Maria Gerbino

Prosocial Development from Childhood to Adolescence: A Multi-Informant Perspective with Canadian and Italian Longitudinal Studies.

OBJECTIVES To longitudinally describe prosocial behaviour development from childhood to adolescence, using multiple informants within Canadian and Italian samples. METHOD Participants in Study 1 were 1037 boys from low socioeconomic status (SES) areas in Montreal, Canada, for whom yearly teacher and mother reports were obtained between the ages of 10 and 15. Participants in Study 2 were 472 children (209 girls) from Genzano, Italy, for whom yearly self and teacher reports were obtained between the ages of 10 and 14. Developmental trajectories were estimated from ratings by each informant to identify subgroups of children following distinct courses of prosocial development. RESULTS In Study 1, three trajectory groups (low/declining 53%, high/declining 16%, high/steep declining 31%) were identified from teacher ratings, while five trajectories (low/stable 7%, low/declining 19%, moderate/stable 41%, high/declining 24%, high/stable 9%) were identified from mother ratings. Small but significant associations were observed between mother and teacher ratings. In Study 2, three trajectory groups (low/stable 9%, moderate/stable 50%, high/stable 42%) were identified from self-ratings, while four trajectory groups (low/stable 8%, moderate/declining 48%, high/declining 37%, increasing 7%) were identified from teacher ratings. Small but significant associations were observed between self- and teacher ratings. CONCLUSIONS The present studies investigated levels of prosocial behaviours from childhood to adolescence, using a multi-informant, cross-cultural perspective. All but one of the developmental trajectories identified were characterised by stable or declining levels of prosocial behaviours. Further research longitudinally investigating prosociality across developmental periods is needed to clarify prosocial behaviour development over time.

Positive Effects of Promoting Prosocial Behavior in Early Adolescence: Evidence from a School-Based Intervention.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of a pilot school-based intervention called CEPIDEA, designed to promote prosocial behavior in early adolescence. The study took place in a middle school located in a small city near Rome. The intervention group included 151 students (52.3% males; Mage = 12.4), and the control group 173 students (50.3% females; Mage = 13.0). Both groups were assessed at three time points, each 6 months apart. A Latent Growth Curve analysis revealed that the intervention group, compared to the control group, showed an increase of helping behavior along with a decrease of physical and verbal aggression across time. Current results also showed that the increase of helping behavior mediated the decline of verbal aggression in adolescents who had attended the intervention. Participants of CEPIDEA also attained higher grades than the control group at the end of middle school. Overall, findings suggest that promoting prosocial behavior may serve to counteract aggressive conduct and enhance academic achievement during adolescence.

Stability and change of ego resiliency from late adolescence to young adulthood: a multiperspective study using the ER89-R Scale.

In this research, we examined the psychometric properties of the Revised Ego Resiliency 89 Scale (ER89–R; Alessandri, Vecchio, Steca, Caprara, & Caprara, 2008), a brief self-report measure of ego resiliency. The scale has been used to assess the development of ego resiliency from late adolescence to emerging adulthood, focusing on different ways to define continuity and change. We analyzed longitudinal self-report data from 267 late adolescents (44% male) using 4 different approaches: factor analysis for testing construct continuity, correlational analysis for examining differential stability, latent growth modeling for analyzing mean level change, and the reliable change index for studying the occurrence of change at the individual level. Converging evidence points to the marked stability of ego resiliency from 16 to 20 years, both for males and females. The scale predicts externalizing and internalizing problems, both concurrently and at 2 and 4 years of distance. Findings suggest that the ER89–R scale represents a valid and reliable instrument that can be fruitfully suited for studying ego resiliency through various developmental stages.

Individual differences in personality conducive to engagement in aggression and violence

This paper examined empirically the value of a conceptual model in which emotional stability and agreeableness contribute to engagement in aggression and violence (EAV) indirectly through irritability, hostile rumination and moral disengagement. Three hundred and forty young adults (130 male and 190 female) participated in the study. The average age of participants was 21 at time 1 and 25 at time 2. Findings attested to the role of basic traits (i.e. agreeableness and emotional stability) and specific personality dispositions (i.e. irritability and hostile rumination) in predisposing to EAV and to the pivotal role of moral disengagement in giving access to aggressive and violent conduct. In particular, the mediational model attested to the pivotal role of emotional stability and agreeableness in contributing directly to both hostile rumination and irritability and indirectly to moral disengagement, and to EAV. Agreeableness and hostile rumination contribute to moral disengagement that plays a key role in mediating the relations of all examined variables with EAV. Copyright

