Impact of maternal age on infants' emotional regulation and psychomotor development.

Background: Maternal age has progressively increased in industrialized countries. Most studies focus on the consequences of delayed motherhood for women's physical and mental health, but little is known about potential effects on infants' neurodevelopment. This prospective study examines the association between maternal age and offspring neurodevelopment in terms of both psychomotor development (Ages & Stages Questionnaires-3) and emotional competences (Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire).

Sequential analyses in coercive mother-child interaction: the predictability hypothesis in abusive versus nonabusive dyads.

Objective: A two-fold purpose guided the present study: 1) To test the sequential relationship between the child's aversive behavior and both the predictability and the compliance episodes, as well as the sequential relationship between these two mothering episodes proposed by the new predictability hypothesis (Wahler, Williams, & Cerezo, 1990); 2) to explore whether or not these patterns are specific to these dysfunctional dyads by using a nonabusive comparison group.

Method: Fifty mother-child dyads, 25 abusive and 25 nonabusive, participated in this study. Lag sequential analyses were carried out on 302 hours of direct observation, 178 hours in the abusive group, and 124 in the nonabusive group.

Mother-child interactive patterns in abusive families versus nonabusive families: an observational study.

The interest in aspects relative to the maintenance of aversive family interactions is common among investigators who, from many different fronts, treat child and family issues. If these interactions end in episodes of physical abuse of a child by his/her parents, the need to quickly detect these patterns of family violence in order to prevent and treat them is all the more urgent. The present work falls within this context and focuses on a detailed analysis of behavior in the home of both the abusive mother and the victimized child.