爱是什么——用美学的眼光读绘本《小小恋人》

试图通过儿童绘本《小小恋人》的作品赏析,以设计美学角度解构如何有效传达情感,进而引发对生命美学相关问题的思考。设计美学角度:儿童绘本如何有效完成复杂情感的沟通。生命美学角度:儿童绘本如何动态传达生命美学的内涵。     

Telescoped trajectories from alcohol initiation to disorder in children of alcoholic parents.

The current study tested whether and why children of alcoholics (COAs) showed telescoped (adolescent) drinking initiation-to-disorder trajectories as compared with non-COAs. Using longitudinal data from a community-based sample, the authors confirmed through survival analyses that COAs progressed more quickly from initial adolescent alcohol use to the onset of disorder than do matched controls. Similar risks for telescoping were evident in COAs whose parents were actively symptomatic versus those whose parents had been previously diagnosed. Stronger telescoping effects were observed for COAs whose parents showed comorbidity for either depression or antisocial personality disorder. Both greater externalizing symptoms and more frequent, heavier drinking patterns at initiation failed to explain COAs' risk for telescoping, although externalizing symptoms were a unique predictor of telescoping. This risk for telescoping was also evident for drug disorders. These findings characterize a risky course of drinking in COAs and raise important questions concerning the underlying mechanisms and consequences of telescoping in COAs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effectiveness of antismoking public service announcements on children's intent to smoke.

The authors randomly assigned 5th- and 8th-grade students to 1 of 3 treatment conditions to study the effects of frequency of exposure to an antismoking public service announcement (PSA) on the students' intent to smoke over time. They found that, among younger children only, viewing an antismoking PSA at least once reduced smoking intentions, although these positive effects did not remain over time. However, the antismoking PSA was effective for younger at-risk children. After younger at-risk children viewed the antismoking PSA once, their intent to smoke decreased significantly. Notably, these positive effects remained stable over time and mirrored the smoking intentions of younger children who were not identified as at risk. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The sources of normativity: Young children's awareness of the normative structure of games.

In two studies, the authors investigated 2- and 3-year-old children's awareness of the normative structure of conventional games. In the target conditions, an experimenter showed a child how to play a simple rule game. After the child and the experimenter had played for a while, a puppet came (controlled by a 2nd experimenter), asked to join in, and then performed an action that constituted a mistake in the game. In control conditions, the puppet performed the exact same action as in the experimental conditions, but the context was different such that this act did not constitute a mistake. Children's normative responses to the puppet's acts (e.g., protest, critique, or teaching) were scored. Both age groups performed more normative responses in the target than in the control conditions, but the 3-year-olds did so on a more explicit level. These studies demonstrate in a particularly strong way that even very young children have some grasp of the normative structure of conventional activities. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Tracking and inferring spatial rotation by children and great apes.

Finding hidden objects in space is a fundamental ability that has received considerable research attention from both a developmental and a comparative perspective. Tracking the rotational displacements of containers and hidden objects is a particularly challenging task. This study investigated the ability of 3-, 5-, 7-, and 9-year-old children and great apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, and orangutans) to (a) visually track rotational displacements of a baited container on a platform and (b) infer its displacements by using the changes of position or orientation of 3 landmarks: an object on a container, the color of the containers, and the color of the platform on which the containers rested. Great apes and 5-year-old and older children successfully tracked visible rotations, but only children were able to infer the location of a correct cup (with the help of landmarks) after invisible rotations. The ability to use landmarks changed with age so that younger children solved this task only with the most explicit marker on the baited container, whereas older children, particularly 9-year-olds, were able to use landmark orientation to infer correct locations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Hermon Wilkes Martin (1892–1997).

Memorializes Hermon Wilkes Martin, a pioneer of psychology in the South. Martin taught at Emory University for 40 yrs and led the formation of the Georgia Psychological Association. He was instrumental in the move to license psychologists and shepherded the inaugural bill to create the Georgia State Board of Examiners in Psychology through the state legislature in 1951. In addition, Martin founded the Howard School for children with attention deficit disorder. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Control-related beliefs and depressive symptoms in clinic-referred children and adolscents: Developmental differences and model specificity.

The contingency–competence–control (CCC) model links contingency and competence beliefs to perceived control and, in turn, to depression. However, a developmental perspective suggests that noncontingency may be too abstract a concept to be directly tied to depression before adolescence. We tested the CCC model and this developmental notion, using structural equation modeling, with 360 clinic-referred 8- to 17-year-olds. The CCC model fit the data well for the full sample accounting for 46% of the variance in depression. Separate analyses by age group placed perceived contingency in the best-fit model for adolescents (ages 12–17 years) but not for children (8–11 years). This suggests that abstract cause–effect concepts may have more direct affective impact after the cognitive changes of adolescence (e.g., formal operations) than before. Finally, the CCC model accounted for much more variance in depression than conduct problems, suggesting diagnostic specificity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Les structures conceptuelles centrales à l' épreuve des faits: Le nombre, l'espace et la cognition sociale.

Presents research that tests the empirical validity of the construct of Central Conceptual Structure (SCC) proposed by R. Case to account for children's conceptual development in 3 distinct domains: number, space, and social cognition. Three batteries of tasks (numerical, spatial, and narrative) were translated and administered to 69 6–10 yr old French children. The experiment was designed to verify 3 hypotheses relative to the development of SCC: the 1st concerns developmental synchrony between the numerical, spatial and narrative SCC; the 2nd individual differences in the elaboration of SCC; and the 3rd, relation between treatment capacities and levels of conceptual structuring. Results show that the developmental synchrony postulated within SCC is not generalized to all domains and age levels; individual patterns of performance are mostly similar; and the positive correlations observed between span measures and battery scores are not sufficient to validate the relation between treatment capacities and conceptual structuring. The limits of the SCC construct both in characterizing cognition at different age levels and specifying children's reasoning in different domains of knowledge are discussed with regard to the role attributed by Case to the general capacity of treatment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Positive and negative associations with alcohol and familial risk for alcoholism.

Considerable evidence indicates that cognitions regarding favorable drinking consequences figure prominently in the development of problem drinking. Because children of alcoholics (COAs) are at particularly high risk for developing drinking problems, the authors hypothesized that they would have higher levels of such cognitions than children of nonalcoholics (CONAs). The authors administered a free-recall task consisting of alcohol, positive, negative, and neutral words to 100 college students and predicted that COAs (n?=?18) would have higher levels of positive associations (measured by contiguous recall) and lower levels of negative associations with alcohol than would CONAs (n?=?82). The results indicated that although COAs had significantly fewer negative associations than CONAs they had statistically comparable levels of positive associations. Early intervention efforts among COAs may be enhanced by placing increased emphasis on alcohol's negative consequences. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Short-term group play therapy with Chinese earthquake victims: Effects on anxiety, depression and adjustment.

Investigated the effectiveness of short-term child-centered group play therapy in elementary school settings with Chinese children in Taiwan who experienced an earthquake in 1999. 65 children (aged 8-12 yrs) were screened. Children in the experimental group scored significantly lower on anxiety level and suicide risk after play therapy than did children in the control group. The effects of the treatment support previous studies of play therapy with American children. These findings reveal the possibility of disaster intervention services adopting Western helping techniques with school children of non-Western cultures. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)