Socioeconomic inequalities in children's skills and capabilities begin early in life and can have detrimental effects on future success in school. The present study examined the relationships between ...school readiness and socioeconomic (SES) inequalities using teacher reports of the Short Early Development Instrument (Janus et al. 2005) in a disadvantaged urban community of Ireland. It specifically examined differences in skills within a low SES community in order to investigate the role of relative disadvantage on children's development. SES differences across multiple domains of school readiness were examined using Monte Carlo permutation tests and seemingly unrelated regression models. The false discovery rate (Benjamini and Hochberg 1995) was used to control for multiple hypothesis testing. The results indicated that being from a relatively higher SES background does not act as a protective factor for children residing in a disadvantaged community for the majority of school readiness domains. This implies that the neighbourhood may play a role in children's school readiness skills. These results suggest that school readiness interventions should target all children living in disadvantaged communities as each child may be at risk of poor school readiness.
Feeding infants unscreened, raw human milk from a source other than the mother may pose health risks. The objectives of the Moms2Moms Study were to estimate the proportions of mothers who were aware ...of breastmilk sharing, considered sharing, and shared milk and to identify associated maternal and child characteristics.
All eligible women (n=813) who delivered at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center (Columbus, OH) and did not indicate an intention to exclusively "bottle feed" were asked to participate in this cohort by completing a postal questionnaire at 12 months postpartum (499 61% responded). Women who shared milk participated in a follow-up interview.
Awareness of milk sharing was high (77%) and positively associated with socioeconomic status, age, non-Hispanic white race, having fed one's infant at the breast, and reporting no difficulty making enough milk. Twenty-five percent considered sharing. Primiparous women (odds ratio OR=2.12; 95% confidence interval CI 1.02, 4.62) and those who delivered preterm (OR=3.27; 95% CI 1.38, 7.30) were more likely to consider feeding milk from another mother. Women with public/no insurance (OR=0.52; 95% CI 0.27, 0.97) were less likely to consider providing milk for someone else; highly educated women were more likely (OR=1.90; 95% CI 1.12, 3.32). Almost 4% of women shared milk and did so among friends or relatives or had a preterm infant who received screened and pasteurized donor milk.
Sharing milk among friends and relatives is occurring. Many women are aware of milk sharing and have considered it.
For past centuries, infants have been fed the milk of mothers who are not their own by latching to another woman's breast. Today, the majority of lactating women use electric pumps to extract milk ...from their breasts; thus, an infant now may be fed another woman's milk via a bottle or cup. The Internet is an emerging avenue to acquire pumped human milk. The purpose of our study was to participate in and describe the process of buying milk via the Internet. Our goal is to help those involved with the clinical care, research, and public health policy of mothers and infants better understand that families may be buying milk in this way.
We anonymously bought 102 human milk samples via the Internet. We characterized the outside box, packing materials, milk container, temperature and condition of the milk, and cost.
We bought 2,131 ounces of milk at a total cost of $8,306. Eighty-nine percent of the milk arrived above the recommended frozen temperature of -20°C; 45% of it was even above the recommended refrigerator temperature (4°C). The mean surface temperature of the milk samples in each shipment was correlated with the cost of shipping, time in transit, and condition of the milk containers.
The prevalence and potential risks of this practice currently are unknown. Research related to milk quality and infant outcomes related to milk buying via the Internet is urgently needed.
Previous research shows that synchronous text discussion through group support systems (GSS) can improve the exchange of information within teams, but this improved information exchange usually does ...not improve decisions because participants fail to process the new information they receive. This study examined one potential cause for this failure: Dual-task interference caused by the need to concurrently process new information from others while also contributing one's own information to the discussion. Although prior research argues that dual-task interference should be minimal, we found that it significantly reduced participants' information processing and led to lower decision quality. The effect sizes were large, suggesting that dual-task interference is one of a handful of major factors that exert the greatest influence on information processing and decision-making performance. We believe that these results call for an increased emphasis on and understanding of the cognitive underpinnings of GSS and virtual team decision making. PUBLICATION ABSTRACT
Several lines of theory and research suggest that power (e.g., social dominance) and status (e.g., social prominence and positive peer regard) are enjoyed by those blessed with good looks. The ...present work addresses the relations among physical attractiveness, power, status, and aggression from a resource control theoretic perspective that suggests that group members find power holders physically attractive, even if they are aggressive. Teacher ratings of physical attractiveness, social dominance, peer reception, aggression, and social skills were collected on 153 preschoolers (3–6 years) from a Midwestern city. Positive peer regard was derived via sociometric nominations. Raters unfamiliar with the children assessed their physical attractiveness from photographs. Results show that teachers' perceptions of physical attractiveness are a function of power, status, and social skills. Additionally, teachers rated aggressive children who employ both prosocial and coercive strategies of resource control (bistrategic controllers) to be among the most physically attractive. These relations did not emerge for raters unbiased by children's behavior. Results suggest social dominance achieved via prosocial means begets attractiveness ratings, even if accompanied by high levels of aggression. The implications for intervention are discussed.
