Story Stem Research Articles

Wie Geschwister krebskranker Kinder die Erkrankung erleben und verarbeiten

The aim of this study is to investigate behaviour problems and emotional regulation of children who's siblings are diagnosed with cancer. Participants were assessed with the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and the MacArthur Story Stem Battery (MSSB). Both instruments were administered twice (shortly after diagnosis and at the end of treatment). Brothers and sisters of 14 children suffering from cancer were compared with 18 siblings of healthy individuals. In the SDQ no differences between the two groups were found. At time 1 the MSSB showed significant differences in number and quality of displayed contents, representation of parents and the way of performing the narrative. At time 2 narratives changed particularly in the treatment group, but some differences still remained. Overall siblings of children suffering from cancer showed more intrapsychic reaction to the disease than became obvious in their behaviour. This fosters the conclusion that there may be a need for specific support for siblings of children with cancer in order to prevent them from psychic disorders and pathological mourning reactions.

Internal working models and adjustment of physically abused children: the mediating role of self‐regulatory abilities

Abused children's internal working models (IWM) of relationships are known to relate to their socioemotional adjustment, but mechanisms through which negative representations increase vulnerability to maladjustment have not been explored. We sought to expand the understanding of individual differences in IWM of abused children and investigate the mediating role of self-regulation in links between IWM and adjustment. Cluster analysis was used to subgroup 74 physically abused children based on their IWM. Internal working models were identified by children's representations, as measured by a narrative story stem task. Self-regulation was assessed by teacher report and a behavioral task, and adjustment was measured by teacher report. Cluster analyses indicated two subgroups of abused children with distinct patterns of IWMs. Cluster membership predicted internalizing and externalizing problems. Associations between cluster membership and adjustment were mediated by children's regulation, as measured by teacher reports of many aspects of regulation. There was no support for mediation when regulation was measured by a behavioral task that tapped more narrow facets of regulation. Abused children exhibit clinically relevant individual differences in their IWMs; these models are linked to adjustment in the school setting, possibly through children's self-regulation.

The intergenerational congruence of mothers’ and preschoolers’ narrative affective content and narrative coherence

Intergenerational congruence of mothers’ and preschoolers’ narratives about the mother–child relationship was examined in a sample of 198 Hispanic (59.1%), Black (19.2%), and White (21.7%) mothers and their preschool child. Mothers’ narratives were obtained with the Five Minute Speech Sample and were coded for negative and positive affective content and narrative coherence. Preschoolers’ narratives were collected with the MacArthur Story Stem Battery and were coded for the portrayal of the mother-child relationship and narrative coherence. Across ethnoracial groups, maternal narrative coherence, but not narrative affective content, was related to preschoolers’ positive portrayal of the mother–child relationship. Our findings highlight the importance of maternal narrative coherence for understanding intergenerational continuity of relational representations.

‘I Was Quite Amazed’: Donor Conception and Parent–Child Relationships from the Child's Perspective

Donor conception and parent–child relationships were explored from the child's perspective. At ages 7 and 10, interview data were obtained from children in 31 donor insemination, 28 egg donation and 51 natural conception families. Children were also administered the MacArthur Story Stem Battery and a family map. Children in all family types reported close and affectionate relationships with their parents, irrespective of the lack of a genetic link between the parent and the child. Of those children who were aware of their donor conception at age 10, most demonstrated an understanding of, and had positive feelings about their donor conception.

Maternal distress influences young children's family representations through maternal view of child behavior and parent-child interactions.

Distress of a parent is a key influence on the quality of the child's experience in the family. We hypothesized that maternal distress would spill over into more negative views of their children's behaviors and less emotional availability in their relationships. Further, we investigated whether these cumulative experiences contributed to children's emerging narratives about mothers and family life. In this longitudinal study, mothers of young twin children reported their distress on three occasions in relation to: self, the marital relationship, and the family climate. Mothers also reported on their children's externalizing behavior problems. Mother-child interaction was observed focusing on maternal sensitivity and child responsivity. Children responded to story stem beginnings about challenging situations in the family and their narratives were scored for family conflict and cohesion themes. Actor-partner interdependence model methods of dyadic data analysis accounted for the inclusion of both twins in the analysis. Results from structural equation models supported the hypothesized cumulative experience of maternal distress on children's family life representations for both family conflict and family cohesion. A family environment in which children are exposed to persistent maternal distress early in life may have cumulative effects, influencing how mothers interact with and view their children's behavior at later developmental stages. Moreover, exposure to repeated distress for longer periods of time may contribute to an intergenerational continuity of distress for the child that may become rooted in negative affective bias in their own view of family relationships.

