Childrens Peer Relations Issues In Assessment And Intervention

Willard W. Hartup This volume amounts to an anniversary collection: It was 50 years ago that Lois Jack (1934) published the findings from what most investigators consider to be the first intervention study in this area. The experiment (later replicated and extended by Marjorie Page, 1936, and Gertrude Chittenden, 1942) concerned ascendant behavior in preschool children, which was defined to include: (a) The pursuit of one's own purposes against interference and (b) directing the behavior of others. Individual differences in ascendance were assumed to have some stability across time and, hence, to be important in personality development. But ascendance variations were also viewed as a function of the immediate situation. Among the conditions assumed to determine ascendance were "the individual's status in the group as expressed in others' attitudes toward him, his conception of these attitudes, and his previously formed social habits" (Jack, 1934, p. 10). Dr. Jack's main interest was to show that nonascendant children, identified on the basis of observations in the laboratory with another child, were different from their more ascendant companions in one important respect: They lacked self confidence. And, having demonstrated that, Dr. Jack devised a procedure for teaching the knowledge and skill to nonascendant children that the play materials required. She guessed, correctly, that this training would bring about an increase in the ascendance scores of these children.

Children's Peer Relations presents an up-to-date overview of the latest findings in the area of childhood relationships. An international group of researchers and clinicians review current theory, research and intervention strategies across a wide range of topics including: peer status, gender and ethnicity, disability, illness and loneliness. There is also critical examination of methods of intervention to improve children's relations with others in school, family and community. Children's Peer Relations will provide social researchers, school counsellors, psychologists and students of child development with a comprehensive handbook on this crucial topic.

How we raise young children is one of today's most highly personalized and sharply politicized issues, in part because each of us can claim some level of "expertise." The debate has intensified as discoveries about our development-in the womb and in the first months and years-have reached the popular media. How can we use our burgeoning knowledge to assure the well-being of all young children, for their own sake as well as for the sake of our nation? Drawing from new findings, this book presents important conclusions about nature-versus-nurture, the impact of being born into a working family, the effect of politics on programs for children, the costs and benefits of intervention, and other issues. The committee issues a series of challenges to decision makers regarding the quality of child care, issues of racial and ethnic diversity, the integration of children's cognitive and emotional development, and more. Authoritative yet accessible, From Neurons to Neighborhoods presents the evidence about "brain wiring" and how kids learn to speak, think, and regulate their behavior. It examines the effect of the climate-family, child care, community-within which the child grows.

This study attempts to demonstrate that social relationships are an integral part of a child's broader social and psychological functioning. Chapters are arranged in developmental order in the sense of both age and relationship growth, moving from initial attachments to peer friendships.

Why is it that relationships with family members predict the quality of children's relationships outside the family? A wealth of research has documented that various aspects of family relationships are predictably related to the quality of children's interactions and relationships with peers. Understanding what account for these effects is important both for theories of children's relationships and intervention efforts to ameliorate children's peer relationship difficulties. This volume advances the field by discussing several mechanisms that may account for continuities across family and peer relationships. A variety of theoretical perspectives are represented in the book. For example, both learning and biological explanations are considered. Authors also note two key considerations in investigating family and peer relationships. First, it is necessary to consider the cultural context. The function and meaning of family and peer relationships may differ depending on what roles are played by these relationships in different cultural contexts. Second, it is necessary to consider the child's age. Developmental issues, such as concerns with establishing greater independence at the entrance to adolescence, will impact both family and peer relationships.

This book responds to the absence of a comprehensive consideration of the implications of culture for children's peer relationships. Although research in this field has burgeoned in recent years, cultural issues have often been overlooked. The chapters tap such issues as the impact of social circumstances and cultural values on peer relationships, culturally prescribed socialization patterns and processes, emotional experience and regulation in peer interactions, children's social behaviors in peer interactions, cultural aspects of friendships, and peer influences on social and school adjustment in cultural context. The authors incorporate into their discussions findings from research programs using multiple methodologies, including both qualitative (e.g., interviewing, ethnographic and observational) and quantitative (e.g., large scale surveys, standardized questionnaires) approaches, based on a wide range of ages of children in cultures from East to West and from South to North (Asia, South America, the Mid-East, Southern Europe, and ethnic groups in the US).

In the second edition of his unique study of peer relationships in childhood, Dr Barry Schneider re-examines this fundamental aspect of childhood. Taking the work of Jacob Moreno as its starting point, the book provides an up-to-date and accessible understanding of how children develop social competence in different environments, from school to cyberspace. It is informed by a cross-cultural perspective that examines how peer relationships vary in different cultures, as well as among children who have migrated to a new culture, and provides increased coverage of how bullying is perceived and managed within peer groups. The book is informed, too, by new research techniques, both qualitative and quantitative, which mean we know far more about how children relate to each other than ever before. Childhood Friendships and Peer Relations is a fascinating and very timely overview of what we know about making friends and enemies in childhood, showing how these relationships can have lasting effects. It will be essential reading to all students of Developmental Psychology and Educational Psychology, as well as anyone training towards a career working with children and young people.

This book examines the role of peer relationships in child and adolescent development by tracking research findings from the early 1900s to the present. Dividing the research into three generations, the book describes what has been learned about children's peer relations and how children's participation in peer relationships contributes to their health, adjustment, and achievement. Gary W. Ladd reviews and interprets the investigative focus and findings of distinct research eras to highlight theoretical or empirical breakthroughs in the study of children's peer relations and social competence over the last century. He also discusses how this information is relevant to understanding and promoting children's health and development. In a final chapter, the author appraises the major discoveries that have emerged during the three research generations and analyzes recent scientific agendas and discoveries in the peer relations discipline.