Developmental Psychology Commons^™

Temporal Relevance Of Parent Qualities And Behaviors For Predicting Young Adults’ Emotion Regulation And Romantic Relationships, Saleena Wilson

Masters Theses, 2020-current

The present study sought to compare the utility of adolescents’ parental relationship qualities and behaviors for predicting young adult emotion regulation as well as the mediating role of emotion regulation in the intergenerational transmission of relationship qualities and behaviors. Early adolescence is characterized by the emergence of new emotions, responsibilities, and budding romantic relationships. Parental relationships with positive qualities may provide a safe environment for teens to explore these unfamiliar experiences. In late adolescence, teens depend less on this secure base but benefit from the utilization of specific relationship behaviors, modeled to them by their parents, in increasingly important …

Ambivalent Images, Beloved Objects: Building Bridges Between Picture Books And The Tangible World, Danielle Ridolfi

MFA in Illustration & Visual Culture

"Ambivalent Images, Beloved Objects" examines how pedagogical theories prioritizing objects and direct sensory experiences in early childhood can be applied to the creation of picture book illustrations. In doing so, it positions picture books as educational tools, and advocates for the importance of using them not to recreate nature, but to connect readers with the tangible world of natural and human-made objects that our digital-driven culture eclipses. It strives towards a unifying pedagogical and aesthetic philosophy that accomplishes what illustrator Eric Carle characterizes as a bridge between the tactile world of objects and the world represented in illustrations.

This exploration …

John Glover: A Long Overdue Account Of His Productive Scholarship Methods, Kenneth A. Kiewra, Douglas Kauffman

Department of Educational Psychology: Faculty Publications

How are some scholars so productive? Kiewra and colleagues have interviewed about two dozen productive scholars over six studies to find out (Flanigan et al., 2018; Kiewra & Creswell, 2000; Kiewra et al., 2021; Kiewra et al., 2023; Patterson-Hazley & Kiewra, 2013; Prinz et al., 2020). Meanwhile, Bembenutty has also interviewed about 30 contemporary scholars to uncover their productivity pathways (Bembenutty, 2015, 2022). Absent from these interviews, though, is John Glover, the founding editor of Educational Psychology Review and one of the leading scholars of his time. Unfortunately, Glover’s time was brief. He died from a fallen tree in 1989 …

Socio-Emotional Resilience Among Older Adults During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Cindy J. Lahar, Angela L. Nadeau, Jayne Violette, Summer Roberts, Diana Reindl

Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science

The detrimental impact of social isolation on health and well-being has been reported in older adults (Prohaska, et al., 2020). Yet findings also demonstrate that older adults have a motivational shift to prioritize emotionally meaningful goals and experiences (Carstensen, 1993; Sakaki, et al., 2019), prioritize emotional meaning in situations, focus on positive emotions and stimuli over negative feelings and live in the present rather than focus on future preparedness. Socioemotional selectivity theory (SST) (Carstensen, 1993; Carstensen, Fung & Charles, 2003) suggests that older adults have a limited sense of time left in life and shift their focus to meaningful and …

Playful Learning: The Disposition Of Architecture As Pedagogy, Alyssa Franklin

Bachelor of Architecture Theses - 5th Year

Education is a vital foundation of a society. The standard of today’s school environment is built upon the pedigree of the factory schools from the nineteenth century. However, elementary age children require a flexible, engaging, and creative learning environment that the standard school environment does not provide. Learning is a dynamic and innovative action. Architecture should mirror the learning that it supports through providing spaces that allow for flexibility, engagement, accessibility, and attraction. Children are transformed by the spaces they are in, spaces that will leave lasting impacts on the cognitive development of the children, spaces that can be playful …

Enacting Stories: Discovering Parallels Of Narrative And Expressive Therapies, A Literature Review, Zoe Reddig

