Author : Jennifer Lento
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 246 pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (318 download)
Book Synopsis The Role of Child Maltreatment and Peer Victimization in the Prediction of Playground Social Behaviors in Early Elementary School by : Jennifer Lento
Download or read book The Role of Child Maltreatment and Peer Victimization in the Prediction of Playground Social Behaviors in Early Elementary School written by Jennifer Lento and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Limited research attention has been given to the impact of main and interaction effects of maltreatment and peer victimization on social behaviors such as aggression and group entry behavior, which have been found to be important indices of social competence. The primary goals of this investigation were to examine whether main or interaction effects of maltreatment and peer victimization predicted: (1) initiation and receipt of aggression, (2) responses to aggression, (3) group entry strategies, and (4) group entry outcomes, within the naturalistic setting of the school playground. The current study examined 127 male and female, multi-ethnic children, between the ages of five to seven. Half of the sample experienced at least one episode of parental maltreatment (i.e., physical abuse and/or neglect), as determined by a substantiated report of child maltreatment. The other half of the sample included comparison children recruited from neighborhoods where the majority of the maltreated sample lived. Severity of peer victimization was assessed using the Victimization Scale. All children were unobtrusively observed for approximately 80 minutes on four specific behavioral styles and outcomes: (1) the initiation and receipt of aggression (i.e., bullying, instrumental, and reactive); (2) responses to aggression (i.e., resist, dependent, submit, constructive, ignore/avoid, and no responses); (3) group entry strategies (i.e., attention-getting, disruptive, self-referent, mimic, wait-and-hover, and person-group); and (4) group entry outcomes (i.e., successful, ignored, rejected, and interrupted). Main and interaction effects of maltreatment and peer victimization were hypothesized to predict these four groups of behavioral styles and outcomes. Hierarchical linear regression models did not reveal any main effects of maltreatment or peer victimization on the proposed behavioral styles or outcomes. However, there was a statistically significant maltreatment-peer victimization interaction for both resist responses (p = .03) and not responding to aggression (p = .01). Also, the maltreatment-peer victimization interaction approached significance for the receipt of reactive aggression (p = .06). Main and interaction effects of maltreatment and peer victimization were not predictive of group entry strategies or group entry outcomes. This study contributes to current understanding of behavioral styles of maltreated and peer victimized children in early elementary school that may place them at-risk for social adjustment difficulties.