Researchers who have previously explored the relation of broad-based temperamental approach constructs, such as surgency/extraversion, exuberance, or behavioral approach sensitivity, to academic competence (AC) in early elementary school have often found conflicting results. Moreover, few researchers have examined the interaction between these approach reactivity constructs and effortful control (EC) in the prediction of AC. The goal of the current study was to examine the fine-tuned relations of different aspects of temperamental approach reactivity in early childhood (42 and 54 months; N=223), such as impulsivity, frustration, and positive affect, as well as EC, to AC during early elementary school (72 and 84 months). Examining the complex relations may clarify the literature using broad-based approach reactivity constructs. Temperament was observed in the laboratory when children were 54 months of age. Mothers and caregivers also reported on children's impulsivity at 42 and 54 months. School-related behavioral adjustment was reported by children, mothers, and teachers, and GPA was reported by teachers at 72 and 84 months. The results of the study indicated that positive affect, EC, and receptive language ability were the only unique direct predictors of school adjustment and/or GPA. Without EC in the model, only positive affect and vocabulary predicted AC. Frustration, positive affect, and impulsivity each interacted with EC to predict AC outcomes, such EC was only related to higher AC for children with high impulsivity or anger, or low positive affect. Additionally, positive affect and impulsivity interacted to predict GPA, such that impulsivity was positively related to GPA for children with high positive affect, but it was negatively, albeit nonsignificantly, associated with GPA for children with low positive affect. These results were found to be similar for boys and girls. Finding are discussed in terms of the developmental importance of early EC for academic competence for children who have high approach reactivity, as well as the interactive effects of dimensions of approach reactivity on academic achievement.

In two separate publications, the average patterns of, and individual differences in, preschoolers' selective attention processes were investigated using a multilevel modeling framework. In Publication 1, using two independent samples (Ns= 42, 75), preschoolers' selective attention towards different types of emotions (both positive and negative) was examined using two eye-tracking tasks. The results showed that, on average, children selectively attended to valenced emotional information more than neutral emotional information. In addition, a majority of children were able to detect the different emotional stimulus among three neutral stimuli during the visual search task. Children were more likely to detect angry than sad emotional expressions among neutral faces; however, no difference was found between detection of angry and happy faces among neutral faces. In Publication 2, the associations of children's anger and sadness proneness to their attention biases towards anger and sad emotional information, respectively, and the relations of these biases to various aspects children's social functioning and adjustment were examined among preschool-aged children (N = 75). Children's predisposition to anger and sadness were shown to be related to attentional biases towards those specific emotions, particularly if children lacked the ability to regulate their attention. Similarly, components of attention regulation played an important role in moderating the associations of biases towards angry information to aggressive behaviors, social competence, and anxiety symptoms. Biases towards sadness were unrelated to maladjustment or social functioning. Findings were discussed in terms of the importance of attention biases and attention regulation as well as the implications of the findings for attention training programs.  

The current study delineated the developmental trajectories of early childhood externalizing and internalizing symptoms reported by mothers and fathers, and examined the role of the 18-month observed parenting quality × Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia

(RSA) interaction in predicting these trajectories. Child sex was tested as a covariate and moderator. It was found that children's low baseline RSA or high RSA reactivity , in comparison to high baseline RSA or low RSA reactivity , was more reactive as a function

of early parenting quality when predicting the development of early childhood problem symptoms. Differential patterns of the interaction between parenting quality and RSA were detected for mothers' and fathers' reports. Mother-reported models showed a diathesis-stress pattern, whereas the father-reported model showed a vantage-sensitivity pattern, especially for internalizing symptoms. This may imply the potential benefit of fathers' active engagement in children's early development. In addition, the effect of the parenting quality × RSA interaction in predicting the mother-reported models was found

to be further moderated by child sex. Specifically, the parenting quality × baseline RSA interaction was significantly predictive of girls' 54-month internalizing, and the parenting quality × RSA reactivity interaction significantly predicted boys' internalizing slope. Girls with low baseline RSA or boys with high RSA reactivity were vulnerable to the less positive parenting, exhibiting high levels of 54-month internalizing symptoms or slow decline in internalizing over time, respectively. Future research directions were discussed in terms of integrating the measures of SNS and PNS in psychopathology study,

exploring the mechanisms underlying the sex difference in parenting quality × RSA interaction, and comparing the findings of children's typical and atypical development.

