Suchergebnisse

Prospect-refuge theorywas used to study children's aesthetic responses to landscape paintings. Sixty-seven children between the ages of 8 and 15 years reported their liking for 28 landscape paintings and their perceptions of the degree of prospect, refuge, and hazard in those paintings. Consistent with expectations, children were able to express systematic preferences and judgments of degrees of prospect, refuge, and hazard. Liking was significantly related to perceptions of prospect, to interactions between prospect and refuge, and to interactions between prospect and hazard. Contrary to expectations, age did not moderate the effects of prospect, refuge, and hazard perceptions on liking and boys, but not girls, actually preferred pictures that they perceived to be more hazardous than other pictures. Results are discussed in terms of consistency with previous results and with Darwinian explanations for aesthetic feelings.

AbstractEmotional support from intimate partners has been shown to have both costs and benefits for daily anxious and depressed moods (N. Bolger, A. Zuckerman, & R. C. Kessler, 2000). We examine whether similar costs and benefits are found for practical support, and when fatigue, vigor, and anger are outcomes. Results are based on daily diary reports from 68 recent law school graduates and their intimate partners during the month before the New York State bar examination. Partners' reports of practical support provision to the examinee were beneficial in that they were associated with decreased examinee fatigue and increased examinee vigor. In contrast, examinees' recognition of emotional support receipt was costly in that it was associated with increases in anger, as well as anxious and depressed mood. Results highlight the distinction between emotional and practical support and are consistent with findings that suggest that invisible (provided but not recognized) support leads to the best outcomes.

Romantic partners' daily coping behavior can be viewed as a context for one's own coping. These three studies found that individuals were more likely to cope actively, seek support, or use alcohol, food, and drugs as means of coping when they perceived their partners doing so on a given occasion (Study 1, a cross‐sectional study) and when their partners reported using these strategies (Studies 2 and 3, longitudinal couples studies). These effects were evident regardless of whether or not one partner was dealing with an acute stressor (Study 2) or if both partners were dealing with day‐to‐day hassles (Study 3). Although these patterns are correlational, they raise important questions about how individuals choose to cope with acute stressors.

AbstractThis study evaluated the utility of the social competence scale (SCS)‐parent version, a measure of social competence developed for children of elementary school age, for use with preschool‐age children. Data were derived from two samples of preschoolers: a community sample assessed at enrollment to pre‐kindergarten programs and a high‐risk sample of children at familial risk for conduct problems participating in a preventive intervention trial. Using data from both samples, we assessed the factor structure, internal consistency, and stability of the SCS, and whether the SCS discriminated the high‐risk sample from the community sample. Results support the utility and construct validity of the SCS for use in preschoolers. The total SCS scale was relatively stable over 24 months during the preschool period and was correlated with other measures of social competence, parent ratings of emotion regulation, lability and behavior problems, and tests of child cognitive ability.