The Preschoolers’ Narrative Representations and Hostile Attributional Bias

The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between the preschoolers hostile attributional bias and the narrative representation profiles. Forty five 4-year-old preschoolers (24 boys, 21 girls) participated in this study. In order to measure the childrens narrative responses, MacArthur Story Stem Battery (MSSB) was used, and “a cartoon-based social perception task” was used to obtain preschoolers hostile attributional bias. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and cluster analysis. The results were as follows. First, the rate of hostile attributional style of the subjects was 28.89%. Second, four profiles regarding the narrative representations of 4-year olds were found including: Prosocial (33.3%), Constrained (42.2%), Anxious/Restricted (6.7%), and Dysregulated 17.8%). Third, the rate of preschoolers hostile attributional style differed by the preschoolers narrative representation profile. Children with a Prosocial profile showed a less hostile attributional style than children with an Anxious/Restricted profile and Dysregulated profile. In conclusion, preschoolers hostile attributional bias is related to the narrative representation profile.

Attachment representations in internationally adopted children

Using the Story Stem Assessment Profile, attachment representations were analyzed in a group of 40 internationally adopted children studied after an average of 40 months since their adoption. These children were compared to 58 children living with their birth families and with no experience of maltreatment, and to 50 children who were living in Spanish institutions. All of the children were between four and eight years of age at the time of study. Findings indicated that the adoptees' representations were more negative than those of the control group, but similar to those of the institutionalized children. The associations between different indicators of attachment representations, as well as the role of adopted children's characteristics (pre-adoption experiences, adoption age, time with the adoptive family) were also analyzed. The results showed a long-term impact of early adversity, a certain degree of heterogeneity in the attachment representations' of both the adopted and the institutionalized children, and the role played by certain background and individual variables.

Attachment and social competence: a study using MCAST in low-risk Italian preschoolers

The Manchester Child Attachment Story Task (MCAST) is a story stem method suitable for children aged about 4 to 8, aimed at assessing children's attachment representations with a doll-play format that is evaluated with a series of dimensional scales and classifications. Although this instrument has already been validated in previous studies, not all of the findings have been conclusive. The aims of the present study were (1) to examine the factor structure of the MCAST scales, and (2) to test the association between children's dichotomized MCAST classifications and factors with social competence, using the Social Competence and Behavior Evaluation Scale (SCBE) with a normative group of Italian preschoolers (age range 4.4 to 6.1). Results obtained from a sample of 64 children confirm the association of MCAST attachment classifications (security vs. insecurity and organization vs. disorganization) with both social skills and behavioral problems. Further independent studies on the variables analyzed are recommended for corroborating the findings obtained.

Disorganized Attachment and Inhibitory Capacity: Predicting Externalizing Problem Behaviors

The aim of the present study was to investigate whether attachment insecurity, focusing on disorganized attachment, and the executive function (EF) component of inhibition, assessed at age 5, were longitudinally related to general externalizing problem behaviors as well as to specific symptoms of ADHD and Autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and callous-unemotional (CU) traits. General externalizing problem behaviors were also measured at age 5 to allow for a developmental analysis. Outcome variables were rated by parents and teachers. The sample consisted of 65 children with an oversampling of children with high levels of externalizing behaviors. Attachment was evaluated using a story stem attachment doll play procedure. Inhibition was measured using four different tasks. The results showed that both disorganized attachment and poor inhibition were longitudinally related to all outcome variables. Controlling for initial level of externalizing problem behavior, poor inhibition predicted ADHD symptoms and externalizing problem behaviors, independent of disorganized attachment, whereas for ASD symptoms no predictive relations remained. Disorganized attachment independently predicted CU traits.

Mother-Child Attachment Representation and Relationships Over Time in Mexican-Heritage Families

Continuity and intergenerational transmission of representations of attachment were examined in a longitudinal sample of 88 Mexican immigrant mothers and their children who participated in the local intervention group of the Early Head Start Evaluation Study. The authors interviewed mothers with the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) and Parent Attachment Interview (PAI). Mothers and children were observed when the children were 14 months old with the Attachment Q-Set (AQS), and children were interviewed at 54 months with the MacArthur Story Stem Battery. Early maternal AAI and PAI scores were associated with toddler-age children's AQS scores and preschool Story Stem scores. Mothers who were more secure in their attachment representations in the AAI had children who were also more secure, as measured by the AQS and in their Story Stem narratives. Mothers' high comfort and low enmeshment PAI scores predicted children's Story Stem security. Mothers' AAI security scores predicted children's Story Stem narrative coherence.