This study investigated father-child Activation Theory and the impact of activative fathering on children's dysregulation and social skills. The sample followed 145 families of typically developing children across ages 4 to 6. Fathering and mothering behaviors were coded via naturalistic observations at child age 4, children's dysregulation was coded during a laboratory puzzle task at age 5, and children's social skills were rated by parents and teachers at age 6. Results found support for a constellation of activative fathering behaviors unique to father-child interactions. Activative fathering, net of mothering behaviors, predicted decreased behavioral dysregulation one year later. Support was not found for moderation of the relation between activative fathering and children's dysregulation by paternal warmth, nor was support found for children's dysregulation as a mediator of the relation between activative fathering and children's social skills. These results suggest that parenting elements of father-child activation are unique to fathering and may be more broadly observable in naturalistic contexts not limited to play activities alone. Additionally, activative fathering appears to uniquely influence children's self-regulatory abilities above and beyond identical mothering behavior. In the present work, paternal warmth was not a necessary for activative fathering to positively contribute to children's regulatory abilities nor did children's dysregulation link activative fathering to social skills.

Guided by Belsky's Determinants of Parenting Process Model, the goal of the present study was to examine how mothers' personality (i.e., Conscientiousness) and behaviors (i.e., sensitivity, structure, and negative control) relate to children's developmental outcomes, such as internalization (i.e., committed compliance and effortful control) and academic adaptation. A multi-method, longitudinal model included five waves of data to examine the processes of the relations among variables. Mothers' Conscientiousness was measured via self-reported data when children were 18 months of age (N = 256), mothers' parenting behaviors were measured through observational laboratory tasks when children were 30 months (N = 230), children's internalization was measured using mothers' and caregivers' reports as well as observational data at 42 months (N = 210), and children's school adaptation was measured when children were 72 and 84 months (Ns = 169 and 144) using mothers' and teachers' reports. Through a series of regression analyses, the results supported the mediated effect of effortful control in the relation between mothers' behaviors and children's school adaptation. As hypothesized, mothers' Conscientiousness marginally predicted children's internalization. Contrary to hypotheses, mothers' Conscientiousness was unrelated to parenting behaviors and children's academic adaptation. Mothers' sensitivity interacted with maternal structure to predict children's effortful control. Socioeconomic status and child sex interacted with mothers' behaviors in predicting the child's committed compliance. The discussion focuses on the unique role of parenting practices and personality on children's internalization and academic adaptation and on the existing literature. Implications of the study for clinicians and intervention researchers are offered.

Using data from an eight-year longitudinal study of 214 children's social and emotional development, I conducted three studies to (1) examine patterns of agreement for internalizing (INT) and externalizing (EXT) symptomatology among different informants (mothers, fathers, teachers, and adolescents) using a recently developed structural equation modeling approach for multi-trait, multi-method data; (2) examine the developmental trajectories for INT and EXT and predict individual differences in symptom development using temperament and parenting variables; and (3) describe patterns of INT and EXT co-occurrence and predict these patterns from temperament and parenting. In Study 1, longitudinal invariance was established for mothers', fathers' and teachers' reports over a six-year period. Sex, age, and SES did not substantially moderate agreement among informants, although both sex and age were differentially related to symptomatology depending on the informant. Agreement among teachers and mothers, but not among mothers and fathers, differed by domain of symptomatology, and was greater for EXT than for INT. In Study 2, latent profile analysis, a person-centered analytic approach, did not provide easily interpretable patterns of symptom development, a failure that is likely the result of the relatively modest sample size. Latent growth curve models, an alternative analytic approach, did provide good fit to the data. Temperament and parenting variables were examined as predictors of the latent growth parameters in these models. Although there was little prediction of the slope, effortful control was negatively related to overall levels of EXT, whereas impulsivity and anger were positively related. Mutually responsive orientation, a measure of the parent-child relationship, was a more consistent predictor of EXT than was parental warmth. Furthermore, the relation between mutually responsive orientation and EXT was partially mediated by inhibitory control. Across informants, there were few consistent predictors of INT. In Study 3, latent profile analysis was used to classify individuals into different patterns of INT and EXT co-occurrence. In these models, a similar class structure was identified for mothers and for teachers. When temperament and parenting were examined as predictors of co-occurring symptomatology, few significant interactions were found and results largely replicated prior findings from this data set using arbitrary symptom groups.

