Subjects: Psychology >> Developmental Psychology submitted time 2023-03-28 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》
Abstract： Self-regulation is important for young children considering its profound relations with later mental health and social and cognitive competence. Although psychologists pay much attention to self-regulation for more than 100 years with the aim to investigate individual’s optimal development, the structure of self-regulation and its developmental mechanisms in early ages are still unclear. Following the chronological sequence of the literature, this review shows that the different research perspectives on self-regulation in young children have integrated twice: (1) From 2000 to 2010, researchers attempted to integrate several mainstream perspectives of self-regulation in last century. For example, Kochanska’s model (2006) focused on combining the viewpoints of temperamental and behavioral self-regulation; Calkins’s model (2002) focused on combining the viewpoints of physiological, attentional and emotional self-regulation; and Feldman (2009) constructed a multilevel interdisciplinary model of self-regulation from infancy to preschool ages. (2) In the latest decade, psychologists started to call for the fusion of two research directions and investigate young children’s self-regulation comprehensively. Those two directions are temperamental mechanism of self-regulation—effortful control and “higher-ordered” cognitive mechanism of self-regulation—executive function. After summarizing the previous representative models, the current study further presents a developmental hierarchical-integrative perspective of self-regulation in young children: a physiology-emotion-attention-based and temperament-behavior-cognition-modulated model.
Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-27 Cooperative journals: 《心理学报》
Abstract： An important issue in early socialization and human development is how parents exert control in parent-child interaction and how children comply with parental direction. Moreover, it is commonly believed that maternal control strategies may be affected by social-cultural contexts and their changes. Due to the dramatic social change in urban China over the past decades, for example, compared with their counterparts in the 1990s, contemporary parents may use less coercive or power-assertive control strategies to encourage child autonomy. As a result, there may exist differences between urban parents and migrant parents with a rural background in their control behaviors. Nevertheless, little is known about migrant parents’ control strategies and their relations with children’s compliance behaviors. Thus, the primary purpose of the present study was to examine the control strategies used by urban and migrant mothers and their relations with children’s compliance. We were also interested in gender effects given that urban mothers might be more likely than migrant mothers to emphasize gender equality in childrearing. The participants in the study included 122 mother-child dyads (46 from migrant families). Mother-child interactions and maternal and child behaviors in a clean-up sessions in the laboratory were videotaped. Maternal control strategies (gentle control, direct control, forceful control) and children’s compliance behaviors (committed compliance, situational compliance, noncompliance) were coded. Repeated measure, MANOVA, correlation analysis, and hierarchical regression analysis were conducted. The results first showed that both urban and rural-to-urban migrant mothers used more direct control strategies than other strategies. Migrant mothers used more forceful control and less gentle control than urban mothers. The results also showed that maternal control strategies were significantly correlated to children’s situational compliance in the two groups. Specifically, migrant mothers’ gentle control and direct control strategies were positively related to children’s situational compliance, and urban mothers’ gentle control and forceful control were positively related to children’s situational compliance. Finally, family type and gender had moderating effects on the relations between maternal forceful control strategies and children’s compliance behaviors. Simple slope analysis showed that migrant mothers’ forceful control was positively associated with committed compliance in boys and negatively associated with committed compliance in girls. Migrant mothers’ forceful control was also negatively associated with noncompliance in boys. The relations between urban mothers’ forceful control and their children’s compliance behaviors were not moderated by child gender. These results suggest that social, economic, and cultural background factors may play a significant role in shaping parental control strategies and their functions in child development. Parenting practices interventions should take into account the economic and cultural features of the group the parents belong to, and also the children’s characteristics (e.g., gender).
Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-27 Cooperative journals: 《心理学报》
Abstract： Executive Function (EF), proven to be linked to the prefrontal cortex, refers to a set of higher-order cognitive and self-regulatory processes. These processes include (a) inhibition, the ability to intentionally suppress prepotent impulses or habits; (b) working memory, the ability to hold multiple things in the mind at once while mentally manipulating one or more of them; and (c) cognitive flexibility or shifting, the capability to switch between tasks. However, little attention has been given to predictors of EF across the first two years of life. A principal limitation of this is a methodological challenge, due to toddlers’ limited sustained attention, poor language competence, and labile emotional state. Accordingly, in this study, we aimed to examine developmental intrinsic factors (infant attention and temperament) and the caregiving environment (maternal sensitivity) in infancy as possible predictors of EF in toddlerhood. By estimating specific contributions and interaction effects, we aimed to expand the knowledge on early mechanisms behind the development of EF in toddlerhood from an intrinsic and environmental perspective. At six months (T1, n = 236), infants and mothers visited Center for Child Development for the assessment of maternal sensitivity and infant attention. Mothers completed questionnaires on infant temperament. Maternal sensitivity was evaluated by observing the free, interactive process between mother and children at six months. Infant temperament was assessed by mothers reporting data using the Infant Behavior Questionnaire Revised-Short Form (IBQR-SF), and infant attention was assessed using a Screen Look Duration task at six months. At 24 months (T2, n = 191), the children returned to the laboratory with an accompanying parent for an assessment battery of EF tasks, including Multilocation Search, Shape Stroop, Reverse Categorization, and Delay of Gratification tasks. The results indicated that: (1) Peak look duration could predict working memory task and delay of gratification task performance at 24 months. This provides empirical support for the hierarchical framework of EF development, advocating early attention as a foundation for the development of EF. (2) High levels of maternal sensitivity significantly predicted better EF performance among children with low levels of surgency in infancy. However, there was no link between maternal sensitivity and EF among children with medium to high levels of surgency in infancy. (3) Interaction effects suggested that maternal sensitivity positively predicted EF performance among children with high levels of peak look duration in infancy. However, maternal sensitivity negatively predicted EF performance among children with low levels of peak look duration in infancy. Overall, our findings indicate the importance of intrinsic and extrinsic factors in the development of EF in toddlers and provide key insights about parenting. For infants with a lower level of surgency or longer peak look duration, maternal sensitivity positively predicted EF performance in toddlerhood. However, for infants with shorter peak look duration, excessive maternal sensitivity may not be desirable.