Narrative story stems with high risk six year-olds: Differential associations with mother- and teacher-reported psycho-social adjustment

Children's responses on a Narrative Story Stem Technique (NSST) were coded using scales reflecting essential attachment constructs, specifically, attachment, exploratory, sociability, and caregiving behavioral systems, as originally conceived by Bowlby (1973, 1982) and elaborated upon by his followers (Cassidy, 2008). NSST responses were examined in relation to both mother- and teacher-reported psycho-social adjustment and risk using the MacArthur Health & Behavior Questionnaire (HBQ). Forty-six children participated (average age 6 years 10 months), 19 of whom had high-risk backgrounds, and the rest demographically matched. Findings indicate that NSST scales were associated with behavior on certain HBQ scales, in expected directions. NSST responses appeared to differentiate socially competent children from children with the specific psycho-social risks of externalizing behavior problems and social isolation, according to mother-reports, on the one hand, and peer vulnerability and internalizing problems, according to teacher-reports, on the other. Implications for clinical applications are discussed.

Multi-method assessment of mother-child attachment: Links to parenting and child depressive symptoms in middle childhood

This study included two different methods to assess mother–child attachment, questionnaires, and a doll play story stem interview, so their overlap could be evaluated. In addition, we investigated how attachment is related to parenting and child depression. The sample was comprised of 10- to 12-year-olds (N = 87) and their mothers. Children completed questionnaires (assessing security, avoidance, and ambivalence), and were administered a doll play interview to assess attachment patterns (security, avoidance, ambivalence, and disorganization). Two aspects of parenting (warmth/ engagement and psychological control) were assessed with child reports and observer ratings of maternal behavior. We also obtained child reports of depressive symptoms. Questionnaire and interview measures of attachment security were related to one another, and each showed predictable associations with parenting and child depression. By contrast, results were less consistent for the ambivalent and avoidant insecure attachment patterns, although disorganized attachment showed some associations with parenting and child adjustment.

Verwendung von Geschichtenergänzungsaufgaben zur OPD-KJ-Strukturdiagnostik

The continued play of story stems, introduced by a diagnostician, can add to the diagnostic of the axis "structure" of the OPD-CA in a useful way. Story stems (e.g., the MacArthur Story Stem Battery (MSSB) or the Attachment Story Completion Task (ASCT)) are already used in different research fields and in the clinical context. In this article we propose the administration of story stems, which are supposed to represent certain mental skills. A case study will demonstrate the possibility to complement the evaluation of the axis "structure" by symbolic play with story stems.

Asthma severity, child security, and child internalizing: Using story stem techniques to assess the meaning children give to family and disease-specific events.

Children with persistent asthma are at increased risk for mental health problems. Although mechanisms of effect are not yet known, it may be that children are less trusting of the family as a source of support and security when they have more severe asthma. This study tested whether asthma severity is related to children's perceptions of insecurity in the family, and whether insecurity is in turn associated with child adjustment. Children (N = 168; mean age = 8 years) completed story stems pertaining to routine family events (e.g., mealtimes) and ambiguous but potentially threatening asthma events such as tightness in the chest. Responses were evaluated for the extent to which appraisals portrayed the family as responding in cohesive, security-provoking ways. Asthma severity was assessed by both objective lung function testing and primary caregiver report. Caregivers reported child symptomatology. Beyond medication adherence, caregiver education, and child age and gender, greater asthma severity predicted more internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Greater asthma severity, assessed using spirometry (but not parent report), was related to less secure child narratives of the family, which in turn related to more child internalizing symptoms. Results suggest that asthma can take a considerable toll on children's feelings of security and mental health. Furthermore, given the difficulty in assessing young children's perceptions, this study helps demonstrate the potential of story stem techniques in assessing children's appraisals of illness threat and management in the family.

유아의 나레이티브 반응 프로파일 유형별 어머니-유아의 정서적 가용성

The purpose of this study was to explore and examine the relationship between mother-child emotional availability and preschoolers` story stem narrative response. Eighty two 4-year-old preschoolers and their mothers participated in this study. This study used the following translated evaluation tools: Emotional Availability Scales(EA, 3rd edition) designed by Biringen and colleagues(1998) to examine the quality of the emotional relationship between mother and her child, and the MacArthur Story Stem Battery(MSSB) developed by Bretherton and colleagues with the MacArthur Narrative Group(1990) to measure preschoolers` narrative responses. The following statistical analyses were preformed descriptive, cluster analysis, and One-way ANOVA. The findings were as follows: First, 4 clusters of the narrative responses of 4-year-old preschoolers were prosocial story tellers, avoidant/dysregulated story tellers, constrained story tellers, and anxious story tellers. Second, the preschoolers in the prosocial cluster showed a high level of mother-child emotional availability and the preschoolers in the avoidant/dysregulated cluster showed a low level of mother-child emotional availability.

Mother–Child Attachment Patterns and Different Types of Anxiety Symptoms: Is There Specificity of Relations?

