Power Of Children Research Articles

Book Review: The Power of Children: The Construction of Christian Families in the Greco-Roman World

Book Review: The Power of Children: The Construction of Christian Families in the Greco-Roman World

Validation of Guidelines for Undercorrection of Intraocular Lens Power in Children

Initial undercorrection of intraocular lens (IOL power) is a common practice in children undergoing pediatric cataract surgery. However, the long-term refractive status of these children is largely unknown. The purpose of this study is to analyze the long-term refractive status of these children. Retrospective observational study. We analyzed records of children (<7 years of age) who underwent cataract surgery with a primary IOL implantation and had completed follow-up to ≥7 years of age. Data were collected regarding demographics, etiology of cataract, method of undercorrection, and serial follow-up refractions. Prediction error was defined as refractive error minus emmetropia. The main outcome measure was prediction error at 7 years of age. Eighty-four eyes of 56 children (28 unilateral and 28 bilateral cases) met the study criteria. The median age at surgery was 3.3 years (interquartile range 2.7-5 years), and the median follow-up period was 3.75 years. At 7 years of age, the median absolute prediction was 1.5 diopters (interquartile range 0.75-2 diopters). Seven of 84 (8.3%) children achieved emmetropia while an equal proportion were myopic (45%) or hypermetropic (46%). Prediction error (adjusted for using both eyes) at 7 years of age was not significantly different in any group (P > .05). Maximum myopic shift was observed in children <2 years of age. Age at surgery was the only significant factor that influenced prediction error (â=-0.32; P= .001). This study suggests that children undercorrected using guidelines suggested by Enyedi and associates may achieve an acceptable refractive error at 7 years of age. However, in children <2 years of age, more hypermetropia may be observed. More studies are needed to validate various methods of undercorrection and compare with other guidelines.

Book Review: The Power of Children: The Construction of Christian Families in the Greco-Roman World

Book Review: The Power of Children: The Construction of Christian Families in the Greco-Roman World

Educators' Perceptions of Facilitating Children's Participation in Early Childhood Education

THE AIM OF THIS RESEARCH is to provide a better understanding of children's competence, vulnerability and power issues, and to promote better decision making and protection of children by educators. This means the pedagogy in early childhood education needs to be based on understanding the nature of children's participation and participatory learning. Further on it requires understanding about how the educators working in day care could aim the pedagogical process to supporting children's participation via developing practices. Research is based on a large survey conducted in the Finnish early childhood education (ECE) field and analysed through abductive content analysis. The results show that in the pedagogical process three kinds of participation supporting means could be identified: facilitating environment and atmosphere; facilitating professional skills for learning and supporting children's perspective; and facilitating ongoing participatory practices. Finally, a framework of developing participatory practices was constructed from the findings to represent the pedagogical cycle of participation.

Little Teachers: Children's Drama, Traveling, and Ruptured Childhoods in 1930s and 1940s China

This paper examines and problematizes complex relationships among war, the construction of “children,” and pursuit of national salvation and modernity in wartime China through case studies of children's traveling troupes. Children have received less attention than women and the masses in relation to modern Chinese literature and culture: wartime conceptions of children can contribute to rethinking ideas about orphan and refugee children's role in the national rescue movement during the War of Resistance against Japan (1937–1945). Influential reformer Tao Xingzhi's radical educational philosophy of “little teachers” liberated children's power and organized them for war propaganda. Shaped into a potent cultural symbol, self-administered children's troupes like the Xin'an Traveling Troupe and the Children's Drama Troupe demonstrated the politicization of Tao's slogan “Life is Education.” The children's “long march,” narratives of their travel experience, and amateur performances became a political means to e...

The Mighty Child: Time and Power in Children’s Literature by Clémentine Beauvais (review)

The Mighty Child: Time and Power in Children’s Literature by Clémentine Beauvais (review)

The Mighty Child: Time and Power in Children’s Literature by Clémentine Beauvais

The Mighty Child: Time and Power in Children’s Literature by Clémentine Beauvais

PATTERNS OF EMOTIONAL AVAILABILITY IN MOTHER-INFANT DYADS: ASSOCIATIONS WITH MULTIPLE LEVELS OF CONTEXT.

