Jeanne H. Block

Parental Agreement-Disagreement on Child-Rearing Orientations and Gender-Related Personality Correlates in Children.

BLOCK, JEANNE H.; BLOCK, JACK; and MomISON, ANDREA. Parental Agreement-Disagreement on Child-rearing Orientations and Gender-related Personality Correlates in Children. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1981, 52, 965-974. An objective index of degree of parental agreement was generated by comparing the independent responses of 83 parental dyads to a set of Q-sort items reflecting child-rearing values and orientations. This index was found to significantly predict subsequent continuation or termination of the marriage and to relate to independently described characteristics of the family home environment. Further, the index of parental agreement was significantly related to the quality of psychological functioning in boys and in girls over a 4-year age range, from age 3 to age 7. Reliable differences were found in the patterning among relationships for boys and girls wherein parental agreement was more implicative for the psychological functioning of boys than for girls and was related positively to the development of ego control in boys but was related negatively to the development of ego control in the sample of girls.

The Personality of Children Prior to Divorce: A Prospective Study.

In a longitudinal study, the personalities of children from intact families at ages 3, 4, and 7 were reliably assessed by independent sets of raters using Q-items reflecting important psychological characteristics of children. A number of these families subsequently experienced divorce. The behavior of boys was found, as early as 11 years prior to parental separation or formal dissolution of marriage, to be consistently affected by what can be presumed to be predivorce familial stress. The behavior of boys from subsequently divorcing families was characterized by undercontrol of impulse, aggression, and excessive energy prior to parental divorce. The behavior of girls from subsequently divorcing families was found to be notably less affected by the stresses in families prior to parental divorce. The prospective relations afforded by the longitudinal analyses suggest that the behavior of conflicting, inaccessible parents during the preseparation period may have serious consequences for personality development, especially for boys. Hence, some characteristics of children commonly seen to be a consequence of divorce may be present prior to marital dissolution.

Venturing a 30-Year Longitudinal Study.

Longitudinal inquiry has long been recognized as a uniquely powerful method for seeking understanding of psychological development. A 30-year longitudinal venture is described--its theoretical motivation, methodological rationale, and details of implementation. Some of the novel and implicative findings the study has generated are briefly described. Common to all of the results is an absolute reliance on long-term, widely ranging, independent data. Although specific aspects of the study have appeared over the years, its intentions and scope are recounted only here. By and large, the organizing constructs of ego-control and ego-resiliency find impressive support in various empirical inquiries, here quickly described. Methodologically, a number of savvy research procedures useful and perhaps even necessary in longitudinal research are conveyed. The troublesome burdens but ever-alluring attractions of longitudinal inquiry are noted. A forthcoming Web site will contain the extensive 30-year longitudinal data bank together with explanatory information. Psychological investigators may find these imminently available data resources useful.

Egocentrism and ego resiliency: personality characteristics associated with perspective-taking from early childhood to adolescence.

In this study we examined the longitudinal relation between ego resiliency and egocentrism. Measures of Level 1 and Level 2 egocentrism were administered to one hundred eleven 3 1/2-year-old children. Independent personality evaluations were available on these children at ages 3, 4, 7, 11, and 14 in the form of Q-sort ratings by independent sets of teachers and examiners. The relation between egocentrism and ego resiliency was observed to depend on level of egocentrism, as well as on sex of subject. In the sample of girls, both Level 1 and Level 2 egocentrism were negatively correlated with ego resiliency concurrently at age 3, but no long-term implications of egocentrism emerged. In the sample of boys, Level 1 egocentrism was consistently negatively associated with ego resiliency from early childhood (age 3) into adolescence (age 14). However, Level 2 egocentrism displayed no concurrent nor any dependable longitudinal relation with ego resiliency. The discussion focuses on possible interpretations of the relation between egocentrism and ego resiliency and on the sex differences in the pattern of longitudinal results.

Social-Psychological Aspects of Student Activism

WHEN WE EMBARKED on our study of student activism, evidence was already in hand that the activist minority, whose strident protests first attracted worldwide attention on the Berkeley campus in the fall of 1964, bears little resemblance to the marginal types, the academic dregs, that popular journalism was wont to portray and in which respectable voters-at least in California-liked to believe. It was already becoming clear that they were drawn from among the best students on the best campuses (Block et al., 1968; Peterson, 1968; Sampson, 1967). We did not set out to provide further documentation of this fact. We were interested, rather, in shedding light on the psychological basis of activism and alternative patterns of student orientation to the sociopolitical order. We have reported elsewhere on two major foci of the

Continuity and Transformation in the Psychological Meaning of Categorization Breadth.

As part of an ongoing longitudinal project, measures of breadth of categorization were administered to subjects at age 4 and again at age 11. The category breadth indexes from each age were related to personality data available at ages 3,4, 7, 11, and 14 in the form of independent California Child QSort (CCQ) descriptions. Although the two breadth indexes were not correlated over the 7-year time span, many relations were observed between each of the categorization indexes and personality descriptions. Independently of gender, the preschool-based breadth composite was related to a core set of personality relations. Broad categorizers identified at age 4 were described at all five ages as lacking in autonomous structure and being more susceptible to environmental distraction. Although the relation between breadth of categorization as indexed at age 11 and personality could not be evaluated for girls, many significant relations were obtained for boys. Boys who categorized broadly at age 11 were described at all five ages as able to organize information about the world in a resourceful manner. Furthermore, breadth of categorization at age 4 correlated negatively with intelligence, whereas breadth of categorization at age 11 correlated positively with intelligence. This reversal in relation was highly significant statistically. The observed transformation in the psychological meaning of the results suggests that the use of relatively broad categories in early childhood reflects an inability as yet to organize experience effectively; by preadolescence, however, the use of relatively broad categories reflects a creative ability to see as importantly equivalent those instances that superficially are unrelated. Categorization refers to how individuals classify objects or events by applying rules of similarity. In categorizing, an individual, for the purposes of that categorization, treats all objects in the same category as equivalent and as different from objects not in that category. Categorization is cognitively economical because it reduces the potentially infinite number of possible perceptual discriminations down to personally useful proportions (Bruner, Goodnow, & Austin, 1956; Rosch, 1978). Because of the inevitable diversity of perceptual inputs, one must, for such tasks as recognition, learning, and judgment, have the ability to categorize stimuli and to classify events by similarity (Tversky, 1977).

Assessing Personal and Social Change in Two Generations

As we look back on the student generation of the 1960s we see that the university environment was characterized by unprecedented unrest. Many young people were developing their own values and lifestyles in a milieu marked by conflict between the value system they perceived in their families and those of significant others outside the family context. The substantive focal concerns were civil rights, humanitarian goals and ethical consistency, outrage against the war in Vietnam, and disillusionment with the university. Seeking to develop perspective about the impact of a decade of social unrest on the personological characteristics, value orientations, and goal definitions of persons in proximity to this foment is an irresistable temptation.

Two components of the allergic process compared: Allergic potential and severity of asthma

Abstract Two components of the allergic process, (1) the allergic potential and (2) the severity of asthma, have been described, measured, and compared in a sample of 62 asthmatic children. The statistical and conceptual dissimilarity between them has been demonstrated, and their different psychological correlates have been described.