Sex, ethnicity, and play preferences of preschool children.

"Preschool children of Oriental… and Caucasian… background were observed, using a time-sampling technique; and their choices of play companions were analyzed. Children in both ethnic groups were found to prefer play companions of their own sex, this tendency being more pronounced in boys than in girls." Ss tended to play with dolls resembling their own race. From Psyc Abstracts 36:04:4FF83M. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development of collaborative problem solving among preschool children.

Identified the communication behaviors that enhanced collaborative problem solving in 3–5 yr olds. 32 dyads, matched by age, sex, and friendship, were videotaped as they used balance scales to locate matching pairs of blocks from sets that varied in weight and surface design, but not in size. Findings indicate major skill development in collaborative problem solving during the preschool years. Adequate vocabulary both for labeling objects and for relational concepts was the key to more successful collaboration. However, the vocabulary employed in such peer interaction did not always correspond to adult referential meanings: Children's use of "big" and "little," although the blocks were identical in size, facilitated successful solutions. Also productive were behaviors that enhanced attentiveness to cooperative interaction, including attention-focusing statements, questions, directives, and responsiveness to the partner. A developmental sequence of communication skills for responsive conversation, collaborative problem solving, tutoring, and persuasion is discussed. (19 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Correlates of preschool girls' feminine and masculine toy preferences.

Observed 47 preschool girls (2.5–4 yrs old) in social interaction with boys and girls. For young Ss, feminine toy preference was positively related to interaction with girls, whereas masculine toy choice was positively associated with interaction with boys. For older girls, feminine toy choice was positively related to interaction with girls. Large, older girls tended to play with masculine toys. (5 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Recognition memory in preschool children.

Tested 18 males and 18 females from each of 2 age groups (mean ages, 37 and 53 mo) on a recognition test under each of 3 conditions: (a) verbal only, (b) visual only, and (c) verbal-visual. Correct recognition was obtained for all Ss. Older Ss, however, performed significantly better than younger. Neither age group benefited from E-provided labels; performance in the visual-only and visual-verbal conditions was comparable. It is concluded that the development of mechanisms other than verbal mediator production must account for any age-related improvement in recognition performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Imaginary companions of preschool children.

The developmental significance of preschool children's imaginary companions was examined. Mothers of 78 children were interviewed about their children's social environments and imaginary companions (if their children had them). Results revealed differences between invisible companions and personified objects (e.g., stuffed animals or dolls) in terms of the pretend friends' stability and ubiquity, identity, and relationship with the child. Relationships with invisible companions were mostly described as sociable and friendly, whereas personified objects were usually nurtured. Mothers reported that personification of objects frequently occurred as a result of acquiring a toy, whereas invisible friends were often viewed as fulfilling a need for a relationship. Compared to children without imaginary companions, children with imaginary companions were more likely to be firstborn and only children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Peer preferences and social interaction among third-grade children in an integrated school district.

Assessed social interaction among Black and White 3rd-grade children in 9 classrooms. The children were in integrated schools since kindergarten. Two methods were employed: a roster-and-rating sociometric technique and a classroom behavioral observation procedure using sequential time sampling. Sociometric data were obtained for 179 White and 48 Black children. Observational data were obtained for 39 White and 39 Black children. Both race and sex were found to be significant determinants of sociometric ratings for play and work. Omega-squared analyses, however, indicated that sex accounted for 43.2% of the variance on play and 35.2% on work, while race accounted for only about 1% of the variance on each measure. The observational data indicate a positive pattern of classroom interaction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Selective listening asymmetry in preschool children.

42 right-handed preschoolers listened to dichotic presentations of digit names in 2 experimental sessions. Ss were told to report only the digit arriving at the designated ear; the target ear was designated prior to the dichotic presentation in one session (precuing condition) and after the presentation in the other session (postcuing condition). A significant right-ear superiority was found for all 3 dependent variables: number of correct identifications, total number of digits reported from each ear, and number of intrusion errors. Thus, the procedure demonstrated a marked asymmetry and, therefore, left lateralization of verbal processing in children as young as 3 yrs of age. Since the magnitude of asymmetry was as great in the precuing condition as in the postcuing condition, input factors (perceptual or attentional factors) are sufficient to account for the right-ear superiority. There was no age difference in degree of right-ear advantage. Correlations between asymmetry scores in the 2 sessions ranged between .60 and .68 for the 3 dependent variables. (26 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Evidence-based family-school interventions with preschool children.

