One hundred and ten English-speaking children schooled in French were followed from kindergarten to Grade 2 (M[subscript age]: T1 = 5;6, T2 = 6;4, T3 = 6;11, T4 = 7;11). The findings provided strong support for the Home Literacy Model (Sénéchal, M., 2002) because in this sample the home language was independent of the language of instruction. The…

A bidimensional acculturation framework cannot account for multiple destination cultures within contemporary settlement societies. A "tridimensional model" is proposed and tested among Jamaican adolescent-mother dyads in the United States compared to Jamaican Islander, European American, African American, and other Black and non-Black U.S.…

Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological model proposes that events in higher order social ecosystems should influence human development through their impact on events in lower order social ecosystems. This proposition was tested with respect to ecological violence and the development of children's aggression via analyses of 3 waves of data (1 wave…

To better understand quantity and quality of divorced father contact, a weighted county sample of 230 divorced fathers with a child aged 4-11 years was employed to test whether fathers' antisocial personality (ASP) moderated effects of monthly contact with children in predicting children's observed noncompliance. Eighteen-month latent growth…

This study uses multilevel models to examine longitudinal associations between contextual influences (neighborhood and family) assessed in 1983 in a cohort of 2,355 children, 4-16 years of age, and educational attainment in 2001. Variation in educational attainment in 2001 attributable to between-neighborhood and between-family differences was…

Reveals that different aspects of the environment differentially contributed to variability in communication performance of one-year-old infants. Findings support the environmental specificity hypothesis and underline the need to consider physical environmental parameters when investigating environmental influences. (Author/RH)

Tested a model of family conflict and coercion that linked economic stress in family life to adolescent symptoms of internalizing and externalizing emotions and behaviors. Subjects were 378 seventh graders and their families in rural Iowa. Found that spousal irritability and hostile exchanges over money matters increased the likelihood of…

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)

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)

Analyzed genetic and environmental contributions to intellectual change in 258 adopted and 93 biological children of 3-14 years. The effect of genes and family environment was significant at the time of the first measurement, but only genes made an additional contribution between the first and the second. (RJC)

Discusses both the advantages and difficulties of using nonlinear modeling in the context of a model used to study the relations between parental warmth and control and preschool children's competence. (HOD)

Constructs a model for understanding possible relationships between parents' personal social networks and their children's development. (JMB)

A theoretical model of parental socialization of children's coping behavior was tested with 310 fourth- and fifth-graders. Found that children's coping efforts were associated with family environment, the quality of the parent-child relationship, parents' own coping, and parent coping suggestions. Maternal data were more strongly associated with…

Results give considerable support to the hypothesis that most of the relation between marital conflict and adolescent adjustment problems can be explained by perturbations in the parent-child relationship. Results also suggest that mediational patterns are different for intact and divorced families, and that the model used best fits the context of…

Examined the nature of repetitive, ritualistic, and compulsive-like behaviors in typically developing and children and individuals with Down Syndrome (DS), matched on mental age (MA). Found that that both groups showed similar MA-related changes in compulsive-like behaviors. Younger children showed more compulsive-like behaviors than older.…