Subjects: Psychology >> Developmental Psychology submitted time 2022-01-21
Abstract：
Anxiety is an aversive emotional and motivational state occurring in threatening circumstances, mainly including general anxiety and separation anxiety in early childhood. General anxiety is a kind of trait anxiety relating to general susceptibility to anxiety, while separation anxiety belongs to the state anxiety determined interactively by trait and situational stress. Previous studies have demonstrated the negative effects of anxiety on creativity, but less is known about the mechanisms of these effect, particular the longitudinal effects of anxiety on creativity from toddlerhood to preschool period. Processing Efficiency Theory and Attentional Control Theory explained the effect of anxiety on cognition from the perspective of cognitive processing. Moreover, childhood anxiety may longitudinally affect later development of creativity through neuroendocrine system. That is, anxiety activates the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis (HPA axis) with releasing glucocorticoids, which are associated with the development of higher-order cognitive function. Thus, we assumed that anxiety in early childhood had a longitudinal adverse effect on later development of creativity. Further, the present study explored the mechanisms between early childhood anxiety and creativity in preschool period. The general cognitive ability, a foundamental component of creativity, and motivation may be candidate mediated variables. According to Piaget’s cognitive development theory, a necessary precondition for the development from one cognitive stage to a higher stage is that the individual encounters with discrepancies between the previous schema and the current stimulus, which lead to the motivation to achieve a new cognitive balance. These views suggested that cognition and motivation may be two closely intertwined processes, and general cognitive functions play a decisive role in motivation activation. For younger children, the motivation is reflected in the persistence on objects and people and so on, namely mastery motivation. Accordingly, a longitudinal study was designed to examine the relation between anxiety of toddlers and their creativity when they were 5 years old, and investigate the underlying mechanism by chain mediation effects of general cognitive function and mastery motivation.
96 families (42 boys and 54 girls) were recruited from the local communities and child care clinics in urban areas of Beijing. At 14 and 25 months, infants’ general anxiety and
Subjects: Psychology >> Developmental Psychology submitted time 2018-09-07 Cooperative journals: 《心理学报》
Abstract： 通过对107名幼儿及其母亲历时五年的五次追踪测量，考察了儿童早期（9月～38月）母亲生活压力对5岁时儿童行为问题的预测效应及其作用机制。结果发现，在儿童早期，母亲生活压力具有相对的稳定性，但引起母亲生活压力的主要生活事件排序有所变化；儿童早期母亲生活压力对儿童行为问题的作用机制有两种方式：一方面表现为母亲生活压力对儿童5岁时的情绪症状和品行问题的直接效应；另一方面表现为通过减少母亲积极养育行为进一步影响儿童情绪症状和同伴问题的间接效应；此外，早期母亲生活压力还通过积极养育和儿童努力控制的链式中介作用对儿童过度活跃和亲社会行为产生影响。结论：母亲生活压力对儿童行为问题具有预测效应，这种效应的机制包括母亲生活压力的直接效应以及通过积极养育、努力控制的间接效应。
Subjects: Psychology >> Developmental Psychology submitted time 2018-03-22 Cooperative journals: 《心理学报》
Abstract： Exploratory behavior, derived from one’s motor development, is an important way for infants to obtain information from external environment. Exploration is generally associated with adaptive developmental outcomes, especially cognitive abilities. Although there have been a great number of studies on exploration, most of which focused on the informational value afforded by novel objects, individual differences and different stages of exploration. The environmental factors, more specifically, the maternal behaviors have been obtained little attention. However, two distinctive theories posit mother’s behavior plays a significant role in infant’s exploration, attachment theory and self-determination theory. According to attachment theory, the attachment system and the exploratory system are two distinct yet inseparably linked behavioral systems, and the attachment system contributes to the quality of infant exploration by providing the infant a secure base from which to explore. Self-determination theory argues that infant’s exploration is driven by his/her intrinsic motivation. Individuals will be most intrinsically motivated when the environment supports their need for autonomy, rather than controlling their behavior. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to examine influence of maternal encouragement of autonomy on 14-month toddler’s exploration and the moderating role of attachment in the relationship between maternal encouragement of autonomy and toddler’s exploratory behavior.
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