Affection, virtue, pleasure, and profit: Developing an understanding of friendship closeness and intimacy in western and Asian societies

The development of friendship understanding has rarely been explored from a cross-cultural perspective. In this study, children and adolescents from Iceland, China, Russia, and the former East Germany were investigated in one longitudinal and three cross-sectional samples. Children from three different Chinese ecologies were interviewed to account for within-culture variation. Participants were interviewed about friendship closeness and intimacy at ages 7, 9, 12, and 15 years. Their statements were scored according to (a) structural-developmental stages and (b) content aspects of friendship reasoning. Results reveal that the development of friendship reasoning of participants from all societies could be captured by the cognitive-structural stages and content categories developed in western cultures. At the same time, distinct cultural differences emerged, especially between the Russian and Chinese participants, on the one hand, and the Icelandic and East German participants, on the other hand. The within-China analyses reveal little differences for the content aspects of friendship understanding between the three ecologies, but differences in the cognitive-structural aspects of friendship reasoning were found. © 2008 The International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development

Stability of sociometric categories

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Commentary: Social competence in children with chronic illness: The devil is in the details

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Sociometric perspectives

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Co-development of internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors: Causal direction and common vulnerability

Item does not contain fulltextLatent growth curve modeling was used to study the co-development of internalizing and externalizing problems in a sample of 2844 Korean fourth graders followed over four years. The project integrated two major theoretical viewpoints positing developmental mechanism: directional model and common vulnerability model. Findings suggest that (a) boys and girls follow different developmental trajectories in both domains in early adolescence; (b) bidirectional progression from initial levels of each domain to the developmental pattern of the other domain emerged among boys, while only unidirectional progression from externalizing to internalizing problem emerged among girls; and (c) all risk factors are not equally risky across domain and gender; parental violence was a common cross-domain risk factor for boys, whereas affiliation with delinquent friends was a common cross-domain risk factor for girls. Implications for future research and intervention were discussed.17 p

Disentangling the frequency and severity of bullying and victimization in the association with empathy

Contains fulltext : 157149.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)This study disentangled the frequency and perceived severity of experienced bullying and victimization by investigating their associations with cognitive and affective empathy. Participants were 800 children (7–12 years old) from third- to fifth-grade classrooms who completed self-report measures of the frequency and perceived severity of their bullying and victimization and of cognitive and affective empathy. Results showed that the frequency and perceived severity of bullying were moderately correlated in the entire sample but unrelated within the subsample of bullies. Frequency and perceived severity of victimization were significantly and positively correlated in the entire sample (moderate effect) and the subsample of victims (small effect). Frequent, but not severe, bullies reported less cognitive empathy than non-bullies whereas both frequent and severe victims reported more affective empathy than non-victims. Within subsamples of bullies and victims, frequency of bullying was negatively associated with cognitive and affective empathy, and perceived severity of bullying was positively associated with affective empathy. Frequency of victimization was not associated with cognitive and affective empathy, but perceived severity of victimization was positively associated with both forms of empathy.17 p

How diagnostic coverage improves safety in programmable electronic systems

Programmable Electronic Systems (PES) are a potentially good solution for safety protection applications. But a PES must utilize special circuits and special architectures to reduce the chances of failing dangerously. There are several critical design parameters to measure the effectiveness of these systems. Diagnostic `Coverage Factor' is one of these parameters that affects all architectures. This paper explains the tools used to measure and verify the diagnostic capability of a PE

Implicit and explicit peer evaluation: Associations with early adolescents' prosociality, aggression, and bullying

Item does not contain fulltextImplicit and explicit peer evaluations were assessed among 120 early adolescents (56 boys, 64 girls; M age = 11.1 years). Explicit peer evaluations were round-robin ratings of likeability; implicit peer evaluations were assessed with an approach-avoidance task, also using a round-robin design. Prosocial behavior, aggression, and bullying were assessed with a standard peer nominations procedure. Prosocial behavior predicted explicit positive evaluations given and received. Bullying and physical aggression predicted receiving explicit negative evaluations from peers. Implicit negative biases were found for girls but not boys. Relationally aggressive girls and bullying girls showed a negative implicit bias toward their peers. Possible implications for intervention are discussed.10 p