The purpose of the current study was to use structural equation modeling-based quantitative genetic models to characterize latent genetic and environmental influences on proneness to three discrete negative emotions in middle childhood, according to mother-report, father-report and in-home observation. One primary aim was to test the extent to which covariance among the three emotions could be accounted for by a single, common genetically- and environmentally-influenced negative emotionality factor. A second aim was to examine the extent to which different reporters appeared to be tapping into the same genetically- and environmentally-influenced aspects of each emotion. According to mother- and father-report, moderate to high genetic influences were evident for all emotions, with mother- and father-report of fear and father-report of anger showing the highest heritability. Significant common environmental influences were also found for mother-report of anger and sadness in both univariate and multivariate models. For observed emotion, anger was moderately heritable with no evidence for common environmental variance, but sadness, object fear and social fear all showed modest to moderate common environmental influences and no significant genetic variance. In addition, cholesky decompositions examining genetic and environmental influences across reporter suggested that despite considerable overlap between mother-report and father-report, there was also reporter-specific variance on anger, sadness, and fear. Specifically, there were significant common environmental influences on mother-report of anger- and sadness that were not shared with father-report, and genetic influences on father-report of sadness and fear that were not shared with mother-report. In-home observations were not highly correlated enough with parent-report to support multivariate analysis for any emotion. Finally, according to both mother- and father-report, a single set of genetic and environmental influences was sufficient to account for covariance among all three negative emotions. However, fear was primarily explained by genetic influences not shared with other emotions, and anger also showed considerable emotion-specific genetic variance. In both cases, findings support the value of a more emotion-specific approach to temperament, and highlight the need to consider distinctions as well as commonalities across emotions, reporters and situations.

The moderating effects of five characteristics of peers--their effortful control, anger, sadness, aggression, and positive peer behavior--were investigated in two separate series of analyses of preschooler's social behavior: (a) the relation between children's own effortful control and social behavior, and (b) the relation between children's shyness and reticent behavior. Latent variable interactions were conducted in a structural equation framework. Peer context anger and effortful control, albeit with unexpected results, interacted with children's own characteristics to predict their behavior in both the EC and shy model series; these were the only significant interactions obtained for the EC model series. The relation between shyness and reticent behavior, however, showed the greatest impact of peer context and, conversely, the greatest susceptibility to environmental variations; significant interactions were obtained in all five models, despite the limited range of peer context sadness and aggression observed in this study.

The present study examined the relations of children's effortful control (EC), emotion understanding, maladjustment, social competence, and relationship quality with nonparental caregivers in a sample of 30-, 42-, and 54-month olds. EC was measured with mothers' and caregivers' reports, as well as observed behavioral tasks. Emotion understanding was assessed by asking children to identify emotions during a puppet task. Mothers and caregivers also reported on children's problem behaviors and social competence. Caregivers provided reports of the quality of their relationship with children. Results from longitudinal structural equation models indicated that even after controlling for sex, SES, language ability, and previous levels of constructs, emotion understanding predicted EC one year later at 42 and 54 months. In addition, children with higher EC had more positive relationships with caregivers at 42 and 54 months. Although EC and EU were not significantly related to maladjustment and social competence after accounting for within time covariation among constructs and longitudinal stability, marginal findings were in expected directions and suggested that more regulated children with better emotion understanding skills had fewer behavioral problems and were more socially skilled. Findings are discussed in terms of the strengths and limitations of the present study.

This study examines the relations among three aspects of temperament (shyness, impulsivity, and effortful control), resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) recorded during a calming film and RSA suppression during three behavioral measures of effortful control, and adjustment (anxiety and externalizing behavior) in a sample of 101 preschool-age children. Principal components analysis was used to create composites for effortful control, shyness, impulsivity, anxiety, and externalizing behavior, and hierarchical regression analysis was used to test the study hypotheses. As expected, baseline RSA was negatively related to effortful control in shy children, but was unrelated to effortful control in children who were not shy. It was hypothesized that high baseline RSA would reduce the relation between shyness and anxiety, and between impulsivity and externalizing behavior; this hypothesis was supported for externalizing behavior, but not for anxiety. The interaction between impulsivity and RSA as a predictor of externalizing was statistically independent of effortful control, indicating that these are unique effects. Finally, it was hypothesized that RSA suppression would be positively related to effortful control for children low, but not high, in shyness. There was a marginal interaction between shyness and RSA suppression, with RSA suppression marginally negatively related to EC for children low in shyness, but unrelated to effortful control for children high in shyness; the direction of this association was opposite predictions. These findings indicate that RSA is more strongly related to effortful control for children high in shyness, and that it consequently may not be appropriate to use RSA as an index of EC for all children. This study also draws attention to the need to consider the context in which baseline RSA is measured because a true baseline may not be obtained for shy children if RSA is measured in an unfamiliar laboratory context. The finding that high RSA moderated (but did not eliminate) the relation between impulsivity and externalizing behavior is consistent with the conceptualization of RSA as a measure of self-regulation, but further research is needed to clarify the mechanism underlying this effect.