Fifteen studies of family-school interventions with preschool children conducted between 1980 and 2002, and published in peer-reviewed journals, were reviewed and evaluated according to the criteria developed by the Task Force on Evidence-Based Intervention in School Psychology (Division 16 and Society for the Study of School Psychology Task Force, 2003). Results indicate that family-school interventions with preschool children have taken many forms, have targeted a variety of problems and behaviors, and have generally shown positive effects. Efficacious interventions included parent and teacher training, parent education, and behavioral family therapy. Recommendations for future research include increased methodological rigor, replication and extension of current studies, and the completion of longer-term, follow-up investigations to determine whether gains that are made post-treatment are maintained over time. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stimulation level preferences of autistic children.

Ten autistic, 10 schizophrenic, and 10 outstandingly successful children operated a lever controlling the volume of tape-recorded sound, in a laboratory study designed to follow up clinical reports of abnormal responsiveness to auditory stimulation in autistic children. Results indicated (p     

Attachment and emotional understanding in preschool children.

This study was designed to elucidate the association between attachment and emotional understanding in preschool children. Forty children between the ages of 2.5 and 6 years and their mothers participated in the study. Mothers completed the Attachment Q-set, and children took part at their preschools in both an affective perspective-taking task and a series of interviews concerning naturally occurring incidents of emotions. Overall, age and attachment security predicted a child's aggregate score on the emotional understanding tasks. However, when the score was separated by the valence of the emotion, attachment security and age predicted a child's score for only those emotions with a negative valence (e.g., sadness) and not for those emotions with a positive valence (e.g., happiness). Thus, a secure attachment relationship seems to be important in fostering a child's understanding of emotion, primarily negative emotions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A reliable sociometric measure for preschool children.

Examined the reliability of a rating-scale sociometric technique with 19 4-yr-old children. The test–retest reliability of scores Ss received over a 4-wk interval was high compared to the stability of the traditional positive and negative nomination scores. This preschool sociometric measure has applications for the study of the behavioral correlates of early peer acceptance and for research on the effects of social skill training on children's acceptance by peers. (10 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Memory-strategy learning and maintenance in preschool children.

This study examined preschool children's abilities to maintain the use of a newly learned organizational study–recall strategy in tasks administered immediately after training and 3 and 7 days after training. 36 4- and 5-yr-olds were assigned to training and control conditions after performing study–recall tasks in a baseline session. Training included demonstration and practice in using the strategy, encouragement to apply the strategy in new tasks, a rationale for strategy use, feedback about strategy effectiveness, and incentive for effortful performance. Ss in training groups showed marked increases in study-sorting, group-naming, and category self-cuing activities in posttraining tasks. The majority of the training Ss were able to remember and sequentially perform at least 3 of the 4 instructed strategy activities in the immediate and 3-day posttraining sessions. Training also served to improve recall, but recall improvements were modest relative to posttraining gains in study-strategy activities. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Temperament and helping behavior in preschool children.

This study investigated the idea that children's temperaments, in interaction with situational factors, are related to their helping behavior. Twenty-four preschool children were each presented with four opportunities for helping a female adult during a play session in the laboratory, while their mothers rated the children's helpfulness at home. Multiple measures of sociability as well as a broad temperament measure called social adaptability were gathered from mothers and preschool teachers, some several months prior to the laboratory session and some concurrent with it. The primary hypothesis that sociable children would appear to be more helpful than less sociable children was supported for helpfulness in the laboratory, but not at home. It was suggested that this was because in the laboratory the person needing help was unfamiliar, which may have differentially affected the sociable and unsociable children. Preliminary evidence suggested an association between discipline techniques reportedly used by mothers and their children's temperaments. Possible mechanisms by which temperament could mediate prosocial behavior are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Predictors of social acceptance in preschool children.

Attempted to evaluate, through observation and a measure of sociometric acceptance, the relative contribution of a number of child characteristics to the prediction of social acceptance in 164 3–6 yr old preschool children. The following variables were investigated as predictors of sociometric acceptance: positive social interactions, occupied behavior when not interacting, MA, CA, and sex. A stepwise multiple regression analysis indicated that MA was the best predictor of sociometric acceptance and that positive social interactions significantly increased the correlation. Occupied behavior, CA, and sex did not significantly increase the multiple correlation. Results support the efficacy of intervention procedures that focus on helping social isolates to develop the ability to interact positively with their peers. Within the limited preschool age range, mental maturity appears to be more important to social acceptance than CA per se. This may be a factor in the findings of low popularity for mainstreamed handicapped children. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceptual grouping by infants and preschool children.

