UMD Theses and Dissertations
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Item Examining Associations between Neural Sensitivity to Social Feedback with Trait and State Loneliness in Adolescents(2024) Alleluia Shenge, Victoire; Redcay, Elizabeth; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Loneliness can be defined as the negative emotional response to an experience of discrepancy between the desired and actual quality or quantity of one’s relationships. Loneliness is associated with many negative outcomes, including depression and self-harm. This phenomenon tends to increase in adolescence and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are at even greater risk for developing loneliness during this time than their neurotypical peers. The present study examined how neural sensitivity to both positive and negative feedback from peers is related to loneliness and social experiences among adolescents with and without autism. In a sample of 94 adolescents (22 autistic and 72 non-autistic) ages 11-14, we used an innovative ecologically valid paradigm for fMRI task along with real-world experience sampling to assess self-reported interaction quality and state loneliness, as well as surveys to examine reports of “trait” (or stable levels of) loneliness.The results indicated group differences in both state and trait loneliness, with the autistic group showing high levels of loneliness. In addition, the autistic group had lower interaction quality compared to their non-autistic peers. However, we did not find support for associations between neural sensitivity to feedback and interaction quality or loneliness across our full group. This work provides an important first step in understanding the relation between loneliness, neural sensitivity to social feedback and social experiences and can further inform intervention for adolescents at risk for negative mental health outcomes depending on which mechanism shows an association effect on social experiences and lonelinessItem PSYCHOSOCIAL STRESS AND INTERNALIZING SYMPTOMS IN BLACK EMERGING ADULTS: THE ROLE OF PHYSIOLOGICAL DYSREGULATION AND CULTURAL SOCIALIZATION(2024) Wang, Yuqi; Tyrell, Fanita A; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Research suggests that ethnic-racial minority emerging adults disproportionately experience higher levels of internalizing problems due to exposure to higher levels of generalized stress (e.g., perceived stress) and unique, race-related stress (e.g., discrimination), which is especially relevant for Black emerging adults. However, few studies have examined the unique contributions of these types of stress and the mechanisms that facilitate their detrimental mental health effects. Informed by existing theoretical models, the current study evaluated the unique contribution of both generalized and discriminatory stress on internalizing symptoms (i.e., anxiety and depression) as well as the mediating role of physiological functioning (i.e., diurnal cortisol slope, C-reactive protein) on these associations. Further, the current study takes astrength-based approach by examining the potential protective role of cultural socialization on the links among psychosocial stress, physiological functioning, and internalizing symptoms. Findings indicate that generalized stress and discriminatory stress both contribute to depressive symptoms and physiological functioning in Black emerging adults, although the links between psychosocial stress and internalizing symptoms were not mediated by physiological functioning. In addition, cultural socialization protected or exacerbated the effects of psychosocial stress on mental and physiological health outcomes depending on the type and severity of the stressor. These findings suggest that therapeutic treatment and intervention efforts for Black emerging adults should consider the impact of both types of stress on these youth’s mental and physiological health as well as the nuanced role of cultural socialization on these links. Future research should examine how other types of psychosocial stress, mediating mechanisms, and resilience processes may impact the mental and physiological health outcomes of Black emerging adults.Item Evaluating the role of acoustic cues in identifying the presence of a code-switch(2024) Exton, Erika Lynn; Newman, Rochelle S.; Hearing and Speech Sciences; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Code-switching (switching between languages) is a common linguistic behavior in bilingual speech directed to infants and children. In adult-directed speech (ADS), acoustic-phonetic properties of one language may transfer to the other language close to a code-switch point; for example, English stop consonants may be more Spanish-like near a switch. This acoustically-natural code-switching may be easier for bilingual listeners to comprehend than code-switching without these acoustic changes; however, it effectively results in the languages being more phonetically similar at the point of a code-switch, which could make them difficult for an unfamiliar listener to distinguish. The goal of this research was to assess the acoustic-phonetic cues to code-switching available to