Authors: Hyein Chang Sheryl L Olson
Publish Date: 2015/08/13
Volume: 44, Issue: 4, Pages: 799-810
Abstract
We investigated systematic changes in 3yearolds’ effortful persistence in a dyadic problemsolving context and explored their correlates ie parenting behavior and demographic characteristics at 3 years and consequences ie child externalizing behavior at 3 6 and 10 years within a sample of 241 middleincome families 118 girls Results indicated that children may be grouped into three classes based on their behavioral profiles of persistence Children who were highly persistent over the course of the task were more likely to have higher levels of IQ and mothers who were observed to be more behaviorally responsive than those who showed consistently low levels of taskrelated behavior Additionally children who demonstrated stably low levels of persistence were rated by teachers to display more externalizing behavior at 6 and 10 years than those in the other groups Profiles of persistence did not predict concurrent levels of child externalizing behavior at the age of 3 years The findings are discussed with respect to expanding the scope of research on child selfregulation by defining it as a time based construct and tracking its dynamic changesThis research was part of the first author’s doctoral dissertation at the University of Michigan This research was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health RO1MH57489 to the second author We are very grateful to the children parents teachers and preschool administrators for making this research possible
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