Increasing evidence suggests that attachment representations take at least two forms—a secure base script and an autobiographical narrative of childhood caregiving experiences. This study presents data from the first 26 years of the Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation (N = 169), examining the developmental origins of secure base script knowledge in a high-risk sample, and testing alternative models of the developmental sequencing of the construction of attachment representations. Results demonstrated that secure base script knowledge was predicted by observations of maternal sensitivity across childhood and adolescence. Further, findings suggest that the construction of a secure base script supports the development of a coherent autobiographical representation of childhood attachment experiences with primary caregivers by early adulthood.

Relative to children and adults, adolescents are highly focused on being evaluated by peers. This increased attention to peer evaluation has implications for emotion regulation in adolescence, but little is known about the characteristics of the evaluatee and evaluator that influence emotional reactions to evaluative outcomes. The present study used a computer-based social evaluation task to examine predictors of adolescents’ emotional responses to feedback from unknown peers. Nine-to-seventeen-year-olds (N = 36) completed the “chatroom task” and indicated the degree to which each peer would be interested in interacting with them and how good they felt after receiving acceptance and rejection feedback from peers. We examined whether adolescents’ age and gender impacted their emotional responses to being accepted or rejected by peers of different age groups (i.e., early or middle adolescence) and genders. We also tested whether expectations about peers’ interest was associated with variability in adolescents’ emotional responses to the evaluative outcome. Upon being accepted by middle adolescent male peers, females in the middle relative to early years of adolescence reported greater well-being, whereas males reported similar levels of well-being regardless of their own age. Following acceptance from middle adolescent female peers, females reported greater well-being than males. Adolescents with high expectations for being liked by peers felt better after being accepted versus rejected relative to those with low expectations. For adolescents with low expectations, acceptance and rejection were associated with similar levels of well-being. Adolescents’ emotional responses to peer evaluation are influenced by specific individual characteristics and antecedent preparation for evaluation that may serve an emotion regulatory purpose.

Although much is written about the impact of deployment on nondeployed spouses (NDSs) and couple relationships, few empirical studies address this directly. Using attachment theory as a guiding framework, this study followed 32 NDSs across a military deployment. We examined the prospective association between NDSs' attachment avoidance and their response to relational challenges (assessed using both correlational and experimental designs) during a deployment. Two weeks before deployment, NDSs provided self-reports of their attachment avoidance and relationship satisfaction. During the deployment, they provided stream-of-consciousness speech samples regarding (a) the deployment and (b) their anticipated reunion with their spouse: after each speech sample they reported on their subjective anxiety. Based on random assignment, NDSs then completed either an experimenter-led "personal" or "relational" memory savoring task, reporting on their emotional state before and after the task. Two JESSICA L. BORELLI received her PhD in clinical psychology from Yale University and completed her predoctoral clinical internship at University of California, Los Angeles's Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. She is currently an assistant professor of psychology at Pomona College in Claremont, California. Her research program focuses on attachment relationships, emotion, parenting, and the goal of developing attachment-based interventions to enhance well-being. DAVID A. SBARRA received his PhD in clinical psychology at the University of Virginia. He is an associate professor of Psychology at the University of Arizona, where he also serves as director of Clinical Training. The focus of his research is on close relationships and health, especially the stress that follows social separations like divorce and military deployment. JONATHAN E. SNAVELY received his MA in psychology and evaluation from Claremont Graduate University, where he is now pursuing a doctorate in applied social psychology. His primary research investigates the differential impact of relational and collective self-construal on social cognition, especially in relation to prosocial behavior, health, and the meaningmaking process. DANA L. MCMAKIN received her PhD in clinical child psychology from the University of Denver and completed her predoctoral clinical internship

The present study used data from the Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation (MLSRA) to investigate how multiple dimensions of childhood abuse and neglect predict romantic relationship functioning in adulthood. Several dimensions of abuse and neglect (any experience, type, chronicity, co-occurrence, and perpetrator) were rated prospectively from birth through age 17.5 years. Multimethod assessments of relational competence and violence in romantic relationships were conducted repeatedly from ages 20 to 32 years. As expected, experiencing childhood abuse and neglect was associated with lower romantic competence and more relational violence in adulthood. Follow-up analyses indicated that lower romantic competence was specifically associated with physical abuse, maternal perpetration, chronicity, and co-occurrence, whereas more relational violence was uniquely associated with nonparental perpetration. We discuss these novel prospective findings in the context of theory and research on antecedents of romantic relationship functioning.

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Attachment theory suggests that early experiences with caregivers are carried forward across development in the form of mental representations of attachment experiences. Researchers have investigated at least two representation-based constructs when studying attachment and successful adaptation in adulthood: (1) coherence of autobiographical discourse/memories and (2) knowledge of the secure base script. Here we present data examining the unique contributions of coherent discourse regarding childhood caregiving experience and secure base script knowledge in a prospective high-risk longitudinal study, the Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation (MLSRA). The current study included three indicators of the quality of romantic relationships: (1) observed quality of interaction with romantic partners, (2) self-reported relationship satisfaction, and (3) interview-rated effectiveness of romantic engagement. Parent-child relationship quality was also assessed across three key outcomes: (1) infant attachment security, (2) observations of supportive parenting, and (3) interview-rated supportive parenting. When examining both attachment representations simultaneously, each representation-based construct was uniquely associated with different relationship quality indices. Specifically, secure base script knowledge was uniquely associated with infant attachment security in the next generation, and coherence of discourse was uniquely associated with observations of romantic relationships quality and interview-rated supportive parenting.

Military deployment affects thousands of families each year, yet little is known about its impact on non-deployed spouses (NDSs) and romantic relationships. This report examines two factors–attachment security and a communal orientation with respect to the deployment– that may be crucial to successful dyadic adjustment by the NDS. Thirty-seven female NDSs reported on their relationship satisfaction before and during their partner’s deployment, and 20 also did so two weeks following their partner’s return. Participants provided a stream-of-conscious speech sample regarding their relationship during the deployment; linguistic coding of sample transcripts provided measures of each participant’s (a) narrative coherence, hypothesized to reflect attachment security with respect to their deployed spouse; and, (b) frequency of first person plural pronoun use (we-talk), hypothesized to reflect a communal orientation to coping. More frequent first person plural pronouns— we-talk— was uniquely associated with higher relationship satisfaction during the deployment, and greater narrative coherence was uniquely associated with higher relationship satisfaction post-deployment. Discussion centers on the value of relationship security and communal orientations in predicting how couples cope with deployment and other types of relationship stressors.

Background and Study HypothesisAre dyslexic children and teenagers more creative than non-dyslexic children and teenagers? Whether creativity is higher in dyslexia, and whether this could be related to neurological development specific to the dyslexic disorder, or to compensatory strategies acquired later in life, remains unclear. Here, we suggest an additional role of differential educational approaches taken in each school that could either enhance or suppress an already higher baseline creativity of dyslexic children and teenagers.ResultsCreativity in dyslexic and non-dyslexic children and teenagers from different schools in France and in Belgium, as well as in students from different universities, was evaluated with the Torrance Test of Creative Thinking (TTCT). Children and teenagers with dyslexia and/or with other similar dysfunctions showed higher creativity scores than non-dyslexic participants. Moreover, the educational approach could further enhance the creative scores in dyslexia, which could be as high as those measured in students from art universities.ConclusionsWe conclude that dyslexic children and teenagers can be highly creative. Yet, expression of creativity can be modulated by educational approach, indicating a probable advantage for personal follow-up compared to normalizing education strategies.