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The proposed study will investigate how having a speech and/or language impairment, as well as age, affect children’s self-esteem and levels of social anxiety compared to children who have typical language development (TLD). This cross-sectional correlational study will examine approximately 160 participants between the ages of 5 to 10 who fall into one of four communication type groups: speech impairments (speech sound disorders and/or stuttering), language impairments (specific language impairment), speech and language impairments, or TLD. The participants’ self-esteem, levels of social anxiety, and attitudes about their communication ability will be measured via established scales. Participants will also be asked questions after viewing an animated video depicting dogs with communication impairments, in order to assess their awareness of their communication abilities. Participants with speech and language impairments are expected to have the lowest self-esteem and highest levels of social anxiety, while participants with TLD are expected to have the highest self-esteem and lowest levels of social anxiety. The older participants are expected to experience more problems than the younger participants. Lastly, it is expected that the relationship between the participants’ age, self-esteem, and social anxiety will be mediated by their awareness of their communication impairments, and moderated by their attitudes about their communication impairments. These findings will hopefully increase the knowledge that children experiencing communication impairments may need assistance to aid their psychosocial well-being.

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Previous studies (Madole, Eastman, Stone, & White, 2005) have suggested that children do not make inferences about people on the basis of race until around 8 years of age. The present study was a replication of a study performed by Madole et al. The distinction between the two studies was in the sample used, hi the previous study the majority of children used were Caucasian. The present study sought to examine whether African American children were more likely to make inferences on the basis of race than Caucasian children. Children ages 6 to 11 years were asked to perform an inference task. The inference task consisted of the children looking at a target picture and two comparison sets of pictures. The children were then asked to choose which set of pictures was more comparable to the target picture based on a novel characteristic. These characteristics were social, biological, and individual in nature. There was also a control task in which trivial characteristics were used. The children were able to make their choices based on age, race, or sex. I hypothesized that the sample of African American children would more often choose their matches in the inference task based on race. I believed that this choice would be made across all characteristics as well as the control tasks. I also believed that older children would more often make matches according to race than younger children. Lastly, I expected that the sample in the current study would more often make matches based on race than the sample in the Madole et al. study. The analyses indicated that the children in the current study made more age-based inferences than race- or sex-based inferences. They only made more race-based inferences when given social attributes. They did not make more race-based inferences than the children in the Madole et al. study.

The purpose of this study was to examine the similarities between children and their friends. Previous research had focused on demographic similarities, with a little attention given to behavioral similarities. This study sought to expand the knowledge of similarities between friends to sociometric and social information processing characteristics and show that friends were more similar than random pairs of children. Children completed a rating and nomination sociometric interview. Children also completed a social information processing interview in which they viewed ambiguous provocation situations and then rated a series of social goals and gave social problem solving responses. Two-hundred and twenty-four pairs of reciprocated friends and 224 random pairs of children were identified and used for analyses. Correlational analyses and regression analyses were used to assess similarities. Results showed that friend pairs were similar for prosocial, hostile/instrumental, and passive/avoidant goals, however, regression analyses indicated that friends' characteristics were significant predictors of only some prosocial and hostile/instrumental goals. Friend pairs also were similar in the passivity/assertiveness of their social problem solving responses. Thus, the current study shows some support for the hypothesis that children and their friends are similar in their social processing mechanisms. Further research should be conducted to determine whether small sample size and small standard deviations made the detection of effects more difficult.

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Diss. (sammanfattning) Luleå : Högsk., 1993. / Härtill 5 uppsatser.

Published also as Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University, 1924.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Cornell University, 1902.