Child abuse in institutions: the case of day-care centers in Nigeria

The authors examine the day-care center in Nigeria as a potential locus for child abuse and neglect by reanalyzing the data from available studies which were originally designed to assess quality of care in centers and not child abuse or neglect. A slightly modified version of the categories of abuse and neglect, delineated by Giovannoni and Becerra, is employed. Preliminary results suggest that substance abuse, verbal abuse and aspects of physical neglect related to housing and cleanliness of the facility may be the categories where research should be focused. The authors note the lack of normative data with reference to determining abuse and neglect in the Nigerian context.     

Young children’s overestimation of performance: A cross-cultural comparison

Western literature suggests that young children overestimate their performance across a range of tasks. Research in non-Western cultures, however, is lacking. In 2019, 101 Chinese (52% girls) and 98 Dutch (49% girls) children, ages 4 and 5, were asked to estimate how well they would perform on both a motor and a memory task. Children from both countries overestimated their performance to the same extent ( = .077 and .027 for the motor and memory tasks, respectively). They generally persevered in doing so despite receiving realistic performance feedback. Yet, children overestimated their peers’ performance about as much as their own performance, in some cases even more. This is the first demonstration of performance overestimation in children growing up in a non-Western culture.     

Does adviser mentoring add value? A longitudinal study of mentoring and doctoral student outcomes

This study of the impact of doctoral adviser mentoring on student outcomes was undertaken in response to earlier research that found (a) students with greater incoming potential received more adviser mentoring, and (b) adviser mentoring did not significantly contribute to important student outcomes, including research productivity [Green, S. G., and Bauer, T. N. (1995). Personnel Psychology 48(3): 537–561]. In this longitudinal study spanning 5 1/2 years, the effect of mentorship on the research productivity, career commitment, and self-efficacy of Ph.D. students in the ‘hard’ sciences was assessed, while controlling for indicators of ability and attitudes at program entry. Positive benefits of mentoring were found for subsequent productivity and self-efficacy. Mentoring was not significantly associated with commitment to a research career.     

Preschool Children's Judgments about Hypothetical and Actual Transgressions

Preschoolers' ( N = 112) judgments about hypothetical and actual moral and conventional transgressions were examined. Equal numbers of boys and girls at 2 ages (3 and 4 years old) either made judgments about 8 hypothetical moral and conventional transgressions or were interviewed on the same dimensions about 8 naturally occurring moral and conventional transgressions they witnessed in their preschools. Children judged both hypothetical and actual moral transgressions to be more serious, punishable, generalizably wrong, and independent of rules and authority than conventional transgressions. Regardless of domain, hypothetical transgressions were judged to be more wrong independent of rules than actual transgressions, and hypothetical (but not actual) moral transgressions were judged to be more independent of rules than conventional transgressions. 3-year-old girls judged the wrongness of actual moral transgressions to be more independent of authority than did 3-year-old boys. Similar findings were obtained when hypothetical and actual transgressions were matched, and domain differences were still obtained when individual items were examined. Findings are discussed in terms of previous research on preschoolers' conceptions of rules and transgressions.     

Socially transmitted food preferences can be used to study long-term memory in rats

Immediately after a recently fed rodentdemonstrator interacts with a conspecificobserver, the observer shows a substantially enhanced preference for whatever food its demonstrator ate. Here we show that (1) influence of a single, 30-min interaction with a demonstrator on an observer’s food preference lasts for at least 1 month, and (2) observers interacting on 2 successive days with a demonstrator fed a different diet on each day show significantly enhanced preferences for both diets a month later. Such enduring effects of single, brief interactions between a demonstrator rat and its observer provide an efficient means for studying physiological and behavioral substrates of long-term memory in rodents. Together with the results of previous studies of social influences on food choices of rats, the present results also suggest that rats may use information acquired from conspecifics to identify both toxic and safe foods for many weeks after they have acquired this information.