Showing papers by "Marc H. Bornstein published in 1998"

Sources of child vocabulary competence: a multivariate model.

Abstract: This study examines sources of individual variation in child vocabulary competence in the context of a multivariate developmental ecological model. Maternal sociodemographic characteristics, personological characteristics, and vocabulary, as well as child gender, social competence, and vocabulary competence were evaluated simultaneously in 126 children aged 1;8 and their mothers. Measures of child vocabulary competence included two measures each of spontaneous speech, experimenter assessments, and maternal reports. Maternal measures, from proximal to distal, included vocabulary, verbal intelligence, personality, attitudes toward parenting, knowledge of parenting, and SES. Structural equation modelling supported several direct unique predictive relations: child gender (girls higher) and social competence as well as maternal attitudes toward parenting predicted child vocabulary competence, and mothers' vocabulary predicted child vocabulary comprehension and two measures of mother-reported child vocabulary expression. In addition, children's vocabulary competence was influenced indirectly by mothers' vocabulary, social personality, and knowledge of child development. Maternal vocabulary itself was positively influenced by SES, maternal verbal intelligence, and mothers' knowledge about parenting. Individual variation in child vocabulary competence might best be understood as arising within a nexus of contextual factors both proximal and distal to the child.

Vocabulary competence in early childhood: measurement, latent construct, and predictive validity

Abstract: We systematically examined relations among 6 measures of child language derived from 3 sources, including observations of the child's speech with mother, experimenter assessments, and maternal reports. A total of 184 20-month-olds and their mothers contributed complete information about child language comprehension and expression. Correlations of child language measures with socioeconomic status and maternal education were accounted for, as were correlations of child language measures with mothers' verbal intelligence, maternal report measures with mothers' tendency to respond in a socially desirable fashion, and experimenter assessments with child social competence. Structural equation modeling supported (1) strong relations among child language measures derived from observations of the child's speech with mother, experimenter assessments, and maternal reports; (2) the loading of multiple measures of child language from different sources on a single latent construct of vocabulary competence; and (3) the predictive validity of the vocabulary competence latent variable at 20 months, as well as receptive vocabulary specifically, for both verbal and performance IQ (verbal better than performance) at 48 months. Neither an index of child monologing (a nonvocabulary language measure) nor symbolic play (a nonlinguistic representational measure) covaried with vocabulary competence. Girls consistently outperformed boys on individual language measures, but no differences emerged in any model in the fit for boys and girls.

Preoperative preparation programs in children: a comparative examination.

Abstract: UNLABELLED We sought to determine whether an extensive behavioral preparation program for children undergoing surgery is more effective than a limited behavioral program. The primary end point was child and parent anxiety during the preoperative period. Secondary end points included behavior of the child during the induction of anesthesia and the postoperative recovery period. Several days before surgery, children (n = 75) aged 2-12 yr randomly received either an information-based program (OR tour), an information + modeling-based program (OR tour + videotape), or an information + modeling + coping-based program (OR tour + videotape + child-life preparation). Using behavioral and physiological measures of anxiety, we found that children who received the extensive program exhibited less anxiety immediately after the intervention, in the holding area on the day of surgery, and on separation to the operating room. These findings, however, achieved statistical significance only in the holding area on the day of surgery (44[10-72] vs 32[8-50] vs 9[6-33]; P = 0.02). Similarly, parents in the extensive program were significantly less anxious on the day of surgery in the preoperative holding area, as assessed by behavioral (P = 0.015) and physiological measures (P = 0.01). In contrast, no differences were found among the groups during the induction of anesthesia, recovery room period, or 2 wk postoperatively. We conclude that children and parents who received the extensive preoperative preparation program exhibited lower levels of anxiety during the preoperative period, but not during the intraoperative or postoperative periods. IMPLICATIONS The extensive behavioral preoperative program that we undertook had limited anxiolytic effects. These effects were localized to the preoperative period and did not extended to the induction of anesthesia or the postoperative recovery period.

A cross-national study of self-evaluations and attributions in parenting: Argentina, Belgium, France, Israel, Italy, Japan, and the United States.

Abstract: This study investigated and compared ideas about parenting in Argentine, Belgian, French, Israeli, Italian, Japanese, and U.S. mothers of 20-month-olds. Mothers evaluated their competence, satisfaction, investment, and role balance in parenting and rated attributions of successes and failures in 7 parenting tasks to their own ability, effort, or mood, to difficulty of the task, or to child behavior. Few cross-cultural similarities emerged; rather, systematic culture effects for both self-evaluations and attributions were common, such as varying degrees of competence and satisfaction in parenting, and these effects are interpreted in terms of specific cultural proclivities and emphases. Child gender was not an influential factor. Parents' self-evaluations and attributions help to explain how and why parents parent and provide further insight into the broader cultural contexts of children's development.

