The high school transition was examined in an ethnically diverse, urban sample of 1,979 adolescents, followed from 7th to 10th grade (M[subscript age] = 14.6, SD = 0.37 in 7th grade). Twice annually, data were gathered on adolescents' perceptions of school climate, psychological functioning, and academic behaviors. Piecewise growth modeling…

Describes a study involving administration of a home environment inventory to a sample of 77 mothers and infants in order to explore its ability to predict later mental test performance. Correlations between home inventory data and measures of infant development over a period of 30 months were higher than those typically reported. (ED)

A sample of 34 infants participated in 3 experiments designed to determine whether experience with response-contingent stimulation would enhance an infant's subsequent learning performance. (Author/JMB)

Reviews Greenough, Black, and Wallace's (1987) conceptual framework for understanding the effects of early experience and sensitive periods on development, and illustrates the applicability of their model with recent data on the consequences for animals and human infants of the acquistion of self-produced locomotion. (BN)

Compared the perceptual learning of reflective and impulsive kindergarten children. (WY)

Reviews findings of two large adoption studies. Both examined the levels of intellectual and personality development, as well as the degree of resemblance, among family members. Focus is directed toward intelligence quotient and school achievement tests, with briefer attention given to personality interests and attitudes. (Author/RH)

Contrasts measurements and conceptualizations of the environment employed by environmentally oriented behavioral scientists with those developed by behavior geneticists. For the environmentalist, the environment is multidimensional, dynamic, and transactional, as well as mediated by the individual. By contrast, the behavior geneticist's…

Examined data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health to determine impact of school-level substance use on adolescent-peer similarity for smoking and drinking. Found that adolescent-peer similarity was significantly moderated by school-level substance use for both tobacco and alcohol use. Inferred that schools with relatively few…

Investigated the effect of setting on the social referencing of 48 children of 6-40 months. Behavioral regulation was observed in familiar child care centers and an unfamiliar university laboratory. Affect was not influenced by setting and showed regulation only for the oldest children. (RJC)

Findings indicated that zygosity was not related to behavioral scores during the neonatal period, and that environment substantially influenced neonatal temperament. Specific perinatal indicators of risk were found to account for some of the intrapair differences in behavioral variables. (RH)

Children, aged 9-10, and their mothers described how they coped with stress, and mothers completed a questionnaire that assessed parenting dimensions. Results indicated that children from families with high levels of maternal support and low levels of family structure used the greatest variety of coping strategies, and children of supportive…

Clarifies two sets of issues raised in preceding commentaries. First, interaction effects are undoubtedly salient in resilience research; yet main effect findings can be equally critical from an intervention perspective. Second, although resilience research and prevention science reflect similar broad objectives, the former involves explicit…

Research suggests that sadness expressions may be more beneficial to children than other emotions when eliciting support from caregivers. It is unclear, however, when children develop the ability to regulate their displays of distress. The current study addressed this question. Distress facial expressions (e.g., fear, anger, and sadness) were…

This study used a sample of 551 children surveyed yearly from ages 6 to 13 to examine the longitudinal associations among early behavior, middle-childhood peer rejection and friendedness, and early-adolescent depressive symptoms, loneliness, and delinquency. The study tested a sequential mediation hypothesis in which (a) behavior problems in the…

The role of experience in the developing brain is considered. A categorization scheme based upon the type of information stored and the brain mechanisms involved in storing the information is proposed. Experience-expectant and experience-dependent information storage are differentiated. (BN)