Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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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 give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
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Item EVALUATING SOCIAL EXCLUSION: THE INTERACTION BETWEEN GROUP GOALS AND TARGET CHARACTERISTICS(2011) Richardson, Cameron; Killen, Melanie; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Past work has revealed that adolescents utilize a variety of justifications to support exclusion and inclusion judgments. Group functioning justifications (e.g., "She will ruin the group/make the group work well") are one frequently cited class of considerations. This type of justification is suggestive of an attempt by the adolescent to coordinate group concerns with what the target will likely bring to the group. The above account of group functioning considerations, however, has yet to be formally tested. In this report, both target characteristics (e.g., aggression, shyness, gender) as well as group goals (competitive, noncompetitive) are manipulated in a soccer context to assess the extent to which exclusion judgments rely on the perception of target-group fit. We demonstrate evidence consistent with a target-group fit account of exclusion judgments. Implications and future directions are considered.Item Children's Moral Reasoning about Attribution of Intentions: The Influence of Gender Stereotypes and Theory of Mind(2011) Kelly, Megan Clark; Killen, Melanie A; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The present study investigated how holding gender stereotypes and having a false belief theory of mind impacts children's understanding of intentionality when evaluating morally relevant stories. Children 3 - 4, 5 - 6, and 7 - 8-years-of-age (N = 127) were interviewed about the intentions of a potential transgressor in two hypothetical stories. Both stories involved a child accidentally (or on purpose) putting another child's toy into their own backpack. One of the stories utilized the taking of a toy that was gender stereotype consistent (a girl taking a doll) while the other story involved a gender stereotype inconsistent toy (a boy taking a doll or a girl taking a truck). A false belief theory of mind task as well as gender stereotype knowledge, tolerance, and flexibility tasks were administered to each participant. Results revealed that children over-attributed negative intentions and endorsed more punishment in the story with the counter-stereotypic toy than in the story with the stereotype consistent toy, indicating that stereotypes were impacting the children's decisions concerning intentionality. Additionally, across scenarios, older children as well as children able to pass the false belief theory of mind task, endorsed less punishment and indicated less negative intentions than their counterparts, demonstrating that as children get older and more cognitively advanced they are better able to see the ambiguity of a morally relevant scenario, despite gender stereotypes, in order to attribute less negative intentions. Furthermore, children who were aware of gender stereotypes and children who were tolerant of others playing with any toy regardless of the associated gender stereotype also endorsed less punishment and indicated less negative intentions than their counterparts. The present study therefore shows how children may erroneously focus on stereotypic knowledge when making attributions of intentionality. This is important as over-attributing negative intentions can lead to peer rejection and exclusion. Understanding when and how contextual variables such as gender stereotypes as well as when and how having a false belief theory of mind impacts attributions of intentions is critical to understanding the ontogeny and development of moral reasoning.Item CONTRIBUTIONS OF AGENCY VS. NON-AGENCY TO SEQUENTIAL MEMORY IN 3-YEAR OLDS(2010) Shuck, Lauren Haumesser; Woodward, Amanda L.; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Two studies explored the effect of agency on memory in 3-year-old children when learning a sequence in a picture-book format. Previous research has shown that with both adults and older children, the inclusion of agency in free verbal recall is a central theme. However, very young children are often thought to have poor memory for social events because of their verbal limitations. By using a form of deferred imitation, Study 1 explored social episodic memory in a non-verbal sequential reconstruction task. Children who saw an agent in the picture sequence reconstructed more steps than those that did not see an agent present in the picture-books. Study 2 expanded upon these results by investigating the extent to which agency is necessary in order to improve memory, and what properties of the Study 1 increased performance. In this study, participants who were presented with an agent in only the first and last picture of the sequence did not reconstruct more steps than those that did not see an agent present. Taken together, agency may increase memory for a sequence but only if ample amounts of agentive cues are present throughout.Item DEVELOPMENTAL AND INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN REWARD PROCESSING ACROSS CHILDHOOD AND ADOLESCENCE(2010) Kirwan, Michael Louis; Fox, Nathan A; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Adolescence is a developmental period characterized by maturation across multiple domains. This maturation is not without difficulties, however, as adolescents also display increased negative mood, conflict with parents, and risk-taking behaviors. Increased risk-taking is thought to be the byproduct of changes in reward circuits in the brain, and while a solid foundation of research has provided evidence for changes in reward processing during adolescence compared to adulthood, little is known about the changes that occur from childhood into adolescence. The current study addresses this gap in the literature with an investigation of changes in behavioral performance on a reward-processing task using a cross-sectional sample of children and adolescents. Three primary findings emerged from this study. First, adolescents displayed faster reaction times than 8-year-olds. Second, subjects responded faster and more accurately on trials with greater potential rewards. Finally, individual differences were related to reward sensitivity, reaction times, and response accuracies.Item Relationships Among Internalizing Symptomatology in Kindergarten and Later Self-Concept and Competence(2010) Denny, Michelle Setser; Strein, William; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This study used a longitudinal sample of 9,160 children participating in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study- Kindergarten