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

This literature review will analyze the use of narrative therapy (NT) techniques, dance/movement therapy (DMT) techniques, and expressive therapy (ET) techniques in an effort to distinguish where theoretical parallels exist between these methods of counsel. Narrative therapy is a postmodern framework of counseling that assists clients in resisting damaging stories that have been embedded through bioecological systems of exposure throughout development. Narrative therapy structures its philosophy through processes of externalization and deconstruction, and encourages the process of reframing or re-authoring one’s personal self-narrative. At their core, DMT and ET already utilize components of foundational NT practices, through processes of enactment, …

Maladaptive Inconsistent Parenting Behavior And Borderline Personality Disorder: The Mediating Effect Of Disturbed Sense Of Self, Mst S. Islam

Theses and Dissertations

We investigated the child’s disturbed sense of self in relation to maladaptive inconsistent parenting behavior and BPD features. 158 participants completed measures assessing emotions and parenting. The mediating effect of disturbance of self was significant as a single mediator, but not when emotional dysregulation and impulsivity were included as mediators.

Embodied Fatness In Boys: A Critical Phenomenological Study, Sean Leadem

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation was an exploratory study of experiences of fatness in boyhood using a hermeneutic phenomenological qualitative method. The author conducted in-depth, open-ended interviews with participants who identify as men and for whom fatness or related body-difference was an issue in childhood or adolescence to gather data on the meanings of fatness for boys and the men they become. Data analysis was organized around the existential dimensions of embodiment, temporality, and relationality. Themes emerging from this analysis included a) the discovery of fatness as ambiguous meanings mediated by others, b) fatness as a problem in a horizon that does not …

Opportunities For Learning And Social Interaction In Infant Sitting: Effects Of Sitting Support, Sitting Skill, And Gross Motor Delay, Kari S. Kretch, Emily C. Marcinowski, Hsu Lin-Ya, Natalie A. Koziol, Regina T. Harbourne, Michele A. Lobo, Stacey C. Dusing

Nebraska Center for Research on Children, Youth, Families, and Schools: Faculty Publications

The development of independent sitting changes everyday opportunities for learning and has cascading effects on cognitive and language development. Prior to independent sitting, infants experience the sitting position with physical support from caregivers. Why does supported sitting not provide the same input for learning that is experienced in independent sitting? This question is especially relevant for infants with gross motor delay, who require support in sitting for many months after typically developing infants sit independently. We observed infants with typical development (n = 34, ages 4–7 months) and infants with gross motor delay (n = 128, ages 7–16 …

Parents’ Adverse Childhood Experiences In Relation To Parent-Child Emotion Socialization, Emily Thompson

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Parents’ adverse childhood experiences in relation to parent-child emotion socialization

Objective: Parents have an integral role in a child’s development of important emotional and psychosocial processes through emotion socialization. The goal of this paper is to examine the presence of adverse childhood experiences during the parents’ childhood and adolescence alongside the parents’ responses to their child’s emotional expression. The impact of adverse childhood experiences on a parent’s ability to socialize their child’s emotions is a key factor in the continued objective of cultivating positive parent-child interaction and improving adolescent mental health.

Methods: Participants were 165 adolescents and their parents. Adolescent …

Adolescents With Family History Of Alcohol-Use Disorders Have Reduced Structural Coherence Of Anterior Insula To Nucleus Accumbens Tract, Grace Wood

Psychological Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

Genetics play a significant role in predisposition towards alcohol use disorders. Analyzing the neural phenotypes related to alcohol use disorder development could allow researchers to predict one’s predisposition. The anterior insula (AIns) contributes to binge drinking tendencies while exhibiting downstream signaling towards the nucleus accumbens (NAcc). Recent research has examined this relationship simultaneously with alcohol consumption, but the genetic effect of the AIns and NAcc functional relationship prior to alcohol consumption has yet to be examined. In this study, we used data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study to analyze the structural coherence of the AIns to NAcc …

The Effect Of Minority Stress On Sexual Minority College Students' Mental Health: The Role Of General Social Support And Sexuality-Specific Social Support, Lee A. Golembiewski