Predicting Variation in the Timing of Language Milestones in the Second Year: An Events History Approach

Abstract: In a longitudinal investigation of 40 child–mother dyads, we examined prediction from three indexes of children's own language: (1) vocal imitations, (2) first spontaneous words in production, and (3) receptive language starting at 0;9, and their mothers' verbal responsiveness at 0;9 and 1;1, to the developmental onset of three significant language milestones of the second year: (1) 50 words in productive language, (2) combinatorial speech, and (3) the use of language to express a memory. In these analyses, we utilized EVENTS HISTORY ANALYSIS, a statistical technique well suited to questions concerning when in development certain events begin and the extent to which predictors influence the timing of those events. The timing of children's first words in production, the timing of their achievement of 50 words in receptive language, and maternal responsiveness at 1;1 each contributed uniquely to variation in the timing of the three language milestones. When child and mother factors were considered together, the onset of the three language milestones differed by as much as 0;5 months for children in the lower and upper 10th percentiles of the predictor variables. The present findings contribute to generating and testing specific models about child and mother factors thought to explain variation in key aspects of children's second-year language development.

Mothers' Knowledge About Children's Play and Language Development: Short-Term Stability and Interrelations

Abstract: Sixty-four mothers of children ranging in age from 6 to 58 months were asked to determine, for pairings of play and language items, which item was more advanced developmentally. This procedure was repeated within 2 weeks. In general, mothers' orderings of play and language items matched those established in the developmental literature and were stable over the short term. Mothers' knowledge about language development was stronger than and unrelated to their knowledge about play, suggesting that maternal knowledge about developmental domains is differentiated and specific. Finally, mothers' judgments about the developmental milestones depended on their children's current developmental stage: Mothers were less accurate at estimating the timing of milestones that their children had mastered many months earlier, supporting the view that mothers' knowledge is informed by their children's recent rather than past achievements in specific areas.

Maternal speech to 1-year-old children in two Italian cultural contexts

Abstract: The present study examines maternal speech to 1-year-old children in two cultural contexts in the same nation: an urban industrial town (Padua) and a small rural village (Ruoti). The aim was to evaluate if and how intranational cultural variation influences the ways in which Italian-speaking mothers use language when addressing their children. We hypothesized that mothers in the rural context would adopt speech acts with a control function (‘directive’ speech style) more than mothers in the urban context, whereas urban mothers would use speech acts with a didactic and a tutorial function more than rural mothers (‘child-centred’ speech style). Forty primiparous mothers and their 13-month-old children were videotaped at home in a play session. Maternal speech from transcripts was examined in terms of five different communicative functions (Tutorial, Didactic, Conversational, Control, and Asynchronous) using a 21-category coding scheme validated in previous studies. Parents also completed a demographic and living standards questionnaire. The results showed systematic cultural differences in a variety of maternal communicative functions, presumably related to different life environments and childrearing practices in the two sites. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Refocusing on Parenting

Abstract: Despite the fact that most people become parents, and everyone who ever lived has had parents, parenting remains a somewhat mystifying subject about which almost everyone has opinions, but about which few people agree. One thing is certain: It is the principal and continuing task of parents in each generation to prepare children of the next generation for the physical, economic, and psychosocial situations in which those children must survive and thrive. This essay ... refocuses on parenthood. I address questions about the positives of parenthood for parents, the purview of parenthood, who parents, prerequisites and origins of parenthood, present-day problems of parenthood, and parenting programmes.

Language, play, emotional availability, an acceptance in cocaine-exposed and non-cocaine exposed young children and their mothers

Abstract: Cette etude consiste en une evaluation du langage, du jeu, des capacites emotionnelles chez des enfants de 18 mois exposes ou non a la cocaine et de l'accueil plus ou moins positif que leurs meres leur reservent. On considere generalement une exposition a la cocaine durant la periode pre-natale comme un element de risque pour le developpement du systeme nerveux ; de meme facon, les meres abusant de drogues sont considerees comme ayant une influence negative sur le developpement de leurs enfants. Cependant, l'etude n'a montre aucune difference systematique chez des enfants exposes a la cocaine par rapport a leurs pairs apparies non exposes, tant pour les mesures de langage que pour celles concernant le jeu, les capacites emotionnelles des enfants ainsi que la qualite de reception des meres. Plus que des effets lies a la cocaine, les mesures ont permis de detecter des effets dus au sexe et a la classe sociale. Les implications de ces resultats pour le fonctionnement cognitif et socio-emotionnel durant l'enfance, ainsi que pour la politique sociale sont discutes.