listeners unfamiliar with the languages by studying the perception and production of these cues. In Experiment 1 Spanish-English bilingual adults (particularly those who hear code-switching frequently), but not English monolingual adults, were sensitive to natural acoustic cues to code-switching in unfamiliar languages and could use them to identify language switches between French and Mandarin. Such cues were particularly helpful when they allowed listeners to anticipate an upcoming language switch (Experiment 2). In Experiment 3 monolingual children appeared unable to continually identify which language they were hearing. Experiment 4 provides some preliminary evidence that monolingual infants can identify a switch between French and Mandarin, though without addressing the utility of natural acoustic cues for infants. The acoustic detail of code-switched speech to infants was investigated to evaluate how acoustic properties of bilingual infant-directed speech (IDS) are impacted by the presence of and proximity to code-switching. Spanish-English bilingual women narrated wordless picture books in IDS and ADS, and the voice onset times of their English voiceless stops were analyzed in code-switching and English-only stories in each register. In ADS only, English voiceless stops that preceded an English-to-Spanish code-switch and were closer to that switch point were produced with more Spanish-like voice onset times than more distant tokens. This effect of distance to Spanish on English VOTs was not true for tokens that followed Spanish in ADS, or in either direction in IDS, suggesting that parents may avoid producing these acoustic cues when speaking to young children.Item Longitudinal associations between parent-child interactions and children’s socioemotional functioning in ethnically diverse families(2024) Alonso, Angelica; Cabrera, Natasha J; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Theoretical and empirical evidence identify parenting behaviors as one of the most robust predictors of children’s socioemotional development. However, this body of evidence is primarily based on White middle-class mothers and children. As such, it remains unclear whether these developmental processes are generalizable to ethnic minority children who are reared in different sociocultural contexts. The present dissertation consists of three interrelated studies that examined longitudinal associations between parent-child interactions (parents’ emotion socialization; responsive parenting; parent-child dyadic synchrony) and children’s socioemotional functioning (socioemotional competence; executive function; self-regulation) in ethnically diverse mothers, fathers, and their young children. I also examined children’s regulatory skills and parent-child dyadic synchrony as mediators and child emotionality as a moderator of these associations. Empirical Study 1 examined how mothers’ and fathers’ emotion socialization behaviors (ESB) at 18 and 24 months were associated with toddlers’ social competence at 24 and 30 months. Fathers’ non-supportive ESBs to negative emotions at 18 months were positively associated with social competence at 30 months. There was a negative association between mothers’ non-supportive ESBs to negative emotions at 24 months and social competence at 30 months only for toddlers with high negative emotionality. A positive association between fathers’ emotion coaching of negative emotions at 18 months and 30-month social competence emerged only when mothers did not provide any emotion coaching. Empirical Study 2 examined longitudinal associations between mothers’ and fathers’ responsive parenting at 9 months and children’s socioemotional functioning (executive function and socioemotional competence) at age 3. This study also tested children’s effortful control at 24 months as a mediator and emotionality as a moderator of these associations. Only mothers’ responsive parenting at 9 months was associated with greater socioemotional competence at age 3. There was no support for effortful control and emotionality as a mediator and moderator, respectively, of associations between maternal or paternal responsive parenting and socioemotional functioning. Empirical Study 3 examined direct associations between mother- and father-child synchrony at 18 months and toddlers’ self-regulation at 24 months and indirect associations through parent-child synchrony at 24 months. I also examined child emotionality as a moderator of direct associations and explored whether participation in a parenting intervention had impacts on synchrony and self-regulation. Father-child synchrony at 24 months mediated associations between earlier synchrony and self-regulation. Child emotionality did not moderate associations between synchrony and self-regulation. Finally, mothers and fathers in the treatment conditions exhibited greater synchrony with their children at 24 months than parents in the control group. Collectively, these findings indicate the unique ways that ethnically diverse mothers and fathers contribute to their children’s socioemotional development. These studies highlight the need for further research examining mechanisms (mediators and