UMD Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/3
New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a given thesis/dissertation in DRUM.
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
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Item Parent- and Teacher-Rated Social Skills and Theory of Mind in Kindergarteners(2018) Caputo, Maryke Haasbroek; Teglasi, Hedwig; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This study investigated how kindergartners’ use of Theory of Mind (ToM; understanding and inferring others’ mental states to predict and explain behavior) relate to their Social Competence (SC), as rated by parents and teachers. This study aimed to determine whether social skills items could be classified as more or less conventional (knowledge of emotions and social conventions) or intentional (requires noticing and interpreting other’s beliefs and intentions) based on their correlates with more or less structured performance measures of ToM, respectively. Results partially supported this this distinction. Patterns suggested that parents and teachers judge children’s social skills differently. This study also explored relations of language with SC and ToM. Language accounted for much of the variance in the more structured ToM task and teacher-rated social skills, but not the less structured ToM task or parent-rated social skills. Implications for SC conceptualization and scale construction and interpretation are discussed.Item Relationships between Temperament, Emotion Understanding, and Social Competence in Early Childhood(2017) Verron, Heather; Teglasi, Hedwig; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Young children’s social competence is regarded as one of the strongest indicators of positive adjustment throughout the lifespan. As part of an effort to unpack its development, a large body of existing research has established relationships between temperamental factors and social competence, as well as between emotion understanding and social competence. However, studies that have examined these constructs have been laden with definitional disagreements and methodological issues, leaving the true magnitude and scope of the relationships difficult to discern. In addition, there has been very little research that has examined relationships between temperament and emotion understanding, although theory and research with clinical samples suggests there are likely links between the two. The current study thus aimed to add to the existing literature by examining temperamental factors, emotion understanding abilities, and social competence in concert. It was hypothesized that emotion understanding would mediate relationships between temperament and social competence. As expected, certain aspects of temperamental reactivity and self-regulation, as rated by both parents and teachers, correlated with preschoolers’ and kindergarteners’ performance on emotion understanding tasks, which required them to identify emotions likely to be elicited by common social situations (emotion situation knowledge) and to offer explanations for why certain situations may be elicited by those social situations (emotion situation reasoning). Interestingly, performance on emotion situation reasoning tasks, but not emotion situation knowledge tasks, emerged as a significant mediator between temperament and social competence, regardless of temperament informant. Although further research is needed in this area, emerging patterns suggest a need to distinguish between children’s possession of rote knowledge of emotions and abilities to reason about them. Limitations of the study and implications for future research are also discussed.Item Outcomes of an elementary grades social competence experiment according to student self-report(2008-06-30) Harak, Elise Touris; Gottfredson, Gary D; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Problem behaviors that emerge in early childhood often persist through adolescence. Evaluations provide evidence that social skills programs in elementary schools can reduce student aggression. There is some evidence that social skills programs also increase social skills, academic commitment, and achievement. Outcome evaluations have more often focused on aggression than on social skills and academics, however. The present study is a randomized, controlled trial evaluating the effects of one popular social skills instructional program, Second Step, in six treatment and six control schools after two years of implementation. Despite the widespread use of Second Step, few evaluations have assessed its effects. The existing evaluations have either: (a) lacked randomization, (b) had small samples, (c) not measured implementation, or (d) were implemented for one year or less. In the present evaluation, implementation data were collected from all teachers as each lesson was completed. Overall implementation was high across two years. Treatment effects were assessed on nine self-report measures including Engagement in Learning, prosocial behaviors (Altruism, Empathy, and Self-Restraint) and problem behaviors and attitudes (Rebellious Behavior, Aggression, Victimization, Acceptability of Aggression, and Hostile Attribution Bias). Analyses completed using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) implied that treatment did not statistically significantly affect individual student self-reports net of individual characteristics. In almost all cases, the non-significant estimates of treatment effects were in the desired direction but mirrored non-significant pre-intervention differences.Item Low-Income African American Fathers' Contributions to Toddlers' Social and Emotional Development(2007-11-26) Mitchell, Stephanie Jolley; Cabrera, Natasha; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Growing interest in low-income, minority fathers' involvement and concern over their children's social and emotional development highlights the need for empirical investigation into the predictors of low-income fathers' involvement and its influence on young children's social and emotional development. Using data from a study of low-income, African American fathers of toddlers enrolled in Early Head Start, the present research examined associations among fathers' family contexts, the quality of father-child interactions, and children's social competence and problem behavior. Guided by the Dynamics Model of paternal influences on children (Cabrera et al., in press a), the present research addressed the following questions: (a) how are fathers' family contexts associated with children's social and emotional development, (b) how are fathers' family contexts associated with the quality of father-child interactions, (c) how is the quality of father-child interactions uniquely associated with children's social and emotional development, and (d) to what extent does the quality of father-child interactions mediate associations between fathers' family contexts and children's social and emotional development? Results of multiple regressions suggest that low-income, African American fathers who parent in the context of more harmonious partner and extended family relationships have children with greater social competence and less problem behavior than fathers who have less amicable partner and extended family relationships. Furthermore, fathers who act negatively and are over-controlling toward their toddlers have children who exhibit less social competence than fathers who display fewer negative behaviors. These findings highlight the importance of supporting fathers' relationships with their partners and extended family members and of encouraging fathers to be less negative and over-controlling when interacting with their toddlers in order to promote impoverished children's healthy social and emotional development.Item First-year Self-Report Outcomes of a Character Education Experiment with Elementary Students(2006-12-10) Harak, Elise Touris; Gottfredson, Gary D; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Instruction in social competence in elementary grades may provide a means of preventing later problem behaviors. Previous studies indicate that school-based social competency curricula sometimes lead to decreases in problem behaviors. This randomized, controlled trial measures the efficacy of the Second Step program in twelve schools. The assessment of efficacy is based on 11 scales in a pre- and post- test, student self-report survey. These scales measure: (a) outcomes directly targeted by the curriculum, (b) school climate, and (c) other related outcomes. Results for students in six intervention schools are compared to students in six randomly equivalent control schools. After the first of three years of intervention, there is a statistically significant main effect for treatment on Engagement in Learning, an interaction of treatment with individual characteristics on Sense of School as a Community and Self-Restraint, and positive but not significant effect sizes on Self-Restraint and Hostile Attribution Bias.