The purpose of this study was to test Manassis' proposal (Child-parent relations: Attachment and anxiety disorders, 255-272, 2001) that attachment patterns (secure, ambivalent, avoidant, and disorganized) may relate to different types of anxiety symptoms, and that behavioral inhibition may moderate these relations. Using a story stem interview to assess attachment and children's reports of anxiety symptoms, we found some support for these hypotheses in a sample of 10-12 years olds. Security was related to lower levels of all types of anxieties, except separation anxiety. Ambivalence was positively related to separation anxiety, although this relation was stronger for boys. Although avoidance was not related to anxiety, disorganization was positively related to somatic symptoms, social phobia, and school phobia. Behavioral inhibition moderated the relations of security with social phobia, and of disorganization with school phobia. The findings suggest that it is important to consider specificity between attachment patterns and various types of anxiety symptoms and to recognize that these relations may be altered by other risk factors.

Narrative skill in children with early unilateral brain injury: a possible limit to functional plasticity

Children with pre- or perinatal brain injury (PL) exhibit marked plasticity for language learning. Previous work has focused mostly on the emergence of earlier-developing skills, such as vocabulary and syntax. Here we ask whether this plasticity for earlier-developing aspects of language extends to more complex, later-developing language functions by examining the narrative production of children with PL. Using an elicitation technique that involves asking children to create stories de novo in response to a story stem, we collected narratives from 11 children with PL and 20 typically developing (TD) children. Narratives were analysed for length, diversity of the vocabulary used, use of complex syntax, complexity of the macro-level narrative structure and use of narrative evaluation. Children's language performance on vocabulary and syntax tasks outside the narrative context was also measured. Findings show that children with PL produced shorter stories, used less diverse vocabulary, produced structurally less complex stories at the macro-level, and made fewer inferences regarding the cognitive states of the story characters. These differences in the narrative task emerged even though children with PL did not differ from TD children on vocabulary and syntax tasks outside the narrative context. Thus, findings suggest that there may be limitations to the plasticity for language functions displayed by children with PL, and that these limitations may be most apparent in complex, decontextualized language tasks such as narrative production.

Making sense of family conflict: Intimate partner violence and preschoolers’ externalizing problems.

This research examines relations among parental intimate partner violence (IPV), preschoolers' narrative coherence about family conflict situations, and preschoolers' externalizing problems. Participants were 57 mothers and their 4- to 5-year-old children. Mothers provided data on IPV and children's externalizing problems. Narrative coherence was coded from children's play narratives in response to story stems from the MacArthur Story Stem Battery. Results are consistent with theory suggesting that exposure to IPV may adversely affect preschoolers' ability to understand family conflict situations in an organized manner, which in turn may contribute to their externalizing problems.

Shame and guilt in preschool depression: evidence for elevations in self‐conscious emotions in depression as early as age 3

Empirical findings from two divergent bodies of literature illustrate that depression can arise in the preschool period and that the complex self-conscious emotions of guilt and shame may develop normatively as early as age 3. Despite these related findings, few studies have examined whether the emotions of shame and guilt are salient in early childhood depression. This is important to further understand the emotional characteristics of preschool depression. Based on the hypothesis that preschool depression would be uniquely associated with higher levels of shame and maladaptive guilt, these emotions were investigated in a sample that included depressed, anxious, and disruptive disordered preschoolers as well as healthy peers using multiple methods. Structured psychiatric diagnoses were derived in a sample of N = 305 preschoolers ascertained from community sites. Preschoolers' tendency to experience shame and guilt were explored using a story stem completion task coded by raters blind to symptoms and diagnosis of the subjects. Guilt experience and reparation behaviors were also measured using parent report. Based on preschooler's emotion themes during the narrative tasks, gender, age, and depression severity predicted unique and significant portions of the variance in preschoolers' expressions of shame. Parent report measures revealed that increasing depression severity was associated with children's more frequent experiences of guilt feelings and less frequent attempts at guilt reparation (maladaptive guilt). Findings demonstrated that high levels of shame and maladaptive guilt were related to preschool onset depression when using observational measures of children's internal representations of their self-conscious emotions as well as parent report. These findings demonstrate continuity of these core emotions of depression as early as age 3. These findings suggest that guilt and shame should be explored in clinical assessments of young children and may be an important focus for future studies of the developmental psychopathology of depression.

Verhaltensprobleme und das Erkennen mentaler Zustände im Vorschulalter

Aim of the study is to present a method to map the ability of children to identify emotions and intentions in emotionally relevant situations (intentional and emotional reflectiveness). Moreover we analyze interrelation between this ability and behavior problems. Therefore we administered Story Stem Interviews with 70 children and added demand questions focusing emotions and intentions of diverse characters within the child constructed stories. All the given answers we displayed on a six-ary scale. To review the clinical relevance we correlated this measure with questionnaire-based behavior screenings by educators in kindergarten. We found correlations between behavior problems and especially answers to emotion questions (emotional reflectiveness). We regard this as evidence that the ability to identify emotions and intentions in others has an important protective function even in childhood.