Developmental Psychology

Ge, Xiaojia; Lorenz, Frederick O.; Conger, Rand D.; Elder, Glen H.; Simons, Ronald L.

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.467pmid: N/A

This 4-year longitudinal study of 191 girls and 185 boys living in intact families in the rural Midwest examines the trajectories of life events and depressive symptoms in adolescence. The trajectories of depressive symptoms differ between boys and girls. Compared with boys, girls experienced a greater number of depressive symptoms after age 13. Changes in uncontrollable events are associated with the increases in girls' but not boys' depressive symptoms. Latent growth curve analyses show that, over 4 years, (a) depressive symptoms for girls changed according to a curvilinear pattern that is associated with changes in stressful events; (b) the level of depressive symptoms is related to the level of life events for both boys and girls; and (c) change in depressive symptoms is significantly related to change in stressful events only for girls. Girls living with less supportive mothers are more vulnerable to negative life changes.

Bendersky, Margaret; Lewis, Michael

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.484pmid: N/A

The impact of 2 environmental and 2 biological risk measures was studied in 175 preterm children. Levels of family risk, which included family composition, support, and interaction variables, and social class, as well as increases or decreases in family risk over the 1st year of life, were examined with intraventricular hemorrhage (IVH) and other neonatal medical complications as predictors of cognitive and motor outcomes in the 2nd year of life. Family risk, early medical risk, and the Family Risk × IVH interaction emerged as significant predictors of later development. Family risk had less impact on subjects at highest medical risk. Different regression equations for each outcome underscored the specificity of environmental effects on developmental outcomes.

Lamborn, Susie D.; Fischer, Kurt W.; Pipp, Sandra

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.495pmid: N/A

To provide an assessment of the dynamics of development of complex sociomoral concepts, a 10-step scale for assessing development of understanding relations between honesty and kindness was administered under multiple assessment conditions to 113 youths who were 9–20 years old. The sequence proved to be both scalable and reliable, even while level of understanding varied greatly as a function of contextual support and practice. Development moved through 3 age periods: With high support and practice, youths age 9–12 demonstrated abstract concepts of honesty and kindness, youths age 13–15 demonstrated simple abstract relations, and youths age 16–20 demonstrated complex abstract relations. Independent of age and verbal intelligence, understanding related to prosocial problem solving but not to nonsocial problem solving.

Wintre, Maxine Gallander; Vallance, Denise D.

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.509pmid: N/A

In individual interviews, 80 children from ages 4 to 8 years predicted which of 5 emotions they would feel, and how intensely, to 15 affect-laden situations. The results indicate that responses involve 3 dimensions of emotion cognition (intensity, multiplicity, and valence) that emerge in a developmental sequence. Four-year-olds predict experiencing one emotion of varying intensity to a situation (Level A). They also predict experiencing multiple emotions, but at maximum intensity and the same valence (Level B). By age 6, children predict experiencing multiple emotions of varying intensity but the same valence (Level C). Children around age 8 predict multiple emotions of varying intensity and opposite valence (Level D). The number of emotions experienced at one time and accuracy also increased with development.

Pipe, Margaret-Ellen; Wilson, J. Clare

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.515pmid: N/A

Eighty-eight 6-year-olds and 88 10-year-olds took part, in pairs, in a contrived interaction with a “magician.” The children were interviewed 10 days and 10 weeks later in 1 of 4 conditions: no cues, context cues, relevant cues, and irrelevant cues. Older children recalled more accurate information than younger children, and both groups recalled more accurate information after the short than the long delay. Although relevant cues facilitated free recall, accuracy did not differ across cue conditions. Younger children were less likely to report an accident they had been asked to keep secret than were older children. Children's understanding of truth and lies did not predict errors in free recall or their reporting of the secret.

Powlishta, Kimberly K.; Serbin, Lisa A.; Doyle, Anna-Beth; White, Donna R.

