Analogical reasoning is a foundational skill necessary for enabling learners to draw inferences about new experiences, to transfer learning across contexts, and to make abstractions based on relevant information from daily experiences. Linguistic and executive function (EF) skills may support analogical reasoning ability, as both these skill sets have previously been shown to influence other higher-order cognitive abilities, such as perspective taking. Outside influences such as socio-economic status (SES) backgrounds may also influence analogical reasoning, as they have been shown to affect other cognitive processes. At present, current research offers little information about developmental relations among SES, language, EF and analogical learning. The purpose of this dissertation research was to explore the extent to which the provision of relational language facilitates children’s analogical reasoning, and to investigate the influence of SES, executive function and language skills in regard to such facilitation. Results indicate that the use of relational language indeed aids analogical reasoning. SES significantly predicted analogical reasoning, but interestingly, this was so only when relational language was absent. These findings support that relational language plays a key role in scaffolding analogical reasoning, and this support is particularly beneficial to children whose cognitive skills may be influenced by SES.

Background and aims: Southern European countries have been showing high overweight and obesity (OW/OB) rates especially among the younger generations (Cattaneo et al. 2010). Portugal is one of those countries with 37.9% overweight and 15.3% obesity in 6 to 8 year olds (Rito et al. 2012). However little is known about the health of ethnic minorities living in its capital city, Lisbon. The Cape Verdean community in Lisbon, the second largest group in Portugal, would be expected to be more affected by this epidemic due to social inequalities. This community also tend to have low educational levels, material deprivation and struggle with discrimination and racism, factors that would likely be associated with a higher prevalence of OW/OB. The aim of this study was to assess the nutritional status of Cape Verdean ancestry children aged 6 to 12 years old living in Lisbon according to their socioeconomic status, general living conditions, family composition, diet and physical activity levels. To compare the findings with previous projects conducted in 1993 and 2009 in the same location with Cape Verdean ancestry children and with Portuguese ancestry children (national study conducted in 2009). To determine what early life factors have significant effect on these children's nutritional health. Methods : Physical measures and household information were collected from November 2013 to February 2014 in Cova da Moura Neighbourhood in Lisbon. Physical measures included height, weight, skinfolds, arm and waist circumferences. From these survey data body mass index (BMI) and the prevalence of stunting (chronic malnutrition - low height-for- age) and underweight (low-weight-for-age) were calculated according to reference values proposed by Frisancho (2008). Overweight and obesity values were defined based on the references established by the International Obesity Task Force (IOTF), CDC, and WHO depending on the specific aim or research question. Results: Results show this is a very deprived community with low educational levels and mostly employed in the service sector. Maternal height and child birth order showed a significant association with child's height. Moreover maternal height and age are associated with child leg length. Living in a single parent family is associated with an increase in child BMI of 1.412 units when accounting for maternal waist circumference. Also significant differences in height for boys and girls were observed between Cape Verdean and Portuguese children. Generally, Cape Verdeans growth falls within the healthy range of International growth references across all of the survey data collected. Cape Verdean rates for combined over nutrition (overweight and obesity) in 2013 (9.8% for boys and 16.7% for girls) are lower than the Portuguese (33% for boys and 31.7% for girls). Logistic regression models showed that Cape Verdean children have a lower risk of being OW/OB compared to Portuguese children when accounting for breastfeeding,birth weight,maternal education and occupation. Conclusions : Despite living in a deprived neighbourhood these Cape Verdean children seem to have grown healthier than Portuguese ancestry children. The challenge for policy makers will be to support improvement of the poverty related living conditions of this community without creating a risky environment for increasing prevalence of overweight and obesity.

Purpose: Food insecurity is an important social determinant of health and is linked with higher health care costs. There is a high prevalence of food insecurity among recent immigrant households in Canada. The aim of the present project was to evaluate the prevalence of food insecurity in immigrant and non-immigrant households in Ottawa, to explore determinants of food insecurity in that population and to evaluate the link between food insecurity, diet quality and weight status. Methodology: A cross-sectional study was conducted with a convenience sample of 258 Ottawa households having a child between 6 and 12 years old, with a mother born in Sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean or Canada. Health Canada’s Household Food Security Survey Module was used to evaluate participants’ food access in the past 12 months. Children’s dietary intake was evaluated with the use of a 24-hour recall and a modified Healthy Eating Index diet quality score was calculated. Chi-square and logistic and linear regression analyses were used to determine correlates of food insecurity and its link with diet quality and weight status (n=249). Results: A high rate of food insecurity (39%) was found among participants. Household food insecurity was associated with low education attainment, lone motherhood, mother’s visible minority status, recent arrival to Canada, limited English fluency, reliance on social assistance, and subsidized/temporary/COOP housing. Food insecurity was associated with consumption of sweetened beverages, lower consumption of saturated fat among children, and with obesity among mothers. Conclusion: These findings suggest that food insecurity is associated with certain indicators of poor diet quality among children and with obesity among mothers. The findings also highlight the need for food insecurity to be explicitly addressed in immigrant integration strategies in order to improve the financial power of new immigrants to purchase sufficient, nutritious, and culturally acceptable foods. Enhancing immigrants’ access to affordable child care and well-paid jobs, improving social assistance programs, and providing more subsidized housing programs would be beneficial to help reduce food insecurity and increase diet quality.