We tested infants 6 to 8 months and children 5? years of age for their discrimination of silent intervals between elements of auditory patterns. Standard patterns consisted of six 200-ms tones, three at 440 Hz and three at 659 Hz, with 200-ms intertone intervals (XXXOOO). Contrasting patterns differed only in the addition of a silent increment following the third tone (i.e., between tone groups, XXXOOO) or following the fourth tone (i.e., within a tone group, XXXOOO). Contrasting stimuli presented to infants had increments of 200, 125, 100, or 75 ms; those presented to children had increments of 100, 75, and 50 ms. Infants detected all increments in all locations except the 75-ms increment in the between-group location, but there were no differences in performance for different increment locations. Children detected all increments, but performed significantly worse for between-group increments than for within-group increments. Thus, the context of a temporal increment influences its detectability for children, as it does for adults, indicating that children group the elements of auditory stimuli on the basis of frequency. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Friendships of preschool children in mainstreamed playgroups.

The friendship patterns of 4-year-old mildly developmentally delayed and 3- and 4-year old nonhandicapped children participating in a series of mainstreamed playgroups were investigated. Results indicated that the majority of children in each of the three groups established a preference for a specific peer on the basis of a unilateral criterion, but only a small proportion of mildly delayed and 3-year-old nonhandicapped children were able to establish reciprocal friendships. The delayed group preferred nonhandicapped older children but were least preferred as friends overall by playgroup participants. For those nonhandicapped children meeting the friendship criteria, interactions with friends produced more advanced and positive social play in comparison with interactions with nonfriends. However, these differences did not occur for the mildly delayed group, suggesting that delayed children may not take advantage of the potential benefits associated with friendships. Possible reasons for these problems and the need to identify relevant social processes in friendship formation are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Determining worker preferences among employee benefit programs.

The paired comparison method was applied to measure the preferences of 1133 members of a trade union among a pay raise, a union shop proposal, a vacation plan, a shorter work week, hospital insurance, and a pension increase. Hospital insurance was most preferred while the shorter work week was least preferred. Differences in preference were markedly related to age and seniority, moderately related to physical-clerical job type, marital status, and number of dependent children. Preference for the pay raise was scarcely related to the demographic variables. The preference judgments were highly transitive and allow the 6 compensation options to be ranked in an ordinal scale. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conceptual sorting and personality adjustment in children.

24 relatively well adjusted and 24 relatively poorly adjusted children, selected from 150 normal 6th-grade children, were compared on the Gelb-Goldstein-Weigl-Scheerer Object Sorting Test. Poorly adjusted children made significantly more inadequate sortings than well adjusted children, confirming the prediction of this study. High and average intelligence children were more adequate in their object sortings than low intelligence children. Relatively poorly adjusted children, because of lack of appropriate categories, may not be as able to reduce environmental complexity and assign meaning to events as relatively well adjusted children. High and average intelligence, at this age level, contributes to the ability to abstract and use shared properties as a grouping principle. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Parental smoking and infection with Helicobacter pylori among preschool children in southern Germany

BACKGROUND: Endoscopic examination (direct laryngoscopy and bronchoscopy) is the method of choice for diagnosis of respiratory symptoms of unknown cause in children. However, gastroesophageal reflux is being recognized increasingly often as a cause of pediatric respiratory symptoms and is difficult to diagnose on the basis of findings from direct laryngoscopy and bronchoscopy. In cases in which gastroesophageal reflux was included in the differential diagnosis, we additionally performed esophagoscopy with esophageal mucosal biopsies. OBJECTIVES: To determine the feasibility, safety, and efficacy of routinely performing esophageal biopsies during triple endoscopy in children. METHODS: Twenty-four children ranging in age from 2 weeks to 10 years were referred for airway evaluation. Under general anesthesia, children underwent direct laryngoscopy and bronchoscopy and esophagoscopy with mucosal biopsy. RESULTS: Esophageal mucosa biopsy specimens were quickly and safely obtained during endoscopic evaluation. There were no complications. Reflux esophagitis was present in 54% of biopsy specimens, as suggested by basal cell hyperplasia, papillary elongation, and/or inflammatory cell infiltrates. CONCLUSION: Gastroesophageal reflux is often difficult to diagnose in the pediatric population. When direct laryngoscopy and bronchoscopy is performed during examination of the child with airway symptoms, the addition of esophagoscopy with mucosal biopsies will safely and quickly provide data regarding the potential contribution of gastroesophageal reflux.