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Sexual minority (SM) college students continue to face greater mental health problems relative to their heterosexual peers (Woodford et al., 2014; Wilson & Liss, 2022). According to minority stress theory, SM individuals face distal (e.g., heterosexist discrimination) and proximal (e.g., expectations of rejection, internalized homophobia, and concealment) stressors related to their SM identity which can have negative effects on their mental health (Douglass & Conlin, 2020; Meyer, 2003). However, social support has been hypothesized to help protect against the effects of minority stress experienced by SM individuals (Cohen & Wills, 1985; Moody & Smith, 2013). Most of the existing research …

Page And Screen: Storybook Features That Promote Parent-Child Talk During Shared Reading, Gabrielle Strouse, Georgene Troseth, Zachary D. Stuckelman

School of Education Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study was to systematically vary the medium used for shared reading (digital versus print), the presence of an audio narration feature, and the inclusion of a character offering conversational prompts to identify their impact on parent-child language. In a randomized experimental design, 67 children (2.75-5.10 years old) shared a book with a parent twice. Built-in conversational prompts were effective in increasing the quantity and quality of extratextual language and conversation. There was no evidence that the book being digital in format nor having automatically-playing narration decreased language or conversation quality compared to reading the print version. …

Adolescent Perception Of Different Conspiracy-Like Scenarios, Christine Honn

Psychological Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

Conspiracy theories are claims that are unverified, less plausible than the mainstream explanation, and contain a malevolent actor. A potentially related concept is intellectual humility, which is a person's willingness to admit when they are not knowledgeable about a subject and turn to an expert or authority figure for an answer. I hypothesized that adolescents who are more prone to endorse conspiracy theories in general as well as believe in specific conspiracy theories would have lower levels of intellectual humility than their conspiracy-resistant peers. Participants read eight conspiratorial vignettes and answered questions about traits of the vignettes, then filled out …

Low-Income Caregivers With Young Children Experience Risk And Resilience Through Pandemic-Related Stressors, Nicole Kingdon, Molly Dubuc, Rosemarie Dibiase

Undergraduate Theses and Capstone Projects

In March 2020, United States government implemented health and safety mandates, including school closures, to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). As a result, some caregivers with young children were forced to take on new roles. Low-income households with young children appeared to be more highly impacted than other groups, experiencing acute pandemic-related stressors on top of previous vulnerabilities. Using qualitative analysis, this study examined how low-income caregivers with young children adapted to pandemic-related stressors and how stressors may have altered relationships and well-being in the household (Daks et al., 2020). Two research questions were examined: (1) how …

An Analysis Of The Sophistication–Maturity Of Justice And Non-Justice Involved Youth And Young Adults, Lauren Grove

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Juvenile transfer refers to a set of mechanisms whereby a juvenile’s case may be processed in criminal court. Forensic mental health evaluators often assess youths’ risk/dangerousness, sophistication–maturity, and treatment amenability to assist judicial determinations regarding youth disposition. Of these three factors, sophistication–maturity—in which the law is concerned with the extent to which a juvenile defendant’s criminal sophistication and maturity level parallels that of an adult—has traditionally been the most challenging for practitioners to define and apply in practice. The Risk-Sophistication-Treatment Inventory (RSTI) is the only commercially available, specialized forensic assessment instrument for the assessment of youths’ sophistication–maturity. However, this tool …

Genetic Implications Of Language Acquisition, Marissa Renee Ciccarini

Honors Scholar Theses

The argument about whether language acquisition is "nature" or "nurture" has been long debated. Linguists have concluded that it requires the two, but how much does language acquisition rely on nature? Children show the capacity to learn languages quickly and without much effort. While research suggests that infants absorb many visual and verbal cues in their environment, biological structures are the underlying component of how this knowledge is gathered and organized. The genetics that code for specific neurophysiological pathways affect how people interact with their environment and where information is stored, forming the basis for these biological structures. Genetic research …

College Success 101: Resilience And Mental Health Mediate The Relationship Between Adverse Childhood Experiences And College Functioning, Mackenzie Crook

