No abstract

Sociocultural theories of development privilege the role of parent–child conversation as a critical interpersonal context for cognitive and socioemotional development. Research on maternal reminiscing suggests that mothers differ on the elaborative nature of their reminiscing style. Individual differences in maternal elaborative style are thought to contribute to children’s cognitive development in at least 3 critical areas: (a) memory; (b) language; and (c) theory of mind (ToM). Further, mothers are thought to be more elaborative with daughters than sons. After more than 30 years of research on maternal reminiscing, there has yet to be a quantitative summary of the literature. As such, we conducted a series of meta-analyses to summarize the effect sizes present in the literature, focusing on the 3 domains listed above as well as the potential impact of child gender on maternal elaborative style. The mean age range for children was set to include 30–60 months; roughly the developmental onset of autobiographical memory. Given these criteria, k = 38 studies (51 independent samples) with N = 2,492 mother–child dyads were included in this meta-analysis. Results indicated that maternal elaborative style did not differ by child gender. However, elaboration was positively associated with child memory, child language ability, and ToM. Ethnicity significantly moderated maternal elaborations by child gender, such that samples with majority non-Caucasian mothers elaborated more with daughters than sons.

There is limited research examining stability and change in attachment security in middle childhood. The current study addresses this gap using data from a 3-year longitudinal study. Specifically, we examined stability and change in secure base script knowledge during middle childhood using a sample of 157 children (Wave 1 mean age [Mage] = 10.91, standard deviation [SD] = 0.87) assessed at 1-year intervals across 4 waves. Secure base script knowledge was moderately stable over time, as script scores were significantly correlated between each wave. We also investigated the impact of life stress on change in secure base script knowledge within individuals across waves. The results demonstrated that daily hassles (minor and frequently occurring stressful life events) but not major (more severe and infrequent) stressful life events predicted change in script knowledge. Implications for attachment-based interventions and, more broadly, the stability of attachment security are discussed.

Disorganized attachment is associated with a host of negative developmental outcomes, leading to a growing interest in preventative interventions targeting the attachment relationship in infancy. The objective of this meta-analysis was to assess the effectiveness of interventions that aimed to prevent or reduce rates of disorganization among children at risk. We performed a literature search using PsycINFO, MEDLINE, and ProQuest databases for studies published between January 1989 and August 2016. All 16 studies (N = 1,360) included a control condition and reported postintervention rates of organized and disorganized attachments assessed by the Strange Situation Procedure. Results showed that, overall, interventions were effective in increasing rates of organized attachment compared to control conditions (d = 0.35, 95% CI [0.10-0.61]). Moderator analyses demonstrated that interventions were more effective (a) in more recently published studies than in older studies, (b) for maltreated samples than nonmaltreated samples, and (c) as children increased in age. These results have important implications for future development, tailoring, and implementation of attachment-based intervention programs.

Taxometric investigation of scripted attachment representations in lateadolescence and adulthood suggests that variations in secure base script knowledge consist of differences in degree (dimensional latent structure) rather than differences in kind (categorical latent structure). However, the latent structure of secure base script knowledge in younger cohorts has gone unexplored. This study presents a downward extension of prior taxometric work using the middle childhood version of the Attachment Script Assessment in a cross‐sectional sample of 639 normative‐risk children (age 8 to 13 years; M = 10.77, SD = 1.06). Results suggest that secure base script knowledge in middle childhood is categorically distributed. Taxometric curves revealed three distinct taxa, highlighting discontinuity in the latent structure of scripted attachment representations across development.