moderators) as additional sources of within-group variability in socioemotional functioning. Doing so will help diversify the science of normative socioemotional development and can inform program efforts to best support ethnic minority children in developing strong socioemotional skills.Item Impact of COVID-19 on Parent and Child Mental Health in India: A Mixed-methods Longitudinal Study(2023) Havewala, Mazneen Cyrus; Wang, Cixin; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The COVID-19 pandemic has affected individuals around the world. Parents of young children have experienced significant strain as they have attempted to balance their work obligations as well as take care of household duties and attend to the needs of their young children. Several studies have demonstrated the detrimental impacts of COVID-19 on parent and child mental health. However, the majority of studies are quantitative, cross-sectional in nature, and were conducted during the early phases of the pandemic. Moreover, there is limited work on the topic of parent and child mental health within the COVID-19 context among families in India. Thus, the current mixed-methods longitudinal study aimed to fill these gaps in the literature by attempting to examine the impact of COVID-19 on child mental health and parent mental health among families with young children in India. The study also aimed to understand the moderating effects of parenting behaviors with relation to child COVID-19-related stress and child mental health difficulties, and the moderating effects of social support with relation to parent COVID-19-related stress and parent mental health difficulties. One hundred and forty parents of children between the ages of 4 to 8 completed a survey between October 2020 and February 2021 (Time 1), of which 85 parents completed it between May 2021 and July 2021 (Time 2), and 70 completed it between July 2022 and October 2022 (Time 3). Qualitative in-depth individual interviews were conducted with a subset of the sample (n=20) between July 2022 and December 2022 to gain a better understanding of challenges experienced by parents and how the pandemic impacted them and their children in various ways over the course of the pandemic. The findings indicated that the stress caused by changes brought about by the pandemic was related to parent and child mental health in India. Parents in India experienced several challenges that impacted their mental health. Factors contributing to those challenges, and in turn, possibly their mental health are discussed. Parenting behaviors such as parental nurturance and restrictiveness were also related to child mental health and served as moderators of the relation between child COVID-19-related stress and child mental health difficulties; parental nurturance emerged as a protective factor while parental restrictiveness was a possible risk factor. Perceived social support was negatively linked with parent mental health difficulties, and it also served as a buffer in the relation of parent COVID-19-related stress and parent mental health difficulties at Time 1. Qualitative findings also indicated that support from spouse, other family members, friends and co-workers helped parents cope with the challenges associated with the pandemic. In sum, the findings of this study helped identify important risk and protective factors for parent and child mental health within the COVID-19 context in India. The findings have important clinical implications that inform future intervention efforts to support children and families during related stressful events.Item CHILDHOOD BEREAVEMENT AND INTERNALIZING SYMPTOMS: RELATIONSHIP QUALITY AS A MECHANISM AND EARLY ATTACHMENT SECURITY AS A BUFFER(2024) Awao, Sayaka; Cassidy, Jude; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Childhood bereavement has been linked with poor psychosocial outcomes. However, few studies have explored the mechanisms and protective factors affecting child outcome following the death of a close family member (i.e., loss), and a limited number of studies have considered the timing of loss. The present study leverages a population-based longitudinal cohort data from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS) to examine outcomes (internalizing symptoms), mechanisms (relationship quality), and protective factors (early attachment security) at age 9 and 15 for children who experienced the death of a close family member during three developmental stages: early childhood, middle childhood, and late childhood/early adolescence. Although many of the hypothesized associations were not found, findings underscore the enduring impact of early childhood attachment in protecting children in the face of loss. Specifically, the protective role of early attachment security was found at age 15, particularly for individuals experiencing loss during late childhood/early adolescence. The study highlights the importance of continued investigation of the impact of childhood bereavement endured during different developmental stages, and the importance of examining outcomes at different ages.Item Latino fathers' motivations, parental play, parent and friend relationship support, and