Unique and protective contributions of parenting and classroom processes to the adjustment of African American children living in single-parent families

The unique contributions that parenting processes (high levels of monitoring with a supportive, involved mother-child relationship) and classroom processes (high levels of organization, rule clarity, and student involvement) make to children's self-regulation and adjustment were examined with a sample of 277 single-parent African American families. A multi-informant design involving mothers, teachers, and 7- to 15-year-old children was used. Structural equation modeling indicated that parenting and classroom processes contributed uniquely to children's adjustment through the children's development of self-regulation. Additional analyses suggested that classroom processes can serve a protective-stabilizing function when parenting processes are compromised, and vice versa. Further research is needed to examine processes in both family and school contexts that promote child competence and resilience.     

Social risks and psychological adjustment: a comparison of African American and South African children

In the United States, race is highly associated with social risk factors such as poverty and family structure that may account by themselves for developmental outcomes often attributed to race alone. This cross-national study assesses the effects of social risks on adjustment of racially similar groups of 306 African American and 625 South African 6-year-olds. Poverty and gender were confirmed as risk factors but single female headship was not. Moreover, poverty and gender posed less risk for South African than for African American children. Poverty placed children at risk for immaturity, hyperactivity, and difficulty in peer relations. Boys were more likely to have behavior problems than were girls. African Americans exhibited higher rates of emotional symptoms but lower rates of bullying, destructiveness, and social rejection than did South Africans. African Americans, particularly the males, scored higher on the opposition and hyperactivity scales than did South Africans. Distinctive social contexts and cultural resources may account for differences in adjustment.     

Profiles of social competence among low-income African American preschool children

Relations between children's personal attributes and peer play competence were investigated in a sample of 141 African American preschool children who participated in Head Start. Variable-oriented analyses confirmed that dispositions of temperament, emotion regulation, autonomy, and language were related to children's peer play competence in the classroom. Person-oriented analyses revealed distinctive profiles of personal attributes linked to adaptive preschool social functioning. A small group of resilient children whose profile was characterized by highly adaptable temperament, ability to approach new situations, and above average vocabulary development evidenced the greatest social competence with peers. Children who were disruptive with peers were equally divided between two profiles characterized by inattention and activity, but with differential performance on vocabulary tasks. A profile containing calm, reticent children was the group least likely to engage in disruptive peer play. Inspection of the six profiles revealed the within-group variability for this economically disadvantaged sample and illustrated the differential importance of temperament, regulation, and language constructs. Findings from the profile analyses and relations with peer competence inform the study of resilience in social development for urban African American children who participate in early intervention preschool programs.     

Protective longitudinal paths linking child competence to behavioral problems among African American siblings

A 4-wave longitudinal design was used to examine protective links from child competence to behavioral problems in first- (M=10.97 years) and second- (M=8.27 years) born rural African American children. At 1-year intervals, teachers assessed child behavioral problems, mothers reported their psychological functioning, and both mothers and children reported parenting practices. Structural equation modeling indicated that child competence was linked with residualized positive changes in mothers' psychological functioning from Wave 1 to Wave 2. Mothers' psychological functioning and child competence at Wave 2 forecast involved-supportive parenting at Wave 3, which was associated negatively with externalizing and internalizing problems at Wave 4. The importance of replicating processes leading to outcomes among children in the same study is discussed.     

Consequences of learning about historical racism among European American and African American children

Knowledge about racism is a critical component of educational curricula and contemporary race relations. To examine children's responses to learning about racism, European American (Study 1; N= 48) and African American (Study 2; N= 69) elementary-aged children (ages 6-11) received history lessons that included information about racism experienced by African Americans (racism condition), or otherwise identical lessons that omitted this information (control condition). Children's racial attitudes and cognitive and affective responses to the lessons were assessed. Among European American children, racism condition participants showed less biased attitudes toward African Americans than control condition participants. Among African American children, attitudes did not vary by condition. Children in the two conditions showed several different cognitive and affective responses to the lessons.     

