G.J.J.M. Stams

Maternal sensitivity, infant attachment, and temperament in early childhood predict adjustment in middle childhood: the case of adopted children and their biologically unrelated parents.

In a longitudinal study, internationally adopted children (N = 146) placed before 6 months of age were followed from infancy to age 7. Results showed that girls were better adjusted than boys, except in cognitive development, and that easy temperament was associated with higher levels of social, cognitive, and personality development and fewer behavior problems. Higher quality of child-mother relationships, in terms of attachment security and maternal sensitivity, uniquely predicted better social and cognitive development. The combination of attachment disorganization and difficult temperament predicted less optimal ego-control and lower levels of cognitive development. It is concluded that even in adopted children, who are not biologically related to their adoptive parents, early mother-infant interactions and attachment relationships predict later socioemotional and cognitive development, beyond infant temperament and gender.

The relations between parents’ big five personality factors and parenting: a meta-analytic review

To investigate the association between Big Five personality factors and three dimensions of parenting-warmth, behavioral control, and autonomy support-the authors conducted meta-analyses using 5,853 parent-child dyads that were included in 30 studies. Effect sizes were significant and robust across mother and father reports and across assessment methods of parenting (self-report versus observations) but were generally small in magnitude. Higher levels of Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Openness and lower levels of Neuroticism were related to more warmth and behavioral control, whereas higher levels of Agreeableness and lower levels of Neuroticism were related to more autonomy support. Several factors moderated the relationship between specific personality dimensions and parenting: child and parental age, reliability of observational assessment of parenting behavior, and study design. Taken together, these results indicate that personality can be seen as an inner resource that affects parenting.

Research Review: The relation between child and parent anxiety and parental control: a meta‐analytic review

BACKGROUND There is growing research interest in the association between parental control and child anxiety. Parental control may enhance child anxiety and parents may exert control in anticipation of their childs anxiety-related distress. Moreover, high levels of anxiety in parents could influence the development of parental control. Whereas past reviews have solely examined the relation between child anxiety and parental control, this meta-analysis focuses on the associations between both child and parent anxiety and parental control. METHODS The associations of parent anxiety and child anxiety with observed parental control (k = 23 studies, N = 1,305 parent-child dyads) were investigated using a meta-analytic approach. Moreover, factors were identified that may function as moderators of these relations, such as parent and child gender, family socioeconomic status, child age, and design and measurement characteristics. RESULTS A substantial association between child anxiety and parental control (d = .58) was found. Moderator analyses yielded the strongest effect sizes for studies with an overrepresentation of girls, for school-aged children, for families from higher socioeconomic backgrounds, and for studies using a discussion task to assess parental control. Although a nonsignificant relation was found for the relation between parent anxiety and parental control (d = .08), small but significant effects were found for school-aged children, for studies using a discussion task to assess parental control, and for samples with an overrepresentation of boys. CONCLUSIONS As the direction of the association between child anxiety and parental control is unknown, future studies should use experimental designs to further explore the causal link between child anxiety and parental control.

Child negative emotionality and parenting from infancy to preschool: a meta-analytic review.

This meta-analytic review (k = 62 studies; N = 7,613 mother-child dyads) shows that effect sizes for the association between child negative emotionality and parenting were generally small and were moderated by sample and measurement characteristics. The association between more child negative emotionality and less supportive parenting was relatively strong in lower socioeconomic status families, reversed in higher socioeconomic status families, and limited to studies with relatively high percentages of participants from ethnic minorities and studies using parent report to assess negative emotionality. Higher levels of child negative emotionality were associated with more restrictive control in samples with less than 75% 1st-born children, as well as in infants and preschoolers, and in studies using parent report or composite measures to assess both negative emotionality and restrictive parenting. Finally, more child negative emotionality was associated with less inductive control.