children's socioemotional development from early childhood to adolescence in racially-ethnically diverse families(2024) Ghosh, Rachel Alina; Cabrera, Natasha; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Parenting practices and parent-child relationship quality, shaped in part by parenting cognitions and beliefs, have a strong proximal contribution to the course and outcome of children’s development from early in the lifespan. However, much existent empirical knowledge about parenting comes from studies of White middle-class mothers and children, and there is far less evidence from racially, ethnically, and economically diverse families – especially from fathers. Through a collection of three interrelated studies, the present dissertation contributes to this literature with an examination of fathers’ parenting motivations, and mothers’ and fathers’ independent and interactive influences on child and adolescent socioemotional outcomes among diverse families. Empirical Paper 1 qualitatively explored what motivated first-time Latino fathers in the U.S. to be good parents for their infants, and examined differences in their motivations by nativity status. Fathers described five primary themes, with variation by nativity,in their parenting motivations: 1) personal rearing history, 2) desire to rear a well-adjusted child, 3) relationship with their child, 4) intrinsic motivations, and 5) sense of duty and responsibility. Empirical Paper 2 examined associations between mothers’ and fathers’ quality of play (i.e., challenging parenting behaviors, playfulness) at 18 months and toddlers’ social competence at 24 months, and tested whether child negative emotional temperament moderated these associations. Contrary to hypotheses, there were no significant associations between mothers’ or fathers’ two types of play and children’s social competence, and no significant moderation effects by negative emotionality. Empirical Paper 3 examined the interactive effects of adolescents’ level of support in their relationships with mothers, fathers, and best friends in the 8th grade and associations with depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and externalizing problems in the 9th grade, as well as differences by adolescent sex. There were several interactive effects of the relationships on later depressive symptoms, though not on anxiety symptoms or externalizing problems, and few differences by adolescent sex. More support from one parent was related to fewer depressive symptoms when youth experienced an unsupportive relationship with the other parent or with a best friend. Taken together, the findings of these studies advance developmental theory and provide nuance to our understanding of mothering, fathering, and children’s and adolescents’ socioemotional developmental processes. These studies have implications for research and programs aimed at promoting the normative, healthy development of diverse youth through recognizing and capitalizing on the contributions of different members within the family system.Item MULTIMODAL ANALYSIS OF NEURAL SIGNALS RELATED TO SOURCE MEMORY ENCODING IN YOUNG CHILDREN(2024) Lei, Yuqing; Riggins, Tracy; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The emergence of source memory is an important milestone during memory development. Decades of research has explored neural correlates of source memory using electroencephalography (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). However, connections between findings from the two approaches, particularly within children, remain unclear. This dissertation identified fMRI-informed cortical sources of two EEG signals during memory encoding, the P2 and the late slow wave (LSW), that predicted subsequent source memory performance in a sample of children aged 4 to 8 years. Both P2 and LSW were source localized to cortical areas of the medial temporal lobe (MTL), reflecting MTL’s crucial role in both early-stage information processing and late-stage integration of memory, which also validated LSW’s suspected role in memory updating. The P2 effect was localized to all six tested subregions of cortical MTL in both left and right hemispheres, whereas the LSW effect was only present in the parahippocampal cortex and entorhinal cortex. P2 was additionally localized to multiple areas in the frontoparietal network, a cortical network known as the “attention network”, highlighting interactions between memory encoding and other cognitive functions. These results reflect the importance of considering both spatial and temporal aspects of neural activity to decode memory mechanism, and demonstrated the potential of combining multimodal measures in children, paving the way for future developmental research.Item Early emotional caregiving environment and associations with memory performance and hippocampal volume in adolescents with prenatal drug exposure(2023) Kohn, Brooke Hannah; Riggins, Tracy; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Early adversities, including prenatal drug exposure (PDE) and a negative postnatal emotional caregiving environment, impact children’s long-term development. The protracted developmental course of memory and