The increase in the number of parents who decide not to enroll their children into a formal kindergarten once they become of age has triggered questions of what impacts readiness. The act of redshirting has doubled since 1980. Redshirting is simply delaying a child’s entry into kindergarten by 1 year after they become age eligible to enroll. Parents want to make sure that with high stakes testing, a more demanding curriculum, and an increase in rigorous standards that their children are ready to start kindergarten with the best opportunity for success. The purpose of this study was to examine how preschool and kindergarten teachers perceive age, gender, prior preschool experience, and socioeconomic status impact a child’s readiness for kindergarten upon school entry. The study was also an examination of perceptions of preschool and kindergarten teachers as to whether or not readiness can be determined by a readiness test. The design method chosen for this study was nonexperimental quantitative. Teachers responded to an online survey. The survey was distributed via email to preschool and kindergarten teachers who were employed in 2 rural east Tennessee counties. This study included the responses of 46 participants who chose to respond to the survey.

This qualitative research study explores the correlation between socioeconomic status and factors of psychotherapy dropout among college students who have prematurely terminated therapy while attending college. Twelve female-identifying college students were interviewed in a semi-structured design. It was predicted that socioeconomic status moderates the impact of financial and logistical barriers to access, mental health stigma, and perceived lack of socioeconomic status competency among practitioners on the decision to leave therapy prematurely, such that these factors have an amplified effect for students coming from lower socioeconomic status backgrounds. Findings indicate that logistical barriers to access are experienced across the socioeconomic spectrum, but with low socioeconomic students having fewer treatment options and an additional step of securing external funding. Results pertaining to identity competency did not indicate a socioeconomic status moderation or the specific need for socioeconomic status competence. Stigma was not found to be related to dropout. Other results are discussed. Further research should apply the present findings and recommendations to intervention-based pilot programs to investigate ways in which dropout can be reduced.

Quantity surcharges have been widespread in the marketplace for decades. However, little is known about what kinds of consumers and under what conditions they are more likely to be impacted by this pricing practice. The current research contributes to the existing literature by investigating how a person’s childhood socioeconomic status affects their reaction toward quantity surcharges during adulthood. Across four studies, we find that childhood socioeconomic status has a positive impact on the purchase of a large and surcharged package size. However, when the economic conditions are threatening, the positive effect of childhood socioeconomic status disappears. The current research also provides a theoretical explanation for the interaction effect of childhood socioeconomic status and economic conditions. The focus on acquiring sufficient resources accounts for the interaction effect.

Veteran suicide is a public health issue that requires more research to understand the multidimensional factors, such as resilience, that lead someone to suicide. Adverse childhood events (ACEs), such as poverty and abuse, have affected how resilience is developed. This study examined the association between childhood factors of socioeconomic status, parental discipline, and being a military child, and adult resiliency level. Dienstbier's theory of mental toughness framed the study, which posits that a child who experiences mild ACEs and has time to recover between events, will be more resilient than children who experience serious ACEs, and children who experience little to no ACEs. Army veterans recruited through social media and veterans' organizations, answered an online survey consisting of demographic questions, the Harsh Discipline Scale and 9 item Resiliency Scale. No significant associations were found between these ACEs and resilience level. However, when the harsh discipline scale was analyzed by individual questions, associations were shown between spanking and high resilience with reported answers of "almost always" having higher level of resilience (OR = 12.001, p = .032), and those who reported they were hit with an object scored much lower on resilience than any other category measured. Examining resilience questions individually showed that low and middle socio-economic status had statistically significant higher resilience in responding to extreme pressure in a positive way. More research is needed on these specific ACEs using Dienstbier's theory. Understanding how specific ACEs affect resilience could lead to developing better prevention strategies that focus on helping children process these ACEs and develop higher resilience as adults, thus reducing suicide in the civilian and veteran population.

