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J S Reznick

Publications and source records attributed to J S Reznick.

31 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed1989

The validity of a parent report instrument of child language at twenty months.

When carefully assessed and analysed, parent report can provide a valuable overall evaluation of children's language at 20 months. Norming information and validity coefficients are presented here for a vocabulary checklist assessment included in the Early Language Inventory. Normative data are provided for fullterm, preterm, and precocious samples, including selected vocabulatory subsets that are indicative of early language learning style. The vocabulary checklist has substantial validity as indexed by correlations with the Bayley Scales of Infant Development and particularly with a language subscale derived from that test.

Child Language↗
PubMed1989

A multiple form word production checklist for assessing early language.

We describe the development of a set of five equivalent checklists to assess word production of children in their second year. The words on each list do not overlap, but represent comparable levels of difficulty. Thus, individual lists may be used to estimate the child's production vocabulary, and the set of lists may be used serially in a longitudinal design. A validation study on 25 infants suggests that the five lists produce comparable mean production scores, reflect differences in age, and preserve individual differences in total production and production of linguistic categories such as nouns, verbs, open class items, and closed class items. This finding provides further support for the reliability of parental report instruments in this developmental domain.

Child, Preschool↗
PubMed1989

Inhibited and uninhibited types of children.

An initial group of 100 children who were not selected a priori on any behavioral features were observed in laboratory settings at 14, 20, 32, and 48 months and their behaviors coded for inhibition and lack of inhibition to the unfamiliar. The children who had been extremely inhibited or uninhibited at both 14 and 20 months differed significantly at 4 years of age in behavior and cardiac acceleration to cognitive stress. However, for the entire sample, there was no significant relation between degree of inhibited behavior at 14 or 20 months, on the one hand, and inhibition at 4 years of age, on the other, nor any relation between behavior and heart rate acceleration. These results suggest that the constructs inhibited and uninhibited to the unfamiliar refer to children who fall at the extremes of a phenotypic continuum from shyness and restraint to sociability and affective spontaneity.

Cognition↗
PubMed1988

Biological bases of childhood shyness.

The initial behavioral reaction to unfamiliar events is a distinctive source of intraspecific variation in humans and other animals. Two longitudinal studies of 2-year-old children who were extreme in the display of either behavioral restraint or spontaneity in unfamiliar contexts revealed that by 7 years of age a majority of the restrained group were quiet and socially avoidant with unfamiliar children and adults whereas a majority of the more spontaneous children were talkative and interactive. The group differences in peripheral physiological reactions suggest that inherited variation in the threshold of arousal in selected limbic sites may contribute to shyness in childhood and even extreme degrees of social avoidance in adults.

Age Factors↗
PubMed1988

Behavioral inhibition in children of parents with panic disorder and agoraphobia. A controlled study.

To investigate the role of "behavioral inhibition to the unfamiliar" as an early temperamental characteristic of children at risk for adult panic disorder and agoraphobia (PDAG), we compared children of parents with PDAG with those from psychiatric comparison groups. Fifty-six children aged 2 to 7 years, matched for age, socioeconomic status, ethnic background, and ordinal position, were blindly evaluated at the Harvard Infant Study laboratory, Cambridge, Mass. The rates of behavioral inhibition in children of probands with PDAG, with or without comorbid major depressive disorder (MDD), were significantly higher than for our comparison group without PDAG. Further, the data suggest a progression of increasing rates of inhibition from the comparison group without MDD (15.4%), to MDD (50.0%), and to comorbid PDAG and MDD (70%) and PDAG (84.6%). In contrast, the rate of behavioral inhibition in children of probands with MDD did not meaningfully differ from the comparison group without MDD. Behavioral inhibition to the unfamiliar, as defined and measured in the previous work of the Harvard Infant Study program, is highly prevalent in the offspring of adults in treatment for PDAG. These children appear to be at risk for distress and disability in childhood and also perhaps for development of psychiatric disorder in later childhood and aulthood.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1988

Childhood derivatives of inhibition and lack of inhibition to the unfamiliar.

Behavioral and physiological assessments of 41 7 1/2-year-old children who had been selected to be inhibited or uninhibited at 21 months and observed again at 4 and 5 1/2 years revealed that each of the 2 original behavioral profiles predicted theoretically reasonable derivatives. A majority of the formerly shy, timid children became quiet and socially avoidant in unfamiliar social situations, while a majority of the formerly sociable children became talkative and interactive with peers and adults. Absolute heart-rate and cortisol level at 7 1/2 years were not as discriminating of the 2 behavioral groups as they had been 2 years earlier.

Arousal↗
PubMed1987

The physiology and psychology of behavioral inhibition in children.

Longitudinal study of 2 cohorts of children selected in the second or third year of life to be extremely cautious and shy (inhibited) or fearless and outgoing (uninhibited) to unfamiliar events revealed preservation of these 2 behavioral qualities through the sixth year of life. Additionally, more of the inhibited children showed signs of activation in 1 or more of the physiological circuits that usually respond to novelty and challenge, namely, the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, the reticular activating system, and the sympathetic arm of the autonomic nervous system. It is suggested that the threshold of responsivity in limbic and hypothalamic structures to unfamiliarity and challenge is tonically lower for inhibited than for uninhibited children.

Arousal↗
PubMed1979

Mental travel: some reservations.

Two experiments were conducted to assess the extent of potential experimental demand characteristics inherent in the image-scanning paradigm. The results of the first "mental travel" experiment that pitted verbal versus imagery coding showed that (a) the positive correlation between physical distance and reaction time was replicated, and (b) when given a choice, subjects' reaction times varied as a function of verbal codes rather than imagery. To isolate the effects due to demand constraints from those produced by mode dominance, a nonexperiment in which subjects received only a description of the image-scanning procedure was conducted. Results demonstrated that subjects were capable of predicting the reaction time results for both verbal and imagery codes. The presence of experimental demand in the image-scanning paradigm necessitates caution when structural interpretations of visual images are considered.

Distance Perception↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Measuring variability in early child language: don't shoot the messenger.

Feldman et al. criticize the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventories (CDIs) as having too much variability, too little stability, and insufficient ability to predict early language delay. We present data showing that these characteristics of the CDI are authentic reflections of individual differences in early language development rather than measurement deficiencies. We also respond to their critical assertions concerning sociodemographic influences on the CDI scores.

Child Development↗
PubMedDate not supplied

The development of visual expectations in the first year.

The development of expectations was investigated by using the Visual Expectations Procedure. In Experiment 1, 128 infants aged 6-, 9-, and 12-months-old saw two 40-trial sequences of a videotaped mechanical toy appearing in various locations. The sequences represented an alternation pattern (i.e., ABAB) or a complex pivot pattern (i.e., ABCBABCB). In Experiment 2, 76 infants aged 4-, 8-, and 12-months-old saw either a left-right alternation or a top-bottom alternation. Reaction time improved and the percentage of anticipations increased between 6 and 9 months in Experiment 1 and between 4 and 8 months in Experiment 2 but not thereafter. Anticipations for the pivot sequence and for younger infants on both sequences were often incorrect (i.e., gaze shifts occurred before stimulus onset but were not directed toward the upcoming stimulus). We conclude that young infants have expectations that reflect some degree of general or procedural knowledge, but it is not clear that this behavior implies specific, articulated expectations about upcoming events.

Age Factors↗