its underlying neural systems offer a valuable framework for understanding the longitudinal associations of pre- and postnatal factors on children with PDE. This study longitudinally examines memory and hippocampal development in 69 parent-child dyads with PDE histories to investigate how the early emotional caregiving environment affects children with PDE’s neural and cognitive systems. Measures of physical health, drug exposure, and the emotional caregiving environment were collected between 0-24 months. At age 14 years, adolescents (N=69, 52.17% Female) completed multiple measures of episodic memory. at ages 14 (n=27) and 18 (n=17) years, a subset of adolescents underwent magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. Latent constructs of episodic memory and the caregiving environment were created using Confirmatory Factor Analysis. Multiple regressions revealed a negative emotional caregiving environment during infancy was associated with poor memory performance and smaller left hippocampal volumes at 14 years. Better memory performance at 14 years predicted larger right hippocampal volume at 18 years. At 18 years, the association between the emotional caregiving environment and hippocampal volume was moderated by sex, such that a negative emotional caregiving environment was associated with larger left hippocampal volumes in males but not females. Findings suggest that the postnatal caregiving environment may modulate the effects of PDE across development, influencing neurocognitive development.Item Relations Between Latent Episodic Memory, Nap Habituality, and the Cortex During Childhood(2023) Allard, Tamara Lynn; Riggins, Tracy; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)During childhood, episodic memory demonstrates marked improvements that are supported by the protracted development of the hippocampus and a larger network of cortical regions. To date, most research has focused on associations with the hippocampus in this age group. Few studies have explored the contribution of cortical regions and no studies have explored this longitudinally. Thus, the first aim of this dissertation was to examine the longitudinal co-development of cortical thickness and surface area in memory-related cortical regions with a latent episodic memory variable in 4- to 8-year-old children (N = 177). Findings, uncorrected for multiple comparisons, demonstrated that a thinner cortex in multiple episodic memory network regions (i.e., inferior frontal gyrus, inferior parietal sulcus, lingual gyrus, middle temporal gyrus, precuneus, lateral occipital cortex, superior frontal gyrus, superior parietal lobule, superior temporal gyrus, and temporal pole) at age 4 predicted more rapid improvements in memory performance from age 4 to 6 years. Similarly, greater surface area in the precuneus and less surface area in the medial orbitofrontal gyrus at age 4 also predicted more rapid improvements in memory performance from age 4 to 6 years. Additionally, results revealed that several regions demonstrate parallel co-development with latent episodic memory performance from age 4 to 8 years. Specifically, greater changes in cortical thickness and surface area of the entorhinal cortex were associated with greater changes in memory from age 4 to 6 years. Furthermore, cortical thickness of entorhinal cortex and surface area of anterior cingulate cortex, entorhinal cortex, inferior parietal sulcus, lingual gyrus, and superior temporal gyrus showed co-development with latent episodic memory from age 6 to 8 years. Together, these findings suggest that cortical thickness and surface area of the episodic memory network support improvements in memory performance during childhood. However, these findings did not survive correction for multiple comparisons. Although age-related differences were one focus of this investigation, individual differences were another. Specifically, during childhood children transition away from afternoon napping. This transition has previously been associated with differences in memory consolidation abilities and hippocampal maturation. These associations suggest that habitual nappers require more regular sleep to consolidate memories due to an immature episodic memory network. However, limited work has examined these associations outside the hippocampus. Therefore, the second aim of this dissertation was to examine whether regions that support longitudinal memory development differ as a function of nap habituality (N = 44). Findings revealed significant differences in cortical thickness of right inferior frontal gyrus and surface area of lateral occipital cortex, such that non-nappers demonstrated a thinner cortex and greater surface area in these regions compared to nappers, though these findings did not survive correction for multiple comparisons. Thus, although there is some evidence that memory-related cortical regions may differ based on nap habituality, additional work is needed to support this claim. Together this dissertation provides new data on the co-development of memory with brain structure in the episodic memory network and identifies individual differences that may be associated with these brain structures.