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.526pmid: N/A

From a very young age, children show signs of prejudice. However, it is not clear whether those who are the most biased in one domain (e.g., gender) are also the most biased in other domains (e.g., ethnicity). This study addressed the issue using multiple measures of prejudice (negative bias) in 3 domains: gender (male, female), ethnicity–language (French Canadian, English Canadian), and body type (overweight, normal weight). The flexibility of attitudes (i.e., the belief that people from different categories can possess similar traits) was also assessed. A total of 254 children (127 boys, 127 girls) in kindergarten to Grade 6 participated. Children demonstrated clear biases against groups to which they did not belong, although attitudes became more flexible and prejudice declined somewhat with age. There was little predictive power across domains; that is, there was no evidence that prejudice represents a general characteristic that differentiates children.

Pickens, Jeffrey

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.537pmid: N/A

This study investigated whether, and on what basis, 5-month-old infants perceive auditory–visual distance relations. A 2-screen visual preference procedure was used in which infants viewed side by side videotaped toy trains (in 4 visual conditions) along with increasing or decreasing amplitude lawnmower engine sounds from a central speaker designed to match one of the videos. Results suggest that 5-month-olds were sensitive to auditory–visual distance relations and that changing size was an important visual depth cue. Infants did not show evidence of matching in other conditions in which the soundtracks were paired with videos depicting shifts in the train's luminance or showing the train moving vertically with no change in size. The infants' matching performance suggested that 5-month-olds respond to invariant auditory–visual relations specifying meaningful spatial properties.

Clancy, Stephanie M.; Hoyer, William J.

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.545pmid: N/A

The effects of age and experience on visual–cognitive performance were examined by administering a domain-relevant visual search task and a standard letter search task to skilled and control subjects at 2 age levels (young and middle-aged adults). In the skilled task, subjects searched for a designated item within 3-item displays using images of bacteria morphology as targets and distractors. Each target was preceded by a word prime representative of bacteria morphology that was valid, invalid, or neutral with respect to the diagnostic characteristics of the target. Skilled subjects showed an age deficit in letter search performance, but the performance of the young and middle-aged skilled subjects was not different on the domain-relevant task. Valid primes produced benefits for the young and middle-aged skilled participants, whereas control subjects were unaffected by the prime manipulation. Results were consistent with the prediction that experience serves to attenuate age-related declines in visual–cognitive performance in the skilled domain.

Woodward, Amanda L.; Markman, Ellen M.; Fitzsimmons, Colleen M.

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.553pmid: N/A

A number of theorists have argued that the productive naming explosion results from advances in abilities that underlie language learning (e.g., the realization that words are symbols, changes in conceptual structure, or the onset of word learning constraints). If any of these accounts are accurate, there should be parallel developments in comprehension. To explore this issue, 4 studies assessed whether pre- and postnaming explosion children differ in their ability to learn a new word after limited exposure. Thirteen- and 18-month-olds heard a new object label just 9 times in a 5-min training session and then their comprehension was assessed in a multiple-choice procedure. Under favorable testing conditions, both 18- and 13-month-olds showed comprehension of the new word, even after a 24-hr delay. These results suggest that well before the productive naming explosion, children can learn a new object label quickly.

Treiman, Rebecca

doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.30.4.567pmid: N/A

Middle-class American children usually learn the names of letters several years before they begin formal instruction in reading and spelling. How does this knowledge affect their subsequent acquisition of spelling? The results of 4 experiments speak against the idea that children go through a stage of spelling development during which they are equally likely to symbolize any sequence of phonemes that matches the name of a letter with the corresponding letter. Although kindergarteners and first graders sometimes spell the nonword /var/ as “vr,” using the letter r to represent both of the phonemes in its name, they are less likely to spell the nonword /vϵs/ as “vs” or the nonword /tib/as “tb.” These differences are interpreted as reflecting the phonological or sound properties of the letters' names. Implications for models of spelling development are discussed.