This study explored emotional availability (EA)- an individual's emotional responsiveness and attunement to another's needs and goals (R.N. Emde, 1980)- among a high social risk group of 226 adolescent mothers and their infants (average = 12 months old). The aim was to identify dyadic patterns of EA and to examine their association with multiple indicators of the ecological context. Maternal sensitivity, maternal nonhostility, and child responsiveness were assessed with the Emotional Availability Scales, Third Edition (Z. Biringen, J. Robinson, & R.N. Emde, 1998) during free play and teaching observations at home. Four EA patterns were identified using k-means cluster analysis: (a) "low functioning," (b) "high functioning," (c) "low functioning dyads with nonhostile mothers," and (d) "inconsistently sensitive mother and responsive child." These patterns had distinct associations with (a) mothers' parenting attitudes regarding children's power and independence and parent-child role reversal, (b) mothers' strategies in conflict resolution with their partners and their children, and (c) the dyads' living arrangements. This study makes a contribution to the understanding of the mother-child relationship from a systemic and relational perspective and explores the association of EA patterns with the dyads' relational context. Implications for programs and treatment approaches aimed at supporting dyads at social risk are discussed.

Reliability and Validity of Tests to Assess Lower-Body Muscular Power in Children

The purpose of this study was to analyze the reliability and the criterion-related validity of several lower-body muscular power tests (i.e., standing long jump [SLJ], squat jump, countermovement jump, and Abalakov jump) in children aged 6-12 years. Three hundred sixty three healthy children (168 girls) agreed to participate in this study. All the lower-body muscular power tests were performed twice (7 days apart), whereas the 1 repetition maximum (1 RM) leg extension test was performed 2 days after the first session of testing. All the tests showed a high reliability (intertrial difference close to 0 and no significant differences between trials, all p > 0.05). The association between the lower-body muscular power tests and 1 RM leg extension test was high (all p < 0.001). The SLJ and the Abalakov jump tests showed the highest association with 1 RM leg extension test (R = 0.700, test result, weight, height, sex, and age were added in the model). The SLJ test can be a useful tool to assess lower-body muscular power in children when laboratory methods are not feasible because it is practical, time efficient, and low in cost and equipment requirements.

Young People's Perspectives on Participatory Ethics: Agency, Power and Impact in Domestic Abuse Research and Policy‐Making

Children's perspectives literature repositions children and young people as active participants in surviving domestic abuse, protecting their family, opposing the violence and recovering from abuse. However, key tenets of safeguarding in relation to domestic abuse, both in practice and childhood research ethics, struggle to fully recognise children's agency and the need to empower children and young people as well as women. Children's right to participation now extends to national policy‐making in many countries, yet has not been explored in relation to the interdependency of women and children's rights, safety and wellbeing where both have been subject to abuse.This paper challenges the current exclusion of young voices from the development of ethical praxis. It outlines a participatory ethical approach that promotes the inclusion and empowerment of young survivors in research and policy. Young expert advisors on Scottish domestic abuse policy (2009–11) co‐develop the approach (participatory action research) which is informed by a wider study (2004–11) about children's help‐seeking and solutions for practice. Mullenderet al.'saccepted model of three Cs and Ds (consent, confidentiality, child protection: danger, distress, disclosure) are adapted to focus on children's agency. Three Es are added focusing on children's power and impact: enjoyment, empowerment and emancipation. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley &amp; Sons, Ltd.‘This paper challenges the current exclusion of young voices from the development of ethical praxis’Key Practitioner MessagesChildren and young people have a distinct, essential voice in risk assessment and management.They are competent and central decision‐makers, they can consent to participation.Participation can be a powerful therapeutic tool.Enjoyment, empowerment and emancipation are intrinsic to participation, alongside recognition of children's agency in safeguarding.Access to power, equal voice and impact on children's lives are preconditions of participation to young survivors – to be worth the inherent risk of speaking out.‘Participation can be a powerful therapeutic tool’‘Access to power, equal voice and impact on children's lives are preconditions of participation to young survivors’

Mothers Are Not Obtainable with Magic: The Uncanny and the Construction of Orphan Children's Desires in Yim Pil-Sung's Hansel and Gretel

