This study reports results of a randomized controlled trial aimed at joint attention (JA) and symbolic play (SP) in preschool children with autism, with prediction to language outcome 12 months later. Participants were 58 children (46 boys) with autism between 3 and 4 years of age. Children were randomized to a JA intervention, an SP intervention, or control group. Interventions were conducted 30 min daily for 5-6 weeks. Assessments of JA skills, SP skills, mother-child interactions, and language development were collected at 4 time points: pre- and postintervention and 6 and 12 months postintervention by independent testers. Results indicate that expressive language gains were greater for both treatment groups compared with the control group, and results could not be explained by differences in other interventions in which children participated. For children beginning treatment with the lowest language levels, the JA intervention improved language outcome significantly more than did the SP or control interventions. These findings suggest clinically significant benefits of actively treating JA and SP skills in young children with autism.

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Temperament, effortful control, and problem behaviors at 4.5 years were assessed in 72 children classified as exuberant, inhibited, and low-reactive as 2-year-olds. Exuberant toddlers were more positive, socially responsive to novel persons, less shy, and rated as having more problem behaviors including externalizing and internalizing behaviors, than other children as preschoolers. Two forms of effortful control, the ability to delay a response and the ability to produce a subdominant response, were associated with fewer externalizing behaviors, while expressing more negative affect (relative to positive/neutral affect) when disappointed was related to more internalizing behaviors. Interaction effects implicated high levels of unregulated emotion during disappointment as a risk factor for problem behaviors in exuberant children. Keywordstemperament; externalizing; internalizing; exuberant; inhibited; toddlers One of the primary aims of developmental research is to identify pathways from early behavior to later childhood competence, or alternatively, to behavioral dysfunction. One construct that has received considerable research attention for its theoretical and empirical links to these outcomes is temperament. In the present study we examined developmental outcomes, specifically externalizing and internalizing behavior, of children varying on the temperament dimensions of approach and inhibition. This research is based on the theoretical model which proposes that temperament may have a critical role in the development of psychopathological conditions (Frick & Morris, 2004;Rothbart, Posner, & Hershey, 1995). Likewise, our study is informed by the developmental psychopathology framework (Cicchetti & Cohen, 1998) which emphasizes the application of normative development to understanding atypical populations and the study of individual developmental pathways as essential to identifying those most likely to develop maladaptive behaviors.Several pathways by which temperament may be related to high-risk conditions or psychopathology have been proposed (Rothbart et al., 1995). Psychopathology, for example, may directly map onto a temperamental extreme, as when an infant who has difficulty Please send correspondence to: 105 White Building, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16803, 814-865-2666 (office), 814-865-4417 (fax), TVR@PSU.EDU. NIH Public Access Author ManuscriptDev Psychopathol. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2013 August 04. NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author Manuscript attending for long periods develops attention deficit disorder. Temperament may also contribute to psychopathology by providing a context that interacts with other factors to increase the probability of a disorder. A tendency to be easily frustrated, for example, may create difficulties interacting with peers, which in turn may lead to heightened aggression. On the positive side, temperament may also act as a buffer to conditions that put a child at risk, as in the example of a chil...

Objectives We examined the impact of Arizona’s “Supporting Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act” (SB 1070, enacted July 29, 2010) on the utilization of preventive health care and public assistance among Mexican-origin families. Methods Data came from 142 adolescent mothers and 137 mother figures who participated in a quasi-experimental, ongoing longitudinal study of the health and development of Mexican-origin adolescent mothers and their infants (4 waves; March 2007–December 2011). We used general estimating equations to determine whether utilization of preventive health care and public assistance differed before versus after SB 1070’s enactment. Results Adolescents reported declines in use of public assistance and were less likely to take their baby to the doctor; compared with older adolescents, younger adolescents were less likely to use preventive health care after SB 1070. Mother figures were less likely to use public assistance after SB 1070 if they were born in the United States and if their post–SB 1070 interview was closer to the law’s enactment. Conclusions Findings suggest that immigration policies such as SB 1070 may contribute to decreases in use of preventive health care and public assistance among high-risk populations.

The results go beyond the recent literature by offering a rich description of children's efforts to regulate their frustration when faced with challenge, and point to important contextual differences in the efficacy of children's coping strategies.

Previous research has investigated the effect of maternal soothing behaviors on reducing infant reactivity but not the differential effects of specific maternal behaviors on infant stress responses. The present study investigated maternal regulation of 2-and 6-month-olds' responses to an inoculation and found a significant decline with age in both the intensity and duration of infants' crying. Maternal affection and touching decreased from 2 to 6 months, whereas maternal vocalizing and distraction behaviors increased. At both ages, the combination of maternal holding/rocking and vocalizing was associated with decreases in all levels of infant reactivity. Neither strategy alone, however, was found to be effective. Feeding/ pacifying behaviors were effective only when initial distress was at a low or moderate level, which suggests that the effectiveness of maternal regulatory behaviors may depend on the intensity of infants' crying.

Thirty-four toddlers with autism and their mothers participated in an early intervention targeting joint engagement. Across the 24 intervention sessions, any significant distress episode in the child was coded for emotion regulation outcomes including child negativity, child emotion self-regulation, and mother emotion co-regulation. Results revealed that emotion regulation strategies by both mother and child were employed during distress episodes. An effect of intervention was found such that children decreased their expression of negativity across the intervention and mothers increased their emotional and motivational scaffolding. The results of this study indicate a positive effect of an intervention targeting joint engagement on emotion co-regulation outcomes.

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