Facilitating Children's Accounts of Experienced Events
Lamb, Guterman, Orbach, Sternberg, Thierry
One major program of research has involved the development and assessment of techniques for enhancing the informativeness of child witnesses and for evaluating the credibility of their accounts. Most studies in this research program are focused on the relationship between interviewer style and the quality of information provided by young children. Several studies have confirmed that open-ended questions elicit longer and more detailed responses than more focused questions, regardless of the number of incidents experienced and the language (English, Swedish, or Hebrew) in which the interview was conducted. We have also shown similarities between the types of questions that are likely to elicit accurate and inaccurate information in analog and forensic contexts, thereby strengthening the generalizability of the results obtained in many laboratory studies. In other studies, we have shown that interviewers can increase the length and richness of children's accounts, regardless of the children's ages, by following SSED-designed protocols designed to probe recall memory and reduce the reliance on more focused questions, which are more likely to elicit erroneous information. These interview protocols are being evaluated by investigative agencies in Israel, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Implementation began in Sweden in 2001. Independent studies in Israel and the United States have shown that use of the NICHD protocol dramatically increases the amount of information retrieved from four- to 13-year-old alleged victims when using open-ended prompts. Such information is more likely to be accurate than information elicited by using more focused prompts. The performance of very young children, as well as children who are reluctant to disclose, are currently under closer investigation, as these groups were underrepresented in earlier studies. In other recent studies, we have shown that mental context reinstatement facilitates recall better than physical context reinstatement. Because these procedures can be implemented nonsuggestively in forensic settings, such results are of considerable potential importance for the field.

Adaptation to Nonparental Child Care
Lamb, Ahnert, Chuang
An ongoing program of research in the SSED has involved long-term longitudinal studies of daycare conducted in Göteberg (Sweden) and Berlin (Germany) as well as a series of short-term studies in the Berlin setting. The longitudinal study in Sweden was designed to elucidate the effects of early care arrangements on the development of 145 children recruited in 1982 at an average age of 16 months. Initial analyses indicated that the quality of home care and the quality of alternative care had substantial effects on the children's verbal abilities, social skills, and personal maturity. These effects appeared to diminish as the children moved into the formal educational system. Formal assessments of the psychological status and educational histories of these children at 15 years of age during their final year of school were completed this year, and analysis of the data have begun.
In Berlin, SSED researchers began studying the attachments between children and care providers shortly before political reunification of the city. Comparative analyses showed that infants were more likely to establish secure attachments to their care providers after reunification than before, perhaps because care providers in the later regime focused on the styles and needs of individual infants. In a subsequent study, researchers observed in detail the everyday experiences of toddlers who either did or did not receive regular out-of-home care. The data showed different diurnal patterns of adult attention, stimulation, and emotional exchange, although the total amount of social interaction experienced over the course of the day did not differ depending on whether the toddlers spent time in day care. In a longer-term longitudinal study, we have been examining the psychophysiological and behavioral tendencies of infants for the purpose of assessing the effects of prior individual differences in emotional reactivity and infant-mother attachment on the adaptation to out-of-home center care. Preliminary analyses indicate that the securely attached infants had slower and more variable heart rates at day care when their mothers were present than did insecurely attached infants. The quality of infant-care provider relations, infant-parent attachment, and infant temperament all appeared to shape adaptation to day care.

Subcultural Variations in the Nature of Children's Early Experiences
Lamb, Ahnert
Another project has focused on the description of early interaction in diverse ecological contexts. Extensive observations of infant-other interaction and attachment in multiple samples demonstrated that the quality of social interaction within dyads changed dramatically depending on the functional and social context. As a result, extended observations are necessary to obtain reliable indices of individual differences. Comparable day-long observations of parents and infants in Quebec, Germany, the Central African Republic, and Colombia, as well as in African-American families in the United States, are being conducted to explore further the effects of culture and context on early interactions. At least two samples are being drawn from each culture sampled to maximize insight into the sources and interpretation of variability. We hope that systematic and detailed observations of parents and infants in a variety of ecological contexts will provide a clearer understanding of the extent to which infant experiences vary and of the best ways of obtaining reliable indices of individual differences within and between cultures. In separate short-term longitudinal studies, we are exploring the stability of individual differences in physiological, social, and affective functioning. Analyses completed to date have revealed remarkable stability from infancy into middle childhood.

Subcultural Variations in Parental and Filial Perceptions and Beliefs
Lamb, Chuang
We have also been investigating ways in which variations among rearing environments (especially as indexed by parental beliefs, values, and practices) affect children's development. In one line of research, gender differences in the self-perceptions of two cohorts of seventh to 12th graders are being assessed longitudinally so that the antecedents and correlates of different styles of self-perception in adolescence can be explored. To explore antecedents further, portions of the self-perception battery were completed by a group of Swedish 15-year-olds whose development has been documented systematically since infancy. Analyses of these data are currently under way.