Maternal Factors That Influence Children's Positive Behavior: Demonstration of a Structural Equation Analysis of Selected Data from the Berkeley Growth Study.

CRANO, WILLIAM D., and MENDOZA, JORGE L. Maternal Factors That Influence Children's Positive Behavior: Demonstration of a Structural Equation Analysis of Selected Data from the Berkeley Growth Study. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1987, 58, 38-48. Experimentation can be inappropriate in research concerned with natural progressions, because the experimental method requires an artificial intervention into the ongoing processes it is designed to investigate. Nonetheless, when technical alternatives are not available, the research question sometimes is reshaped to fit the extant methodology. In such instances, the resulting data often do not speak to the issue that initially gave rise to the research. Structural equation modeling can be useful in solving the problem of lack of fit between issue and method, especially in developmental research. An analysis that makes use of data drawn from Bayley's Berkeley Growth Study is performed for didactic purposes to illustrate the use of structural equation modeling on a child development data set. Alternatives to the standard latent factor approaches are suggested and demonstrated for use in research situations in which the subject-to-variable ratio is less than optimal. These preliminary analyses are intended to provide later confirmatory analyses with a more coherent empirical and theoretical foundation than would be possible if the data were left in their original form. The Bayley data provide a substantive context in which to consider the relevance of the proposed methodological approach for research on child development and an additional role for preliminary approximations of structural equation models in the early stages of a research project.

[1]  Bruce J. Biddle,et al.  Causality, confirmation, credulity, and structural equation modeling. , 1987 .

[2]  J. S. Tanaka.  "How Big Is Big Enough?": Sample Size and Goodness of Fit in Structural Equation Models with Latent Variables. , 1987 .

[3]  J. Connell.  Structural Equation Modeling and the Study of Child Development: A Question of Goodness of Fit. , 1987 .

[4]  M. Brewer,et al.  Principles and Methods of Social Research , 1986 .

[5]  W. Crano.  Research methodology: The interaction of substance with investigative form. , 1986 .

[6]  Sandra Scarr,et al.  Constructing psychology: Making facts and fables for our times. , 1985 .

[7]  W. Crano,et al.  Assessing and Redressing Comprehension Artifacts in Social Intervention Research , 1985 .

[8]  Karl G. Jöreskog,et al.  Recent Developments in Structural Equation Modeling , 1982 .

[9]  Gerald Y. Michaels,et al.  Parental interpersonal perceptual style, child adjustment, and parent—Child interactions , 1982, Journal of abnormal child psychology.

[10]  P. Bentler,et al.  Significance Tests and Goodness of Fit in the Analysis of Covariance Structures , 1980 .

[11]  P. Bentler.  MULTIVARIATE ANALYSIS WITH LATENT VARIABLES: CAUSAL MODELING , 1980 .

[12]  L. Wheeler,et al.  Review of personality and social psychology , 1980 .

[13]  John R. Nesselroade,et al.  Longitudinal Research in the Study of Behavior and Development , 1979 .

[14]  R. Q. Bell.  Parent, Child, and Reciprocal Influences. , 1979 .

[15]  Karl G. Jöreskog,et al.  Statistical estimation of structural models in longitudinal-developmental investigations , 1979 .

[16]  Donald B. Rubin,et al.  Interpersonal expectancy effects: the first 345 studies , 1978, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

[17]  W. Crano,et al.  Causal influence of teachers' expectations on children's academic performance: A cross-lagged panel analysis. , 1978 .

[18]  W. Crano.  What Do Infant Mental Tests Test? A Cross-lagged Panel Analysis of Selected Data from the Berkeley Growth Study. , 1977 .

[19]  E. Broussard.  Neonatal prediction and outcome at 10/11 years , 1976, Child Psychiatry and Human Development.

[20]  M. Goldschmid,et al.  Negative teacher expectation and IQ change in children with superior intellectual potential. , 1974, Child development.

[21]  W. Seaver,et al.  Effects of naturally induced teacher expectancies. , 1973 .

[22]  D. Baumrind,et al.  Harmonious Parents and Their Preschool Children. , 1971 .

[23]  D. Baumrind.  Current patterns of parental authority. , 1971 .

[24]  E. Broussard,et al.  Maternal perception of the neonate as related to development , 1970, Child psychiatry and human development.

[25]  D. Campbell,et al.  More plausible rival hypotheses in the cross-lagged panel correlation technique. , 1969 .

[26]  R. Rosenthal,et al.  Pygmalion in the classroom , 1968 .

[27]  N. Bayley,et al.  CORRELATIONS OF MATERNAL AND CHILD BEHAVIORS WITH THE DEVELOPMENT OF MENTAL ABILITIES: DATA FROM THE BERKELEY GROWTH STUDY. , 1964, Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development.

[28]  N. Bayley,et al.  Maternal behavior, child behavior, and their intercorrelations from infancy through adolescence. , 1963, Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development.

[29]  H. E. Jones,et al.  The Berkeley growth study. , 1941 .