethod study of 101 mothers, fathers, and children elucidates poorly understood role of children's attachment security as "moderating" a common maladaptive trajectory: from parental power assertion, to child resentful opposition, to child antisocial conduct. Children's security was assessed at 15 months, parents' power assertion observed…