Although differential ratings by multiple informants are an important issue in survey design, few studies test the degree of difference between informants. This study examined differences in ...caregiver and teacher ratings of school readiness of children from a disadvantaged urban community in Ireland. School readiness was assessed using the Short Early Development Instrument (S-EDI). Two hundred and twenty-three caregivers and 21 teachers completed a survey for 223 and 224 children, respectively. Caregiver ratings of school readiness were significantly higher than those of teachers across multiple domains and subdomains of school readiness. Most discrepancies remained when the sample was disaggregated according to child gender, teacher experience, and caregiver education. These findings may be due to different frames of reference held by caregivers and teachers or differential child behaviour in the home and school contexts. Thus, contributions of different informants may provide valuable information on the school readiness of children and highlight key areas of importance for early interventionists.
The present work addresses the associations between self-reported maternal parenting behaviours and aggression, personality and peer regard of children (n = 119) in early childhood (ages three-six ...years). A k-means cluster analysis derived types of mothers based on their relative use of autonomy support and restrictive control. Outcomes included mother and teacher reports of physical and relational aggression, personality and peer acceptance as well as a peer nominations procedure for social reception. As hypothesised, children of mothers who report demonstrating little autonomy support and high restrictive control were more aggressive, less agreeable, conscientious, extraverted, and less well accepted by their peers. Findings are discussed in terms of maternal attributions of maternal behaviour, child behaviour in multiple contexts, and differential perceptions of mothers and teachers.
Early home visiting intervention programmes have been associated with greater familial well-being, yet their success depends on attaining engagement from the outset. Implementation practices, central ...to positive programme outcomes, rely on a strong relationship between programme providers and families. The present study explored the role of this relationship in the implementation of an Irish early childhood intervention. A randomised controlled trial of the Preparing for Life (PFL) programme was conducted in disadvantaged Dublin communities involving 233 participants recruited during pregnancy and assigned to a high or low intervention group. High intervention involved regular home visits from a trained home visitor providing parenting support and information. This study presents qualitative findings from focus groups with high intervention parents (n=11) and interviews with home visitors (n=5) conducted when participating children were on average 5 months old. Though early engagement challenges were identified, in time parents noted the strengthening parent-home visitor relationship. Findings highlight the importance of programme flexibility and parent-home visitor rapport to programme engagement. Wellbeing did not arise as a salient theme, though it may emerge as a longer-term programme outcome. These findings reveal key aspects of early implementation which may contribute to the ultimate success of the programme.
This study examined the factors associated with childcare staff members' readiness to implement quality standards in early childhood settings in Ireland. To coincide with a new government policy that ...provides every three-year-old child with access to a free preschool year, a framework designed to improve the quality of early childhood care and education centres (ECCECs) is being rolled out nationally. The new quality framework details the first national set of best practice standards for early childhood care and education in Ireland. This study measured support for this change in childcare practices in one pilot community, which introduced the framework prior to national roll-out. The study used the Organizational Change Recipients' Belief Scale to determine how readiness for change was associated with job satisfaction and the work environment in childcare settings. One hundred and twenty surveys were completed by childcare staff in nine pilot ECCECs. The surveys were distributed in 2009 and therefore capture staff attitudes towards the introduction of the new quality framework. The results show that individual staff characteristics had little association with support for the implementation of the quality framework, while factors related to group dynamics were significantly associated with readiness for change. Specifically, a positive work environment and greater job satisfaction were associated with a lower belief that there is a need for the national quality framework, but a higher belief that the childcare staff will be supported by management when the quality framework is introduced.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
BFBNIB, DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Abstract Introduction This study examined the role of fathers caring for children with cancer. Psychological adjustment, coping, and work patterns of mothers and fathers were described. Method Twenty ...fathers of children with cancer were compared with 20 mothers of children with cancer and 20 control fathers of healthy children. Questionnaire data were collected regarding coping, parental adjustment, child adjustment, and family involvement. Results Fathers did not differ from mothers or control fathers in terms of psychological adjustment or coping. However, fathers of children with cancer spent more hours at work and more hours caring for children than did control fathers. Paternal adjustment was significantly related to child adjustment only when the child had cancer. Coping was related to work outside the home for fathers and adjustment for mothers. Discussion Models of family adaptation may be different for fathers and mothers. Treatment teams must attend to the unique needs of fathers.
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