Drawing from Pierre Bourdieu’s socio-cultural approach, this qualitative research project aimed to: (a) understand the responses to current body norms and expectations tied to health and physical appearances amongst underprivileged young women; and; (b) understand to what extent the dominant obesity discourse is inscribed in these women’s bodily habits. Results highlight that participants were aware of the dominant obesity discourse through their perceptions, sentiments, and dispositions towards bodily norms and expectations. Despite their awareness, underprivileged living conditions generated other sets of priorities, such as motherhood, achieving economic stability, completing education, and gaining physical independence which were far greater preoccupations. Underprivileged young women’s ‘choice of the necessary’ is based on optimizing resources and prioritizing needs and responsibilities. Findings support the use of Pierre Bourdieu’s concepts which consider the effects of various aspects of underprivileged living conditions on lifestyles.

Although several studies have demonstrated that differential parenting has a negative impact on the children exposed to it, only a small number of studies have attempted to understand why differential parenting occurs within families. The goal of the present study was to examine the contextual correlates of differential parenting. Specifically, the association between parental socioeconomic status (SES) and differential parenting and the association between objective and subjective indices of neighbourhood quality and differential parenting were investigated. Data were collected as part of the Kids, Families, and Places (KFP) study and analyzed using multilevel modeling. Six hundred and fifty families provided data on 881 children. Five hundred and ninety nine families included a father in the home. Close to seventy five percent of children included in the sample were less than six years of age. Differential parenting was assessed separately for mothers and fathers and across positive and negative parenting outcomes. The findings revealed that parental SES was significantly associated with differential parenting for three of four parenting outcomes. For mothers, SES was negatively associated with differential positivity and negativity. For fathers, SES was negatively associated with differential positivity but not negativity. The objective quality of neighbourhoods in which families resided (i.e., measured as a composite score that combined census tract data on neighbourhood disadvantage and interviewer observations of neighbourhood physical and social disorder) was positively associated with maternal differential negativity; however, this association was also moderated by mothers’ subjective perceptions of their neighbourhoods (i.e., measured using maternal reports of neighbourhood collective efficacy). In other words, when mothers perceived their neighbourhoods to be highly cohesive and supportive, exposure to objectively unfavourable neighbourhood conditions was less strongly associated with differential negativity. Objective neighbourhood quality was not associated with the other three differential parenting outcomes of interest. These findings highlight the important relationship that exists between contextual influences both within and outside of the immediate family and differential parenting. Moreover, they speak to the importance of including both mothers and fathers in studies of differential parenting. The merits of using multilevel modelling to investigate differential parenting and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Although several studies have demonstrated that differential parenting has a negative impact on the children exposed to it, only a small number of studies have attempted to understand why differential parenting occurs within families. The goal of the present study was to examine the contextual correlates of differential parenting. Specifically, the association between parental socioeconomic status (SES) and differential parenting and the association between objective and subjective indices of neighbourhood quality and differential parenting were investigated. Data were collected as part of the Kids, Families, and Places (KFP) study and analyzed using multilevel modeling. Six hundred and fifty families provided data on 881 children. Five hundred and ninety nine families included a father in the home. Close to seventy five percent of children included in the sample were less than six years of age. Differential parenting was assessed separately for mothers and fathers and across positive and negative parenting outcomes. The findings revealed that parental SES was significantly associated with differential parenting for three of four parenting outcomes. For mothers, SES was negatively associated with differential positivity and negativity. For fathers, SES was negatively associated with differential positivity but not negativity. The objective quality of neighbourhoods in which families resided (i.e., measured as a composite score that combined census tract data on neighbourhood disadvantage and interviewer observations of neighbourhood physical and social disorder) was positively associated with maternal differential negativity; however, this association was also moderated by mothers’ subjective perceptions of their neighbourhoods (i.e., measured using maternal reports of neighbourhood collective efficacy). In other words, when mothers perceived their neighbourhoods to be highly cohesive and supportive, exposure to objectively unfavourable neighbourhood conditions was less strongly associated with differential negativity. Objective neighbourhood quality was not associated with the other three differential parenting outcomes of interest. These findings highlight the important relationship that exists between contextual influences both within and outside of the immediate family and differential parenting. Moreover, they speak to the importance of including both mothers and fathers in studies of differential parenting. The merits of using multilevel modelling to investigate differential parenting and suggestions for future research are discussed.