Attachment Predicts College Students’ Knowledge, Attitudes, and Skills for Working with Infants, Toddlers, and Families

Research Findings:Adults’ attitudes about attachment relationships are central to how they perceive and respond to children. However, little is known about how attachment styles are related to teachers’ attitudes toward and interactions with infants and toddlers. From a survey of 207 students taking early childhood (EC) courses at 4 U.S. universities, we report relations among students’ attachment styles and their (a) career goals, (b) attitudes about caring for and educating infants and young children, and (c) interaction skills for responding in developmentally supportive ways. Overall, attachment security was positively associated with career goals focused on working with younger children, knowledge about infant/toddler development, attitudes that acknowledge the importance of adult support in children’s development, and developmentally supportive interaction skills. Students who scored high on attachment fearfulness minimized the importance of adults in children’s lives, minimized the importance of the early years for later learning, and endorsed strict and controlling forms of child guidance. Practice or Policy: A conceptual mediation model linking a path from attachment to caregiving skill through knowledge and attitudes is articulated. We propose a person-centered pedagogy for infant/toddler professional preparation that provides opportunities for reflection on one’s own attachment and its effects on work with young childre

Correlates and Consequences of Spanking and Verbal Punishment for Low-Income White, African American, and Mexican American Toddlers

This study examined the prevalence, predictors, and outcomes of spanking and verbal punishment in 2,573 low-income White, African American, and Mexican American toddlers at ages 1, 2, and 3. Both spanking and verbal punishment varied by maternal race/ethnicity. Child fussiness at age 1 predicted spanking and verbal punishment at all three ages. Cross-lagged path analyses indicated that spanking (but not verbal punishment) at age 1 predicted child aggressive behavior problems at age 2 and lower Bayley mental development scores at age 3. Neither child aggressive behavior problems nor Bayley scores predicted later spanking or verbal punishment. In some instances, maternal race/ethnicity and/or emotional responsiveness moderated the effects of spanking and verbal punishment on child outcomes

Victimization in The SAGE Encyclopedia of Lifespan Human Development

Most research on victimization tries to explain why some people are more likely than others to be the targets of physical and social aggression, and what the consequences are for victims. In physical victimization, victims’ bodies are attacked via pushing, hitting, strangling, and so on. Social victimization involves emotional hurt caused by exclusion, malicious gossip, taunting, or other forms of verbal or nonverbal ostracism and rejection. Victimization is fairly common and occurs in all life stages. This entry focuses only on victimization that is serious because it is deeply felt or has other grave consequences; it does not discuss brief episodes that leave little or no mark

Mainland Chinese Mothers’ Autonomy Support Across Four Caregiving Contexts

Self-determination theorists argue that parental autonomy support is a significant foundation for children’s optimal development and wellbeing. However, research is scarce regarding how parents of very young children practice autonomy support, especially in non-western countries (such as mainland China). This paper describes two studies that address this gap. Both studies investigated how Chinese mothers (children’s age \u3c 7) say they would support their children’s autonomy in four caregiving scenarios. Study 1 was exploratory with 20 low-income mothers of young children (age \u3c 7) from a northeastern city in mainland China. Sensitizing concepts from self-determination theory and constant comparison guided the development of themes. In Study 2, we posed the same questions via Qualtrics and received open-ended responses from 307 Chinese mothers of preschool-aged children. Mothers’ responses were again inductively coded using the constant comparison method (Corbin & Strauss, 2015); in addition, responses were assigned ratings based on expressed level of autonomy support. Maternal levels of autonomy support were compared across the four caregiving contexts. Inductive coding revealed similar autonomy supportive and autonomy restrictive strategies across samples. Autonomy support levels varied across the four caregiving contexts. Maternal education was related to levels of support for children’s autonomy in the academic learning context. Maternal autonomy support levels differ by caregiving context and by mother’s education. Mothers’ responses allowed us to describe various autonomy supportive strategies that mothers said they would use. Sharing these strategies may help parents who are underequipped to better support young children’s autonomy

Conversations Between African American Mothers and Children About School and Education

Objectives: This study investigated what low-income, African American mothers say to their children about the value of education and how children respond to these messages. Method: Qualitative methods were used to analyze 43 videotaped mother–child conversations about disagreements regarding school and education. The conversations had been videotaped for the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation Project when children were in fifth grade. Results: The majority of discussions about school and education were initiated by mothers, not children. Mothers’ reasons concerning the importance of education mostly reflected utility values. No mother criticized teachers or accepted children’s attempts to blame external factors for poor performance. Children were open with their mothers and seemed to accept their standards. Conclusions: The findings underscore the sincerity of most mothers’ communications to children about the importance of education and their children’s receptivity to these messages. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved

The Interplay of Maternal Sensitivity and Toddler Engagement of Mother in Predicting Self-Regulation

Using data from the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation Project, a cross-lag mediation model was tested to examine longitudinal relations among low-income mothers\u27 sensitivity; toddlers\u27 engagement of their mothers; and toddler\u27s self-regulation at ages 1, 2, and 3 years (N = 2,958). Age 1 maternal sensitivity predicted self-regulation at ages 2 and 3 years, and age 2 engagement of mother mediated the relation between age 1 maternal sensitivity and age 3 self-regulation. Lagged relations from toddler self-regulation at ages 1 and 2 years to later maternal sensitivity were not significant, suggesting stronger influence from mother to toddler than vice versa. Model fit was similar regardless of child gender and depth of family poverty. (PsycINFO Database Recor

Maternal depression and the timing of mother-child dialogue

This project contains data and R script to reproduce analyses conducted in: Smith, N. A., McDaniel, V. F., Ispa, J. M., & McMurray. B. (2023). Maternal depression and the timing of mother–child dialogue. Infant and Child Development, 32, e2389. https://doi.org/10. 1002/icd.238