The Development and Adjustment of 7-year-old Children Adopted in Infancy

The present study (N = 159) provides evidence of an increased risk for behavior problems of infant-placed 7-year-old internationally, transracially adopted children in the Netherlands. However, parents reported more behavior problems for adopted boys than for adopted girls. Notably, about 30% of the adopted children were classified as clinical on the CBCL scale for total problems, which is a much larger percentage than the 10% found in the normative population. It was suggested that these results could be explained by the operation of multiple risk factors before and after adoption placement, e.g. the childs genetic disposition, pre-natal and pre-adoption care, or the childs cognitive understanding of adoption in middle childhood. Also, results suggest that maternal sensitive responsiveness in adoptive families declines in the transition from early to middle childhood. In contrast to the home setting, the adopted children showed favorable behavioral and socioemotional adjustment at school, while their academic achievement and intelligence were in the normal range or above average. In particular Korean children had high IQs: 31% of these children obtained an intelligence score above 120. It was suggested that adoptive parents seem to offer their children sufficient or even more than average cognitive stimulation. Furthermore, adopted girls scored higher in optimal ego-control, social competence, and peer group popularity than nonadopted girls from the general population: 30% of the adopted girls were rated as popular by their classmates, which compares favorably to the 13% found in the general school population.

A Meta-analysis of Attachment to Parents and Delinquency

To investigate the link between attachment to parents and delinquency, and the potential moderating effects of age and sex, 74 published and unpublished manuscripts (N = 55,537 participants) were subjected to a multilevel meta-analysis. A mean small to moderate effect size was found (r = 0.18). Poor attachment to parents was significantly linked to delinquency in boys and girls. Stronger effect sizes were found for attachment to mothers than attachment to fathers. In addition, stronger effect sizes were found if the child and the parent had the same sex compared to cross-sex pairs of children and parents. Age of the participants moderated the link between attachment and delinquency: larger effect sizes were found in younger than in older participants. It can be concluded that attachment is associated with juvenile delinquency. Attachment could therefore be a target for intervention to reduce or prevent future delinquent behavior in juveniles.

The Relation Between Insecure Attachment and Child Anxiety: A Meta-Analytic Review

Attachment theory suggests that childrens attachment insecurity plays a key role in the development of anxiety. In the present study we evaluated the empirical evidence for the link between insecure attachment and anxiety from early childhood to adolescence. A meta-analysis of 46 studies, from 1984 to 2010, including 8,907 children, was conducted. The results show an overall effect size of r = .30, indicating that attachment is moderately related to anxiety. Moderator analyses indicated that ambivalent attachment showed the strongest association with anxiety. Further, the relation was stronger during adolescence, when attachment and anxiety were measured through questionnaires, when the informant was the child, when attachment was measured as internal working model, in cross-sectional studies, and in studies conducted in Europe. No difference was found between studies that measured anxiety as symptoms or as a disorder, and when different kinds of anxiety were considered.

Efficacy of EMDR in children: a meta-analysis

The efficacy of eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) in children with post-traumatic stress symptoms was meta-analytically examined from the perspective of incremental efficacy. Overall post-treatment effect size for EMDR was medium and significant (d=.56). Results indicate efficacy of EMDR when effect sizes are based on comparisons between the EMDR and the non-established trauma treatment or the no-treatment control groups, and the incremental efficacy when effect sizes are based on comparisons between the EMDR and the established (CBT) trauma treatment. The discussion focuses on the future replication of EMDR findings and further research on post-traumatic stress in children.

The Contribution of Organized Youth Sport to Antisocial and Prosocial Behavior in Adolescent Athletes

In this study, we investigated the contribution of organized youth sport to antisocial and prosocial behavior in adolescent athletes. The sample consisted of N=260 male and female soccer players and competitive swimmers, 12 to 18 years of age. Multilevel regression analysis revealed that 8% of the variance in antisocial behavior and 7% of the variance in prosocial behavior could be attributed to characteristics of the sporting environment. Results suggested that coaches who maintain good relationships with their athletes reduce antisocial behavior, and that exposure to relatively high levels of sociomoral reasoning within the immediate context of sporting activities promotes prosocial behavior. These results point to specific aspects of adolescents’ participation in sport that can be used to realize the educational potential of organized youth sport.

The relationship between juvenile psychopathic traits, delinquency and (violent) recidivism: A meta-analysis

A meta-analysis of k = 53 studies containing 60 non-overlapping samples and 10,073 participants was conducted to investigate whether psychopathy was associated with delinquency and (violent) recidivism in juveniles. The results showed that psychopathy was moderately associated with delinquency, general recidivism, and violent recidivism. Moderator effects revealed that various study and participant characteristics influenced the strength of the association between psychopathy, delinquency, and (violent) recidivism. It was concluded that screening for the (early) detection of psychopathy is important, as delinquent behavior and recidivism can be predicted from psychopathy as early as the transition from middle childhood to adolescence.