Psychological Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) are potentially traumatic events that children experience during the first 18 years of their lives. They can lead to health risks, both physical and mental, later on in life (Felitti et al., 1998). One of the largest transitions a person will experience is the transition from being a child to becoming an adult. This transition is often paired with people entering college, and being able to function successfully in college is a vital part of this transition. College functioning is assessed through educational functioning, relational functioning, and psychological functioning (O’Donnell et al., 2018). The purpose of …

Frequency, Form, And Function Of Dyadic Questions In Children With Autism: A Childes Corpus Study, Rhiannon Luyster, Isabella Leiwant, Sudha Arunachalam

Emerson Authors, Researchers, & Creators

Children’s questions to their caregivers – and caregivers’ questions to their children – play an important role in child development. For children on the autism spectrum, who often experience cognitive, linguistic and social difficulties, prior research on questions has resulted in inconsistent and incomplete findings. The present study characterized the frequency, form, and function of queries posed by children on the autism spectrum (n = 12), non-spectrum peers (n =20), and parents using the Nadig ASD English Corpus in the Child Language Data Exchange System (CHILDES). Results suggested that children on the autism spectrum and their caregivers produced fewer questions …

Working Memory And Language Associations In Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Megan A. Goldfarb

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by impairments in social communication and interaction, with repetitive behaviors or specialized interests. A range of language abilities is seen in ASD, with some having typical abilities and others severe impairments. Working memory (WM) deficits have also been found in some children with ASD. In typically developing, as well as non-ASD children with language deficits a strong relationship has been found between WM and language abilities. Although both language and WM deficits are often seen in ASD, the relationship between these deficits has been underexplored. The objective of this study is …

Making Mistakes: Children’S Errors As Opportunities For Emergent Literacy Learning In Early Childhood, Clariebelle Gabas, Laura Cutler, Rachel E. Schachter

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

Errors are a natural part of children’s knowledge building and learning experiences in early childhood (EC). Importantly, errors can be a powerful tool for tailoring instruction to children’s specific needs and supporting learning processes (Seifried & Wuttke, 2010). The leveraging of errors to support children’s emergent literacy learning became apparent to us when we examined data from a recent observational study of teachers’ practices in EC classrooms with children 3–5 years old. In our study of 400 classrooms, we identified the 30 classrooms in which children demonstrated the highest language gains and the 30 classrooms in which children demonstrated the …

Success Over Stress Support Group, Sophia Pescador-Torrance

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The Harden Wellness Center is located in Salinas, California on the campus of Harden Middle School. After surveying and interviewing eighth-grade students at Harden Middle School, it was determined that there was a need to provide healthy coping skills for stress and anxiety. The project provided students a place to learn healthy coping skills along with normalizing mental health services among adolescents. In order to engage students and keep them interested each week, focus on a new skill with an activity attached to reinforce the coping skill. By the end of the six weeks, the group started to talk about …

Children's Beliefs About Hierarchical Structures And Relationships., Megan Norris

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Children are surrounded by social structures such as families, schools, and workplaces which are often arranged hierarchically with some people holding more power than others. This dissertation explores how children think about hierarchical relationships and more complex hierarchical structures. In Chapter 2, children were asked to evaluate the traits of people who hold hierarchically dominant and subordinate social roles. With age, 4- to 6-year-olds increasingly inferred that dominant individuals have social power and they deferred to their instructions (Chapter 2, Study 1). Furthermore, 5- and 6-year-olds attributed knowledgeability to individuals with dominant social roles but overall children did not prefer …

The Impact Of Music Therapy On Language Acquisition In Children With Nonverbal Autism, Alecia Bernau

Senior Honors Theses

Through an experimental method, the researcher investigated whether children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are more likely to develop verbal communication skills after consistent exposure to songs with lyrics. Six children with nonverbal ASD were exposed to the same song with lyrics, with the goal of increased vocalization and language acquisition. Over nine sessions, subjects were pulled to participate in the experiment. The researcher played the song for the participants, recording the responses from each trial and categorizing them as either full words, verbal approximations, or miscellaneous verbalizations. The findings of the study suggest that there is a relationship between …