Cohort (ECLS-K) to: (a) describe characteristics of children who present with elevated internalizing symptomatology, (b) investigate stability of elevated internalizing status across early and middle childhood, and (c) explore possible relationships between elevated symptomatology in kindergarten and later academic competence and self-concept. Children were dichotomously categorized at kindergarten (Time 1), three years later (Time 2) and five years later (Time 3) as having either elevated or typical levels of internalizing symptomatology based on their scores on the internalizing subscale of an adapted version of the Social Skills Rating Scale (SSRS). Elevated internalizing symptomatology was unrelated to gender. In middle childhood more lower SES children than expected fell within the elevated category and fewer higher SES children than expected fell within the elevated category. Elevated internalizing symptomatology, as measured by teacher ratings, was associated with weaker academic skills and less social/behavioral competence at all three points in time. Elevated internalizing symptomatology was also associated with heightened internalizing and externalizing symptomatology, as measured by children's self-report, in middle childhood. Elevated internalizing symptomatology was negatively associated with social self-concept, but not academic self-concept. Teacher-rated elevated internalizing symptomatology was very unstable from early to middle childhood, and only slightly more stable within the middle childhood years. Kindergarten internalizing symptoms were not predictive of later self-concept and competency. The impact of selected socio-cultural factors (i.e., gender, race/ethnicity, SES) on temporal relationships was not significant. Results are discussed with regard to future directions for research and implications for practice.Item THE ROLE OF MOTHER-CHILD RELATIONSHIP QUALITY IN THE LINK BETWEEN MATERNAL PSYCHOLOGICAL CONTROL AND INTERNALIZED MALADJUSTMENT IN EARLY ADOLESCENCE(2010) Kovacs, Sarrit Michal; Rubin, Kenneth H; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Self-determination and attachment theorists and researchers have recently hypothesized about the role of parent-child relationship quality as a mediator or moderator in the relation between parental psychological control and child and adolescent internalized maladjustment. Thus, the overall purpose of the present study was to empirically investigate the interrelations among maternal psychological control, mother-child relationship quality, and young adolescent internalized maladjustment. Ninety 5th and 6th grade young adolescents and their mothers participated in videotaped shared activities and completed questionnaires in a laboratory visit. The study sample consisted of mostly middle class, well-educated, two-parent families. The following variables were assessed and were of primary importance to the present study: maternal-reported psychological control; observed positivity and negativity in the mother-child relationship; youth-perceived positivity and negativity in the mother-child relationship; youth-perceived attachment security to mother; youth-reported self-esteem; and maternal-reported youth internalizing problems. Both a mediation and moderation model were examined. Simple mediation analysis was conducted in order to examine mother-child relationship quality as a mediator of the relation between maternal psychological control and young adolescent internalized maladjustment. However, no evidence of mediating processes was found. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis was conducted examining mother-child relationship quality as a moderator of the relation between maternal psychological control and young adolescent internalized maladjustment. Results revealed significant maternal psychological control youth-perceived mother-child relationship quality interaction effects on young adolescent self-esteem and internalizing problems. More specifically, young adolescents who perceived the lowest levels of negativity their relationships also reported higher levels of self-esteem when their mothers reported using low levels of psychological control. In addition, young adolescents who perceived the highest levels of positivity in their relationships had mothers who reported using low levels of psychological control and reported observing lower levels of internalizing problems in their children. Another important finding of the present study was the significant main effect of observed positivity in the mother-child relationship on youth-reported self-esteem. This finding was obtained despite the greater difficulty in obtaining significance when using independent reporters for the constructs of interest.Item The Impact of Parenting Practices and Early Childhood Curricula on Children's Academic Achievement and Social Competence(2006-06-05) kessenich, anne; Hofferth, Sandra; Koblinsky, Sally; Family Studies; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Current research highlights the importance of early social competence for later academic success. Nevertheless, despite that documented importance, the emphasis in both policy and practice has been on academic achievement in early learning curricula. The proposed research had three objectives: 1) to understand how parenting behaviors toward children in kindergarten influence their academic achievement in third grade, 2) to understand how curriculum in kindergarten influences academic achievement in third grade, and 3) to ascertain whether social competence mediates the relationship between parenting factors in kindergarten and academic achievement in third grade and curriculum factors in kindergarten and academic achievement in the third grade. Data are drawn for the period 1998-2003 from an existing data set, the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study - Kindergarten Cohort (ECLS-K) and analyzed using multiple regression analyses. After controlling for background characteristics and academic achievement in kindergarten, these analyses revealed that the presence of spanking in kindergarten was significantly related to academic achievement in third grade. The presence of spanking in kindergarten was also related to children's learning related skills in third grade. Spanking and higher levels of warmth in kindergarten were related to children's interpersonal skills in third grade. Curriculum in kindergarten was unrelated to third grade academic achievement, social competence, and behavior problems. Social competence in third grade was related to academic achievement in third grade, while behavior problems were not. Finally, social competence mediated the relationship between spanking in kindergarten and academic achievement in third grade.