The present study is an investigation of the role of family management practices and interactional processes on the development of the child's peer relations, self-esteem, and academic performance. Data collected in two separate studies, representing a passive longitudinal design and a randomized longitudinal experiment, will be analyzed to provide support for the causal role of family management on the three child outcome variables. In the passive longitudinal design, two 100-subject cohorts of 9- to 10-year-old boys were followed over 3 years to ages 11 and 12. The randomized longitudinal experiment consists of 70 families randomly assigned to OSLC or community treatment. The OSLC intervention is aimed at helping parents develop noncoercive means of discipline, better child monitoring skills, the use of positive reinforcement, involvement with the child, and problem solving skills. Both studies provide multiple agent and method assessments of the key theoretical dependent and independent constructs. Structural equation modeling (i.e., LISREL) is proposed as the primary analytic tool for both samples. The authors hypothesized and tested a series of static (concurrent) structural equation models relating family management skills and undersocialized child behavior to peer relations, self-esteem, and academic skills. Alternative models for the longitudinal data sets have been developed for this proposal that reflect different developmental processes leading to the three child outcome variables: peer relations, self-esteem, and academic performance. The models will be tested on the passive longitudinal data set, and the results confirmed with data from the randomized longitudinal experiment. The study is viewed as making at least two distinct contributions. First, considerable knowledge of the developmental processes which determine peer acceptance, academic performance, and self-esteem will be gained. Second, the unique methodological approach proposed has been written about in several sources, but no previous research effort has been able to dovetail a passive longitudinal study and its findings with a randomized longitudinal experiment. This paradigm allows for causal inferences to be made based on the combination of these methods.
| Dishion, T J (1990) The family ecology of boys' peer relations in middle childhood. Child Dev 61:874-92 |