Making The Subconscious Conscious - Showcasing Unresolved Childhood Trauma Through Animation, Alexis Hunter

All Theses

The focus of this work is to shed light on unresolved childhood trauma that can contribute to mental hardships - whether people are aware of its presence in their lives or not. In this paper, I will discuss childhood trauma, its impact on adult life when left unresolved, self-parenting as a method to manage it, and how it is portrayed in various media. Drawing inspiration from my research on trauma and visual storytelling, I will present a proof-of-concept for a 2D animated short film, Strongholds, which visualizes the internal mental struggles through the character dynamics of the personifications of the …

Children’S Disclosure Of School Bullying: The Relation Between Peer Victimization, Internalizing Symptoms, Negative Affect, And Gender, Julia L. Kiefer

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Children who are bullied by their peers are at risk for several negative developmental outcomes and are therefore advised to tell an adult when they are. However, victims of school bullying are often reluctant to disclose to adults that they are being bullied. Some bullied children also experience symptoms of anxiety or depression, which could further reduce their likelihood of telling an adult. In this study, I tested the degree to which children’s internalizing symptoms predicted their likelihood of telling adults about being bullied at school, and if this relation was exacerbated by children’s negative feelings associated with telling an …

Bilingual Profiles Differentially Predict Executive Functions During Early Childhood: A Latent Profile Analysis, Hwajin Yang, Germaine Y. Q. Tng, Wee Qin Ng, Sujin Yang

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Recent studies suggest that heterogeneous bilingual experiences implicate different executive functions (EF) in children. Using a latent profile analysis, we conducted a more nuanced investigation of multifaceted bilingual experiences. By concurrently considering numerous bilingual indicators – age of L1 and L2 acquisition, interactional contexts of verbal exchanges, L1 and L2 proficiency, balance of language use at home and school, and receptive vocabulary – we identified three latent profiles (subgroups): balanced dual-language, dominant single-language, and mixed-interaction. We found that the balanced dual-language and dominant single-language profiles predicted significantly better switching than the mixed-interaction profile. However, no profile differences were found in …

Impacts Of Poverty On Language Development How Low Socio-Economic Status Students Are At An Academic Disadvantage, Farbod Samari

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Socioeconomic status impacts a variety of mental health outcomes, including language development. Delays in language development have consistently been linked to poverty. Decreases in vocabulary and phonological awareness are among developmental delays in school-aged children living in poverty. This research aims to contribute to the field of human services by examining the negative impacts of poverty on language development from a social worker’s perspective. As social workers thrive to serve disadvantaged populations, this research brings awareness to how language development deficiencies occur in school-aged children living in poverty.

To fulfill the purpose of this study, a quantitative, descriptive/explanatory design …

The Big Five And Dark Triad: The Role Of Personality In The Development Of Passion, Hannah Behar

Honors Theses

The present work explored the connection between personality and the Dualistic Model of Passion (DMP) and weather psychological safety moderated this relationship. The first study comprised 109 Introduction to Psychology students at the University of Richmond, and the second study measured 128 MTurk participants. The web-based survey administered to both samples consisted of measures assessing Harmonious Passion (HP), Obsessive Passion (OP), the Big Five traits, the Dark Triad traits, and Psychological Safety (PS). Due to reliability concerns, only OP and the Dark Triad traits could be used to assess the MTurk sample. Results from regression analysis showed that among MTurk …

Perceiving The Poster: How Suspicion Of Motives May Impact Perceptions Of Potential Allies Engaging In Online Activism, Kathrina Z. Durante

Honors Theses

Social media posts signaling support for various social and racial justice movements have emerged as an important aspect of social media use. However, little research has investigated how these posts and the social media users behind them are perceived by members of disadvantaged groups﹘those the messages are presumably intended to “help.” Though the post’s content and poster’s identity are likely important, the primary aim of this study is to investigate an individual difference variable in the perceiver, specifically disadvantaged group members’ Suspicion of Motives Index (SOMI) scores, which measure a general tendency to perceive White individuals’ attempts at non-prejudice to …