Racial identity,maternal support,and psychological distress among African American adolescents

This study investigated the role of racial identity and maternal support in reducing psychological distress among African American adolescents. Both direct and indirect influences of multiple dimensions of racial identity (i.e., centrality, private regard) and maternal support on perceived stress, depressive symptoms, and anxiety were examined among 521 African American twelfth graders. Findings indicated that maternal support was positively related to both centrality and private regard. Results provided little support for a direct association between racial identity or maternal support and depressive symptoms and anxiety within a multivariate context. Rather, the influences of racial identity attitudes and maternal support on these mental health outcomes were mediated by perceived stress. Further, the two racial identity attitudes were associated with perceived stress in different ways. Study findings suggest that the significance and meaning that African American adolescents attribute to being Black may be critical to their psychological well-being, and that maternal support and perceived stress are important considerations.     

Identifying and promoting social competence with African American preschool children: Developmental and contextual considerations

School psychologists and teachers are frequently asked to assess the level of social competence of preschool children as one indicator of their academic readiness. However, many assessment instruments available to psychologists working in early childhood settings fail to consider important contexts where children acquire social competencies. This study presents a comprehensive picture of multiple constructs that play a role in understanding African American preschool children's social competence. Domains of temperament, language, self‐regulation, and peer play were assessed within a classroom context for a sample of 139 low‐income African American children attending Head Start. Findings support the importance of considering both children's developmental stage and their gender when evaluating aspects of social competence, particularly temperament and interactive peer play abilities. As a group, younger boys experienced the greatest difficulties with initiating and sustaining play activities with classmates. Language abilities and self‐regulation were significantly greater among older preschool children. Implications for school psychologists conducting preschool assessment, intervention, and outreach to parents and teachers within early childhood settings are discussed. © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

African American student sociocultural adjustment to Thai international higher education

ABSTRACT

This article aims to detail an exploratory study involving African American student experiences in a Thai international programme. This study employed a qualitative case study to explore the adjustment process of African American international students in Thailand. The participants included 15 African American students who were selected through a snowball sampling technique in 2014–2016. The data were collected through semi-structured one on one interviews and analysed through content analysis. The participants reported adjustment difficulties related to their sense of isolation in Thailand, the excessive attention received from their hosts, the appropriate response to said attention, Thai culture and adjustment to academic differences. An analysis of the source of stress, anxiety and conflict among the participants is intended to provide insight into international recruitment practices and facilitating more progressive pre-departure orientation sessions among impending international students.     

Shyness-sensitivity and unsociability in rural Chinese children: relations with social, school, and psychological adjustment

The purpose of this study was to examine how shyness-sensitivity and unsociability were associated with social, school, and psychological adjustment in rural Chinese children. Participants were third- to fifth-grade students (N = 820; M age = 10 years) in rural schools in P. R. China. Data on shyness-sensitivity, unsociability, and adjustment were obtained from multiple sources including peer assessments, sociometric nominations, teacher ratings, self-reports, and school records. It was found that unsociability was associated with social, school, and psychological problems, whereas shyness was generally associated with indexes of adjustment such as social status, teacher-rated competence, and academic achievement. The results indicate that rural Chinese context may play an important role in defining the functional meanings of children's social behaviors.     

Perceptions of personal and familial adjustment by children from intact,single-parent,and reconstituted families

The present study investigated children's (N=566) personal and familial adjustment, and sought to determine if this varied as a function of familial configuration and gender. More specifically, these children were surveyed across a broad range of adjustment measures, including self-concept, perception of school adjustment, home adjustment, peer relationships, state and trait anxiety, as well as their evaluations of mother, father, and family. The results from these measures revealed: (a) less positive adjustment among children from divorced families (whether the remaining parent remarried or not) as opposed to children from intact families; (b) mixed findings regarding comparisons of psychosocial adjustment between single-parent and remarried groups; and (c) a pattern of effects related to significant interactions of family type and gender in which males appeared to be favorably affected within the single-parent configuration, while females were more favorably adjusted within the reconstituted family.     

单亲家庭孩子心理障碍及教育策略研究

家庭是个性形成的第一课堂。父母是孩子个性形成的第一任老师。随着人们婚姻观、家庭观的发展变化,单亲家庭日趋增多,单亲家庭的孩子身心的健康发展也日益成为人们关注的焦点。     

A future of possibilities: Educating children living in HIV impacted households

Close to one and a half million Kenyans reportedly live with HIV/AIDS. Using qualitative in-depth interviews this study explores the ways in which parents living with HIV/AIDS navigate their social and economic environment to provide educational opportunities for their children. Barriers identified include the economic costs of a free primary education, and the emotional implications of living in an HIV affected household. Respondents demonstrate a persistent utilization of internal and external resources in navigating these barriers. These findings support family economic interventions that enable parents guarantee an educational future for their children.     