Employing the main motifs of the Grimms' version, Yim Pil-Sung's Hansel and Gretel explores the trauma that three orphans suffered in their experiences at an orphanage. The orphans' circumstances represent the symbolic dimensions of desertion, isolation and deprivation, while the children are also provided with extraordinary magic power. This dual construction of the orphans' situation generates the uncanny, which reveals something hidden underneath what is seen on the surface. What is buried is the trauma of abandonment and violence, and the ‘Happy Children's Home’ in the forest is where all the main characters face their traumatic past. The uncanny is also created by the children's surprising and thus disturbing power, which subverts the normal and familiar reality by which adults usually hold power over children. The children's power is ironic, in that it is unlimited to satisfy their material deprivation, yet so powerless and limited in that it cannot provide them with their ultimate need – parental love. While this film seems to construct the orphans' absolute need of parental love and the damage to their personalities without it, it is also a thought-provoking metaphor about the long journey of recovery from repressed childhood trauma.

Fat tax, subsidy or both? The role of information and children's pester power in food choice

Using a discrete choice experiment with real economic incentives, this paper studies how food fiscal policies and external influences (such as pestering and information) can affect parental choice of food for their child. Using pairs of a parent and child, the experimental design varies the food prices of healthier and unhealthier alternatives of food products for children as part of specific food fiscal policies. We then examine the interplay of children's pester power as well as information about the fiscal policies. The results from our lab experiment suggest that (a) implementing a fat tax and a subsidy simultaneously can shift parental behavior to healthier food products to a greater degree than a fat tax or a subsidy alone, (b) providing information regarding the food fiscal policies can further increase the impact of the intervention, and (c) child pestering is one of the causes of the moderate effectiveness of the policies as it strongly affects parents in making unhealthier choices.

Psychometric properties for the Children's Power of Food Scale in a diverse sample of pre-adolescent youth

PurposeThe Children's Power of Food Scale measures appetitive responsiveness across three domains, food available, food present, and food tasted but not eaten, and a total aggregate score. Although validated in adult populations it has not been tested in youth. The purpose was to establish psychometric properties for the Children's Power of Food Scale (C-PFS) for use in youth. MethodsSix content experts were recruited to establish content validity (CVI). Reliability was established using 2-week test–retest procedures following lunch period in 47 ethnically diverse 10–14 year olds. ResultsCVI for the aggregate score was 0.87. Factor and aggregate score Cronbach's alphas were 0.61–0.89. Intra-class correlation factors scores were 0.28–0.68. Kappa (κ) ranged from 0.19 to 0.69 for individual questions. ConclusionsThe C-PFS may serve as a useful instrument to identify youth more vulnerable to food preoccupation and overconsumption given the obesogenic food environment. Factor 2, food present not tasted, should be interpreted with caution in English language learners.

Parenting and concerns of pregnant women in buprenorphine treatment.

Opioid-dependent pregnant women are characterized by drug use during pregnancy and deficits in knowledge of newborn care and feeding, and of child development. We assessed parenting skills and concerns among pregnant women in buprenorphine treatment for prescription opioid dependence. We interviewed 32 pregnant women who received buprenorphine treatment for prescription opioid dependence in a primary care setting and administered questionnaires, including the Adult-Adolescent Parenting Inventory version 2 (AAPI-2) and Childhood Experience of Care and Abuse Questionnaire. AAPI-2 scores revealed medium risk of abuse for all five scales: inappropriate expectations of the child, low level of empathy, strong belief in corporal punishment, reversal of parent-child roles, and oppression of children's power and independence. Primary concerns of participants were neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS) and their child's health. Pregnant women who received buprenorphine for treatment of prescription opioid dependence showed a lack of appropriate parenting skills, but did not express concern about their ability to parent. Our findings suggest a need for nurses to assist prescription opioid-dependent pregnant women in acquiring additional parenting skills, to refer for educational parenting intervention, and to educate patients about NAS.

Believe the Power of Children

Believe the Power of Children

Children's Influence on Purchasing Tourism Products via the Internet: Parental Power Versus children's Power—the Social Power Perspective

ABSTRACT An integration of the social power theory, which simultaneously incorporates parental power and children's power into the framework, was used in this research to investigate the causal relationships among perceived parental power, adolescent Internet mavens, and children's influence on purchasing tourism products via the Internet. The cluster sampling approach was used to collect samples from three tutoring schools in Taiwan. A total of 266 student-parent questionnaires was analyzed. The results show that both perceived parental power and adolescent Internet mavens are critical antecedents of children's influence on purchasing tourism products via the Internet. The results also indicate that adolescent Internet mavens exert moderating effects between perceived parental power and children's influence. These findings have managerial implications and provide useful reference data for future research.

