In search of a paradigm: The responsible counselling of youth for responsibility

An ethical basis for a youth counselling paradigm is searched for and found in the writings of Albert Schweitzer, Martin Buber, Karl Jaspers and Karl Popper. A structure of counselling with explicit ethic is described and is contained in the metaphors of these authors. Popper particularly contributes to the translation of structure into process with his concept of totality. The structure and process of the paradigm are applied to the practical therapy and counselling of drug dependent youth.     

Patterns of interaction in family relationships and the development of identity exploration in adolescence

The purpose of this research was to develop a model of individuation in family relationships that focuses on communication processes, and to assess the links between them and adolescent identity exploration. Expressions of the 4 dimensions of the model--self-assertion, separateness, permeability, and mutuality--were predicted to be positively associated with identity exploration in adolescents. A sample of 84 Caucasian, middle-class, 2-parent families, each including an adolescent and 1 or 2 siblings, was observed in a Family Interaction Task designed to elicit the expression and coordination of a variety of points of view. Multiple regression analyses revealed differentiated results concerning father-son, father-daughter, mother-son, mother-daughter, and marital relationships as well as both positive and negative contributions of communication variables to identity exploration when verbal ability and sociability were controlled. Results are discussed in terms of recent formulations of the progressive redefinition of the parent-child relationship during adolescence.     

Students' time on learning tasks in special education

The purpose of this study was to measure, through naturalistic observation procedures, the use of time among handicapped students in four special education alternatives--regular class, resource room, special class, and special school. The sample included 230 elementary age students enrolled in 58 classes in 16 schools. ANOVA comparisons revealed that the least restrictive alternatives, particularly the resource room, made more in-class learning time available. Discussion includes recommendations for increasing learning time.     

Components of attention during infants' manipulative exploration

The purpose of the project was to investigate attention in infants as they manipulate objects. It was hypothesized that examining, in contrast to other activity, reflects focused attention and active intake of information. The first study with 7- and 12-month-olds supported the hypothesis; examining declined with increasing familiarity, while other behaviors, such as mouthing and banging, did not, and examining occurred before other behaviors temporally. The latency to examine declined significantly with age. The second and third studies investigated the effects of age and familiarity on both latency to and duration of examining. Latency again decreased with age but did not change with increasing familiarity. In contrast, duration of examining did not vary systematically with age but declined sharply with familiarity. In a fourth study, latency to examine and duration of examining were related to different measures of attention at 3 1/2 years. The combination of results suggests that the latency and duration measures reflect different aspects of attention--a short-term reaction to object novelty and a more sustained response to the object and its characteristics.