Being positive despite illness: The contribution of positivity to the quality of life of cancer patients.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine the longitudinal relationship between Positivity (POS), defined as a stable disposition to view at experience under a positive outlook, and physical and psychological functioning in a sample of cancer patients immediately after diagnosis and one year later. Methods: A total of 110 patients (40% males) with pulmonary, colorectal and breast cancer, aged 30–75 (M age = 59.62; SD = 10.33), have been prospectively enrolled between 2012 and 2013, at the S. Andrea Hospital in Rome. All patients were previously aware of their diagnosis. A follow-up one year after diagnosis was conducted. We used structural equation modeling in order to analyse the specific effects of POS on functioning impairment from diagnosis to follow up. Results: POS was associated with less functioning impairment both at diagnosis and follow-up assessments. Furthermore, POS level at diagnosis continued to be associated with less functioning impairment one year later, after controlling for its stability. Conclusions: Patients with higher level of POS tended to report less symptoms associated with negative affect such as anxiety and despondency and to preserve their habitual relationships and social roles. POS may act as a basic disposition that sustains patients’ efforts to deal efficaciously with severe illness, by complying with medical treatment and using cognitive strategies that enable individuals to cope with concurrent and prospective challenges of illness.

Estabilidad y predicción de la agresión física desde la infancia hasta la adolescencia: un estudio con múltiples informantes

El objetivo del estudio es examinar la estabilidad y el valor predictivo de la agresión física y verbal evaluada por múltiples informantes (los propios niños, sus profesores y compañeros) desde la última etapa de la niñez a la adolescencia media, la convergencia entre informantes y el valor predictivo a largo plazo de la agresión física y verbal con respecto a diferentes indicadores de ajuste (rendimiento escolar, aceptación social, comportamiento prosocial) y desequilibrio (depresión, delincuencia). Como parte de un proyecto longitudinal italiano se examinaron a 372 niños (204 varones y 168 mujeres) que fueron evaluados anualmente desde el momento 1 (edad 9.5) hasta el momento 5 (edad 13.5).

Measurement Invariance and Convergent Validity of Anger and Sadness Self-Regulation Among Youth From Six Cultural Groups

The present study examined measurement invariance and convergent validity of a novel vignette-based measure of emotion-specific self-regulation that simultaneously assesses attributional bias, emotion-regulation, and self-efficacy beliefs about emotion regulation. Participants included 541 youth–mother dyads from three countries (Italy, the United States, and Colombia) and six ethnic/cultural groups. Participants were 12.62 years old (SD = 0.69). In response to vignettes involving ambiguous peer interactions, children reported their hostile/depressive attribution bias, self-efficacy beliefs about anger and sadness regulation, and anger/sadness regulation strategies (i.e., dysregulated expression and rumination). Across the six cultural groups, anger and sadness self-regulation subscales had full metric and partial scalar invariance for a one-factor model, with some exceptions. We found support for both a four- and three-factor oblique model (dysregulated expression and rumination loaded on a second-order factor) for both anger and sadness. Anger subscales were related to externalizing problems, while sadness subscales were related to internalizing symptoms.

Self-Efficacy in Retrieving Positive Emotional Experience and Using Humor: A Validation Study of a New Instrument in Three Countries

Recent research has pointed to the benefits of positive emotions and their appropriate modulation in buffering the impact of negative experience, and in promoting well-being. Two studies examined the psychometric properties of a new scale that was designed to assess perceived self-efficacy in using memories of positive emotional experiences and humor to face challenges and to cope with stressful experiences. In the first study, we examined the factor structure and internal validity of two scales in youths from the United States (N = 1,277), Italy (N = 363), and Spain (N = 223). In the second study, we examined correlations of the two scales with positive affect, as well as other indicators of well-being and adjustment in the three countries (US: N = 499; Italian and Spanish samples of Study 1). The results of the exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses supported two distinct factors and showed acceptable partial invariance of the scales across countries. Correlations supported the scales’ construct and discriminant validity. Overall, the findings corroborated the psychometric properties of the two scales and the view of retrieval of positive emotional experiences and humor as distinct self-regulatory strategies.