Test-Retest Reliability of the 20-sec Wingate Test to Assess Anaerobic Power in Children with Cerebral Palsy

The aim of this study was to determine the test-retest reliability of the 20-sec Wingate anaerobic test in children with cerebral palsy. Participants were 22 ambulant children with cerebral palsy, with Gross Motor Function Classification System levels I (limitations in advanced motor skills, n = 11), II (limitations in walking, n = 7), and III (walking with walking aids, n = 4), aged 7-13 yrs. All children performed two 20-sec full-out sprint tests on a bicycle ergometer within 1-3 wks. Mean power and peak power (W/kg) were calculated as an estimate of anaerobic power. Test-retest reliability was determined by calculating the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and standard error of measurement (SEM). Values were shown for the total group and Gross Motor Function Classification System I and II/III separately. The test-retest reliability of mean power output was excellent for children with Gross Motor Function Classification System level I (ICC, 0.96; SEM, 5.4%) and II/III (ICC, 0.99; SEM, 6.1%). Peak power output showed a lower reliability in both Gross Motor Function Classification System I (ICC, 0.87; SEM, 9.4%) and II/III (ICC, 0.96; SEM, 11.7%). Anaerobic testing using a 20-sec Wingate bicycle test is reliable in ambulant school-aged children with cerebral palsy.

The Crucible: Adding Complexity to the Question of Social Justice in Early Childhood Development

As an ideology, the concept of social justice has long been a worthy, if slightly volatile, companion of early childhood theorists and researchers. Whilst the majority of the literature has valorised social justice, discontented questions regarding ‘what’ the construct entails and ‘how’ it might be tamed to work still remain. Using complexity theory, this article problematises the amalgam of social justice by readdressing the role of participation, inclusion and equality in early childhood systems. It is argued that social justice evolves from essentially local and relational interactions amongst a range of stakeholders. By framing early childhood interactions as those occurring within the context of relationships which are embedded within open systems (that is, systems within systems), this article discusses how interactions in early childhood involve a set of complex, yet systematic, processes which can only be understood as they unfold. Contextualised against the dominant discourse of ‘normalisation’ in early childhood, this article uses aspects of complexity theory such as non-linearity, emergence and recurrency to focus on the ways in which layers of social justice are embedded in the values and processes experienced in early childhood systems. Drawing on the philosophical roots of transformative education, it focuses particularly on the use of complexity theory to frame concepts of children's power, agency and participation. It discusses how the proactive praxis of social justice might emerge from within early childhood systems.

Socioeconomic Background, Maternal Parenting Style, and the Language Ability of Five- and Six-year-old Children

We examined the pathways through which language ability components, such as reading and writing at the age of 5, and socioeconomic and environmental variables, such as maternal parenting style, affect the language ability of children in the first grade. The focal point of this study's structural modeling analysis was that family socioeconomic factors of income and parental education level directly affect children's vocabulary power and, through mothers' parenting style, affect their language test scores at the age of 5. In turn, the scores of language tests done during a child's first grade year reflect the age 5 test scores. Thus, it was found that language ability is affected by socioeconomic factors. Results also indicate that, for young children, parenting style has a great impact on childhood language ability.

Übersichtsarbeiten: Resilienz – Eine interdisziplinäre Annäherung an Konzept und Forschung

First, the concept of the term "resilience" is introduced and summarized as an adaptive, dynamic "buffering process" of children's mental power of resistance against biological, psychological and psychosocial development risks. Subsequently, based on a critical discussion of the current research findings, protective factors are presented, which is followed by an approach to the concept of resilience from interdisciplinary perspectives. The latest findings from developmental neurobiology show that genetic as well as environmental factors have their important share in the development of resilience. This builds a bridge to the consideration of resilience with regard to attachment theory. Accordingly secure attachment could be seen as a condition for a resilient conduct of life. In this context, the concept of "earned security" is additionally taken into account. Furthermore, the relevance of resilience for the field of pedagogics is shortly and critically considered. With reference to a psychoanalytic approach to the concept of resilience self-regulation, internal integrity, mentalization and self-reflection are elaborated on, as well as the similarity to the psychoanalytic concept of ego strength. In conclusion, a critical discussion of the concept of resilience and its benefits as well as potential risks related to it is presented.