This study explores how caregiver-child scientific conversation during storybook reading focusing on the challenges or achievements of famous female scientists impacts preschoolers' mindset, beliefs about success, and persistence. Caregiver-child dyads (N = 202, 100 female, 35% non-White, aged 4-5, [function] = 0.15) were assigned to one of three…

Children's mindsets about intelligence (as a quality they can grow vs. a trait they cannot change) robustly influence their motivation and achievement. How do adults foster "growth mindsets" in children? One might assume that adults act in ways that communicate their own mindsets to children. However, new research shows that many parents…

This third-generation, longitudinal study evaluated a family investment perspective on family socioeconomic status (SES), parental investments in children, and child development. The theoretical framework was tested for first-generation parents (G1), their children (G2), and the children of the second generation (G3). G1 SES was expected to…

Significant relationships were found between linguistic maturity of children, speech of parents, and children's helping behavior. Mean length of utterance was a better predictor of cooperative behavior than child age; no comparable relationships were found for parents' nonverbal behaviors. Results support a hypothesis of verbal mediation of…

Content analysis was used to assess the extent to which psychological theories and research about infants were communicated to parents from 1955 to 1984 in two popular publications, the "Infant Care Manual" and "Parents" magazine. Findings indicated that there was no singular relation between what experts knew and what was…

Two implications for communication research are evidenced by the results of this study. 1) Junior Kindergarten children are capable of decoding information communicated in terms of descriptions rather than object names; 2) the young listener's performance is a function of the degree of abstractness of the referent. (WY)

Examined strategies used by infants when listener feedback indicated that their requests were not understood. Concluded that children in the early stages of language development have acquired at least rudimentary knowledge of appropriate conversational behavior. (Author/DB)

In a study of four-, six-, and eight-year olds, communication about the left-right dimension proved to be particularly difficult for four-year olds. Frames of reference that children incorporated into their directions changed with age and differed for directions about front-back and left-right dimensions. (RH)

In human infancy, 2 criteria for intentional communication are (a) persistence in and (b) elaboration of communication when initial attempts to communicate fail. Twenty-nine chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) were presented with both desirable (a banana) and undesirable food (commercial primate chow). Three conditions were administered: (a) the banana…

Attempts to determine the nature and psychological organization of components of referential communication. Investigation is based on the premise that preschoolers often are unaware that a message should differentiate referents from nonreferents and that certain rules are applicable to both speaking and listening. (Author/RH)

Referential communication accuracy of mother and child pairs when the children were four years old predicted children's cognitive development one and two years later in the United States and Japan. Main effects were found to be significant even when mother IQ, SES, and child ability at age four were partialled out of the analysis. (JMB)

Children's learning--in the domains of science and religion specifically, but in many other cultural domains as well--relies extensively on testimony and other forms of culturally transmitted information. The cognitive processes that enable such learning must also administrate the evaluation, qualification, and storage of that information, while…

Findings are discussed in an evolutionary context, and with reference to the popular belief that to respond to his cries spoils'' a baby. (Authors)

Investigates children's knowledge of the role of message quality in referential communication and their ability to evaluate the accuracy of a listener's feedback about his/her comprehension. Children evaluated a puppet listener's comprehension after they had given complete or inadequate directions and received his report that he did or did not…

The study focused on the question of whether the use of general persuasive strategies reflecting progressively higher levels of perspective-taking ability increases with age. (SB)