29:T43a,

The goal of this study was to track the progress of Italian children at risk for school failure enrolled in preschools based on the Reggio-Emilia approach. Risk factors considered included family socioeconomic status (SES), child receptive language, and child gender. Participants were 211 children (M_age = 60.8 months, 116 girls) in Reggio-inspired preschools in Genoa, Italy. The sample was followed over six time points starting from the last year of preschool (ages 5–6 years) through the end of the second year of elementary school. We examined trajectories of school liking, teacher–child relationships, and teacher-rated language/mathematics. Trajectories of at-risk children were predominantly indistinguishable from those of the full sample. Children at risk because of lower SES and poorer receptive language (but not gender) were rated by teachers as more dependent than children not identified as at risk. Contrary to expectations, children of mothers from low-SES backgrounds liked school more than the rest of the sample.

2a:T45c,

This study explored the dynamics of motivational development across late elementary and early middle school. Using longitudinal data from a cross-section of fifth to seventh-grade students, analyses examined whether parents’ and teachers’ warm involvement shows unique and/or mediated effects on students’ academic engagement and whether engagement feeds back into adults’ continued involvement. Parent and teacher involvement each predicted changes in adolescents’ engagement; parental involvement also played an indirect role via student–teacher relationships; and students who were more engaged reported that adults responded with increasing levels of involvement. These models provide support for a reciprocal dynamic that could lead to virtuous cycles increasing in both involvement and engagement or to vicious cycles amplifying disaffection and withdrawal of involvement over time. Future studies, using time series or observational data, could further unpack these dynamics, examining processes of transmission, mediators, and effects on the longer-term development of academic engagement.

2b:T54c,

This study examined the association between internalizing and externalizing mental health and prosociality across four developmental transitions. The effects of parent–child interactions on mental health and prosociality were also explored. The data from a community sample of 10,703 children on mental health, prosociality, child maltreatment, parent–child relationships, parental mental health, and socioeconomic status were derived from the Millennium Cohort Study to cover the developmental periods from early childhood to late adolescence (ages 5, 7, 11, 14, 17). Adjusting for covariates, latent trait-state-occasion and cross-lag modeling were deployed. The results indicated that internalizing and externalizing mental health symptoms, and prosociality were more trait-like throughout adolescence. Only within-person increase in externalizing symptoms predicted decrease in subsequent within-person prosociality from middle childhood to late adolescence. Parent–child conflict and maltreatment had deleterious effects on children’s prosociality and mental health. Mental health professionals should screen for both possible mental health problems and deficits in prosociality. Interventions aiming to improve the quality of parent–child relationships could be beneficial for the development of child mental health and prosociality.

2c:T744,