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Reactions to social and non‐social novelties in 2‐year‐olds
Author(s) -
Andersson Kerstin
Publication year - 1999
Publication title -
infant and child development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.87
H-Index - 57
eISSN - 1522-7219
pISSN - 1522-7227
DOI - 10.1002/(sici)1522-7219(199912)8:4<211::aid-icd199>3.0.co;2-0
Subject(s) - psychology , construct (python library) , intrusion , developmental psychology , social psychology , matrix (chemical analysis) , cognitive psychology , chemistry , geochemistry , chromatography , computer science , programming language , geology
The purpose of this study is to investigate the internal structure of behavioural inhibition [cf. Goldsmith, H.H. and Campos, J.J. (1990). Child Development , 61 , 1944–1964]. Observations of 45 2‐year‐olds’ approaching/positive reactions, inhibited/negative reactions, and latencies, when encountering strangers as well as unfamiliar objects, are made in a laboratory setting. The intercorrelations between the six different measures, obtained from the observations, are analysed by means of a multitrait–multimethod matrix. It is concluded, from inspection of the matrix, that aggregations of data into indexes covering different reactions (approaching/positive reactions, inhibited/negative reactions, and latency) and settings (stranger and objects), respectively, are appropriate. To further validate the different indexes, assessments of concurrent variables (separation reactions, reactions to physical intrusion, reactions in a new setting, and maternal ratings of reactions to strangers) are used. The results indicate that all reactions to both social and non‐social novelties can be assigned to one construct, which is in line with the assumption made by Kagan and his co‐workers about behavioural inhibition. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.