The purpose of this study was to define the patterns of socialization on a contemporary Indian Reserve and to show how these patterns relate to other aspects of the society in which they operate. In particular, our aim was to assess whether the patterns of child rearing could be expected to produce individuals prepared to fulfil adult role requirements, or whether discontinuities existed between child-rearing practices and adult role expectations. In order to fulfil this aim, two categories of data were collected, one pertaining to the many facets of adult life, and the other to the training of children. These data are presented in the form of a fairly extensive ethnography with a focus on child-rearing practices. The most significant, and the most extensively employed method of investigation was participant observation. Both adults and children were observed in as many situations as possible. Interviewing took the form of informal conversation. Only two aspects of data collection assumed any degree of formality. These were the recording of genealogies and of general census information such as the sex, age, education, and employment of household members. During census interviews, mental notes were taken of the physical surroundings. In particular, the number, size, and functions of rooms, and the amount, condition, and functions of furniture and appliances were noted. An analytical tool was devised to assist in the organization and analysis of the ethnographic data, according to the research aims presented above. This theoretical framework was based on those presented in works by J.W.M. Whiting and B.B. Whiting. Essentially, the data were categorized into manageable segments labelled Ecology, Maintenance Systems (including Economy, Social Structure, and Political Structure), Adult Personality, Adult Behavior, Projective Systems (including Religion and the Supernatural, and Medical Practices), Child-Rearing Practices, Child Personality, and Child Behavior. The data were presented under these headings and then the relationships between the categories of data were analyzed, the continuities and discontinuities between child-rearing practices and each of the other data categories being particularly noted. The conclusions were briefly as follows: In the Maintenance System -- Economy, Child-Rearing Practices were found to be consistent with traditional economic practices. Inconsistencies and discontinuities were evident, however, between child-rearing practices and modern economic role expectations. These present-day expectations included the roles of wage-earner and of Band administrator. The patterns of formal education were also found to be discontinuous with the roles which children would be required to fulfil as adults. Although changes were found to be occurring in education patterns, they appeared to emanate from the children themselves, manifesting in adolescence; new educational goals were not seen to be stressed in child training. In the Social Structure, it was found that child training was not adequately preparing the young for meeting and relating to non-kin; here again there were inconsistencies between child-rearing practices and adult role requirements. It was found, however, that consistent changes were occurring in kinship terminology in response to changing ideas and attitudes regarding courtship and marriage customs; these changing attitudes were being incorporated into patterns of child rearing. In the Political Structure, it was found that child-rearing practices in no way prepare children for future roles as Band leaders. However, the adult leaders appear to cope admirably and perhaps no special preparation is necessary. Only independence training appeared to present problems in the political sphere, where teamwork is essential. One aspect of child training, discipline, was examined in detail; its interrelationships with each category of data were discussed. / Arts, Faculty of / Anthropology, Department of / Graduate

Clinical child psychology supposedly bridges the gap between clinical and developmental psychology. Nonetheless, there has been a dearth of communication between the two disciplines. For example, there have been no investigations as to whether various behavioral parenting techniques are differentially effective with children of different ages or whether the developmental literature on the use of rationales and modeling with children might be relevant for behavioral parent training. The purpose of this study was to examine whether maternal use of an extinction (ignoring) procedure was differentially effective depending upon the age of the child and whether its effectiveness could be enhanced by the use of verbal rationales and/or modeling procedures. Experimental sessions took place in a laboratory playroom where the mother issued a set of 20 standard commands to the child. Eighty mother-child pairs were recruited through advertisement and randomly assigned to one of four conditions: Ignoring (mothers implemented an ignoring procedure contingent upon child noncompliance), Rationale (in addition to the above, mothers provided the children with a standardized verbal rationale prior to the session), Modeling (in addition to the ignoring procedure and the rationale, mothers demonstrated the procedure to the child prior to the session), and Control (no consequences for noncompliance). Children were from one of two age ranges: 3-4% years or 5%-7% years. Observational measures of child behavior included initiated compliance (within 5 seconds), completed compliance (within 1 minute), and inappropriate behavior (whining, crying, etc.)- Interobserver agreement was at least 8770 for each behavior. A Parental Satisfaction Questionnaire was developed to assess the social validity of the various procedures. Data were analyzed by analyses of variance. With respect to both measures of compliance, children in the Rationale and Modeling groups were more compliant than children in the Control or Ignoring groups. Older children were more compliant than younger children, regardless of group. With respect to inappropriate behavior, children in the Ignoring group were significantly more inappropriate than children in the other three groups. There were no systematic effects of age. On the Parental Satisfaction Questionnaire, mothers in the Rationale and Modeling Groups were more satisfied with the parenting procedure than mothers in the Ignoring group. These results indicate that having parents provide a verbal rationale and/or model ignoring prior to its use enhances child compliance to maternal commands, reduces the extinction burst phenomenon associated with ignoring, and enhances parental satisfaction with the ignoring procedure. The procedures were equally effective with children of different ages. More generally, the results indicate the relevance of empirical research in developmental psychology for enhancing the effects of child behavior therapy. / Arts, Faculty of / Psychology, Department of / Graduate

