Iris Tan Mink

Measuring the Home Environments of Children in Early Adolescence

This article describes the development of the Early Adolescent version of the Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (EA-HOME) Inventory and presents information regarding its usefulness in 5 sociocultural groups (African Americans, Chinese Americans, European Americans, Mexican Americans, and Dominican Americans). EA-HOME is designed to measure the quantity and quality of stimulation, support, and structure available to children ages 10 through 15 in their home environments. Results indicate high interobserver agreement for those using the measure. EA-HOME scores were significantly related to scores on measures of family context and child development for each sociocultural group, but patterns of association varied somewhat across groups.

Home environment, family adjustment, and the development of mentally retarded children.

Abstract This study describes the relationships between home environment, family adjustment and the social competency of TMR and EMR children. The home environmental variables included parental behavior and attitude, psychosocial climate, and demographic and structural characteristics of the families. The measures of family adjustment included the mentally retarded childs impact on the family and the familys capacity to cope with mental retardation. The child characteristics were described in terms of adaptive and maladaptive behavior, psychological and social adjustment, and self-concept measures. Canonical correlation analysis revealed conceptual and statistical linkages between home environment, family adjustment, and the competency of mentally retarded children.

Salient Dimensions of Home Environment Relevant to Child Development

Publisher Summary Quantification of the home environment appears to have followed three different theoretical approaches: (1) the study of general psychosocial climate of the home as perceived by the family members, (2) work on environment process or the reinforcement analysis of learning environment, which is an outgrowth of the social learning theory, and (3) research on child-rearing attitudes and practices. These theoretical approaches have provided the framework for the development of various instruments to measure home environment that use observational and interview methods. The chapter describes several of the instruments developed to measure these three areas and the research that has employed these techniques. The home quality rating scale (HQRS) is the only instrument that measures childrearing attitudes and values. Two of its factors—harmony and quality of parenting and concordance in support of child care—are related to several measures of psychosocial adjustment both at home and school.