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Qing Zhou Assistant Professor Ph.D., Arizona State University
My research can be broadly defined as understanding the developmental pathways towards behavioral problems and competence in childhood and adolescence. Taking a developmental psychopathology perspective, I am particularly interested in the following processes/aspects of development: a) temperament, or the constitutionally-based individual differences in emotional, motor, and attentional reactivity and regulation; b) emotion-related processing, including emotion regulation, emotionality, appraisal of and coping with stressors; c) family socialization, including parenting, parent-child and family relationship; and d) the larger socio-cultural context, including cultural values and norms. I investigate these questions in a variety of child/adolescent populations, including normative children and children at risk for maladjustment (e.g., children from divorced families, immigrant children), children of different cultural/ethnic backgrounds (e.g., European American, Chinese American, and native Chinese children). I use a variety of research designs, including cross-sectional and longitudinal studies, within-culture and cross-culture comparative studies, and naturalistic/correlational and intervention/experimental studies. A multi-method, multi-reporter approach is used to assess the core constructs in my research (e.g., temperament, parenting, mental health adjustment), including questionnaire reports by parents, teachers, children, and peers, structured interviews, behavioral observation in laboratory and naturalistic settings, and neuropsychological testing. I also plan to include psychobiological measures (e.g., vagal tone, skin conductance, and cortisol activities) in my future research. Temperament, Stress & Coping, and Adjustment My colleagues and I have been examining the additive and interactive effects of temperament regulation (e.g., effortful control) and emotionality (e.g., anger/frustration) on children's behavioral problems and social competence, the relative contributions of effortful versus reactive control/regulation to children's emotional expressivity, and the links of empathy to children's social functioning in longitudinal samples of normative and at-risk children. I am also interested in how children react to and cope with stressors (e.g., negative life events), and the roles of stressors and coping in the development of mental health problems. I have investigated the associations between temperament and children's appraisal of and coping with stressors, and whether appraisal and coping mediate temperamental differences in the development of externalizing and internalizing problems. Family socialization My interest in family socialization focuses on aspects of the family context that relate to or interact with children's temperament and emotion-related processing (e.g., parenting styles, parental reaction to children's emotions, parental expressivity, and parental socialization of children's appraisals of and coping with stressors). For example, we have found that children's effortful control--an aspect of temperamental regulation--and empathic responding to other's negative emotions partly mediated the links of parental warmth and positive expressivity to children's externalizing problems. Moreover, we found that children's coping efficacy--the belief that one can cope with the stressors--mediated the link between authoritarian parenting and child externalizing problems. Culture The third part of my research focuses on cross-cultural differences/similarities in children's emotion-related processing, its socialization, and implications for mental health and competence. For example, in our within-culture and cross-cultural comparative research, we found that although cultural differences exist in the means/norms of certain temperament (e.g., effortful control and anger/frustration) or parenting characteristics (e.g., authoritative and authoritarian parenting, parental expressivity), the associations between these constructs and children's psychological adjustment (e.g., behavioral problems, social competence, and academic achievement) are similar across cultures. These findings suggest that there are cross-cultural similarities in the developmental processes underlying behavioral problems and competence. Current Projects Socio-emotional Development and Family Socialization of Native Chinese Children In collaboration with Professor Yun Wang at the National Key Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience and Learning (Beijing Normal University) (http://www.bnu.edu.cn/kxyj/kxyj_zdsys_jybzd6.htm), I have conducted a two-wave (3.8 years apart) longitudinal study to examine the emotional, social, and academic development and family socialization environment of 425 Chinese school-age children in Beijing. Questionnaire ratings (completed by parents, teachers, children, and peers) were the primary method of assessment. The study had three goals:
Data collection for this project was completed in 2000-2004. Results of the study have been published in journal articles and book chapters.
1. To study the relative strengths and weaknesses in CA children's mental health adjustment by comparing their scores with national norms for the American population as a whole and with existing data on native Chinese children; We have completed participant recruitment and Wave 1 assessments, and we will be conducting Wave 2 assessments starting fall 2009.
For more information about my research, please visit our Culture & Family Laboratory website (http://zhoulab.berkeley.edu) Zhou, Q., Sandler, I. N., Millsap, R. E., Wolchik, S. A., & Dawson-McClure, S. R. (2008). Mother-child relationship quality and effective discipline as mediators of the six-year effects of the New Beginnings Program for children from divorced families. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 76, 579-594. Zhou, Q., Wang, Y., Deng, X, Eisenberg, N., Wolchik, S., & Tein, J-Y. (2008). Relations of parenting and temperament to Chinese children's experience of negative life events, coping efficacy, and externalizing problems. Child Development, 79, 493-513. Eisenberg, N., Ma, Y., Chang, L., Zhou, Q., Aiken, L., & West, S. (2007). Relations of effortful control, reactive undercontrol, and anger to Chinese children's adjustment. Development and Psychopathology, 19, 385-409. Zhou, Q., Hofer, C., Eisenberg, N., Reiser, M., Spinrad, T. L., & Fabes, R. A. (2007). Developmental trajectories of attention focusing, behavioral persistence, and externalizing problems in school age years. Developmental Psychology, 43, 369-385. Zhou, Q., King, K. M., & Chassin, L. (2006). The roles of familial alcoholism and adolescent family harmony in young adults' substance dependence disorders: Mediated and moderated relations. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 115, 320-331. Eisenberg, N., Zhou, Q., Spinrad, T. L., Valiente, C., Fabes, R. A., & Liew, J. C. (2005). Relations among positive parenting, children's effortful control, and externalizing problems: A three-wave longitudinal study. Child Development, 76(5), 1055-1071. Zhou, Q., Eisenberg, N., Wang, Y., & Reiser, M. (2004). Chinese children's effortful control and dispositional anger/frustration: Relations to parenting styles and children's social functioning. Developmental Psychology, 40, 352-366.
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