The purpose of this study shall be to determine whether or not any relationship exists between child-rearing attitudes of parents and anxiety in their children. Not only will the attitudes of the mothers be concerned, but also those of the fathers.

This study proposes to examine the impact of an adult education course on the attitudes and orientation of child care workers. Therefore, the researcher has confined her discussion of the Iiterature mainly to examples of research and theory developed in the area of adult education.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

A paper-and-pencil instrument measuring parenting behaviors in hypothetical child rearing Situations was developed, based on Maccoby and Martin’s (1983) fourfold classification of parenting typologies. Maccoby and Martin’s model was expanded and examined from a circumplex perspective; the dimension of warmth/hostility was separated into categories reflecting various degrees of warmth/hostility (over-protective, responsive, hostile, and rejecting). Likewise, the dimension of control was separated into categories reflecting various degrees of control (restrictive, guiding, permissive, and uninvolved). The instrument developed, or the Parent Behaviors Instrument (PBI), consisted of 20 childrearing vignettes describing typical situations that parents of preschoolers might face, followed by four alternative actions that the parent might take in responding to the vignette. The four alternative actions corresponded to each of the four categories of the degrees of parental warmth/hostility and the four categories of the degrees of parental control discussed previously. The Parent Behaviors Instrument was administered to 59 subjects, who were predominantly white and middle class. Reliability and factor analysis were assessed for the instrument. Validity of the instrument was determined by comparing the results obtained on the instrument to the results obtained from administering Emmerich’s (1969) version of the Parent Attitudes Research Instrument (PARI) and to results obtained from in-home observations of parent-child interactions. Results indicated that the reliabilities of the warmth/hostility and control scales of the PBI and were moderate; reliabilities of the eight component subscales tended to be low. Only items belonging to subscales with higher reliabilities had consistent factor loadings. The PBI subscale designed to measure uninvolved parental behaviors was significantly related to the PARI’s authoritarian control scale score. The PBI subscales measuring responsive and guiding parental behaviors were Significantly related to the authoritative style of parenting, assessed through home observations. / Master of Science

M.S.

This one-year longitudinal study was designed to illuminate the direction of the causal arrow between children's perceptions of their mother's behavior and children's attachment style during a period of development that has been relatively neglected in research on attachment - preadolescence. The possibility that children's behavior problems moderate the influence of perceived parenting on attachment, or of attachment on perceived parenting, was also investigated. Participants were an ethnically diverse sample of 407 children (213 girls, 194 boys) who were in the fourth grade at initial testing (M age = 11 years 1 month). Measures included children's perceptions of five maternal behaviors (harassment, overprotectiveness, monitoring, affectionate contact, and reliable support), peer reports of children's behavior problems (internalizing and externalizing), and children's self-perceived attachment styles (preoccupied and avoidant). Contrary to a traditional attachment perspective, there was limited evidence that perceptions of parenting led to change in children's attachment styles. Though children with internalizing problems who perceived their mother as harassing developed preoccupied attachment over time, and children with externalizing problems who perceived their mother as v overprotective developed avoidant attachment over time. However, there was considerable support for the reverse causal hypothesis that children's attachment style influences how they perceive their mother: Preoccupied attachment predicted increasingly favorable perceptions of maternal behavior over time (reduced harassment and increased monitoring), whereas avoidant attachment predicted increasingly unfavorable perceptions of the mother over time (increased harassment, reduced monitoring, reduced affectionate contact, and reduced reliable support). Children's behavior problems moderated a few of these relations. / Overall, results support a "child effects" interpretation of the links between perceived parenting and attachment styles during preadolescence. / by Meenakshi Menon. / Vita. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2008. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, FL : 2008 Mode of access: World Wide Web.