WISC-R factor structures among White,Mexican American,and African American children: A research note

The factor structure for the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R) was investigated for White (n = 183), Mexican American (n = 129), and African American (n = 139) nonreferred school-age children (6.8 to 14.6 years) of low-to middle-class socioeconomic background. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were performed. The WISC-R factor structure model tested was Kaufman's (1975) three-factor solution that consisted of Verbal Comprehension (VC, Factor 1), Perceptual Organization (PO, Factor 2), and Freedom from Distractibility (FD, Factor 3). The results of the exploratory analyses showed Kaufman's three-factor solution for the three ethnic groups, but the order of Factor 2 and Factor 3 was reversed for the Mexican American and African American samples—thus raising questions about the comparability of the WISC-R factor structure across groups. The confirmatory analyses, which used the orthogonal nested factors approach by Gustafsson and Balke (1993), resulted in a model (for each of the ethnic groups) in which a G factor explained most of the variance (followed by the nested first-order factors—VC, PO, and FD). The results of the confirmatory analyses provide some support for David Wechsler's (1974) original intentions that the WISC-R structure is best described as having a general, or global, factor. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Promoting cultural competence in counseling Asian American children and adolescents

Asian Americans are commonly perceived as the diligent and high‐achieving “model minority.” This positive stereotype has negative consequences for this ethnic minority group because it trivializes their social and mental health problems. This image of success has made many overlook the true nature of the struggles many Asian American families have to face in the United States. Scientific literature suggests that Asian American children experience major adjustment problems in school including loneliness, isolation, withdrawal, rejection, anxiety, low self‐esteem, and interpersonal distress. Cultural barriers exist between the Asian and the dominant society and influence Asian Americans' cognitive appraisal and coping choices when personal and emotional problems arise. These barriers also prevent clinicians from identifying and subsequently providing effective mental health services for Asian American children and their families. In this article, the authors examine the Asian cultural conceptions of mental health and various cultural barriers in an attempt to promote cultural understanding and competence among clinicians working with Asian American children and their families. Recommendations for clinical practice and future research directions are provided. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Perceptions of communication choice and usage among African American hearing parents: Afrocentric cultural implications for African American deaf and hard of hearing children

In a qualitative study employing an exploratory design, the researcher explored the perceptions of communication choice and usage among 14 African American hearing parents of deaf and hard of hearing children. Semistructured, in-depth thematic interviews were used with a modified grounded-theory approach in which themes were analyzed and coded. Four thematic challenges and opportunities related to communication choice and usage were found: (a) oral tradition-nommo, (b) sign and oral-diunital, (c) literacy, and (d) racial/ethnic cultural socialization. Afrocentric implications for deaf and hard of hearing children are explored based on research observations pertaining to the significance of the oral tradition in African American culture and the socialization of African American deaf and hard of hearing children in the context of African American hearing families.     

Teacher and observer ratings of young African American children's social and emotional competence

Children's social and emotional competence abilities have been linked to successful social interactions and academic performance. This study examined the teacher and observer ratings of social and emotional competence for 89 young (3‐ to 5‐year‐old), African American children from economically stressed urban environments. There was a specific interest in understanding the convergence and divergence of the raters on these competence behaviors within the classroom. This study also examined the association among children's competence abilities and their overall functioning at school. There were significant associations between teacher and observer reports of children's competence. Children who were observed to be socially and emotionally competent were rated by their teachers as functioning well in school. However, there were differences among teacher and observer reports in terms of the specific behaviors that represented social and emotional competence. These findings provide support for the use of multi‐method, multi‐informant measures to assess competence among African American children. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The moderating capacity of racial identity between perceived discrimination and psychological well-being over time among African American youth

This study examined the influence of racial identity in the longitudinal relation between perceptions of racial discrimination and psychological well-being for approximately 560 African American youth. Latent curve modeling (LCM) and parallel process multiple-indicator LCMs with latent moderators were used to assess whether perceptions of racial discrimination predicted the intercept (initial levels) and the slope (rate of change) of psychological well-being over time, and whether racial identity moderates these relations. The results indicated that African American adolescents who reported higher psychological responses to discrimination frequency levels at the first time point had lower initial levels of well-being. Regressing the slope factor for psychological well-being on the frequency of discrimination also revealed a nonsignificant result for subsequent well-being levels.