Analysis and Replication of Mother-Child Relations at Two Years of Age

This study adopted the same cross-dimensional approach to the study of mother-child interaction that was used by Clarke-Stewart in 1973. Its major purpose was replication: replication of the 1973 study with different children at a different age (2-2½ years) and replication in a series of four different samples (N's = 14, 30, 31, and 35). Variables included measures of children's cognitive, language, and social development and mothers' attitudes, ability, and behavior, assessed in standardized tests, semistructured situations, and natural observations. Like the 1973 study, this study revealed a general competence cluster for children comprising IQ, language level, and interaction with mother. It was most closely correlated with the mother's positive and responsive interaction and language to the child. The child's sociability to adult strangers was related to mother-child interaction and the mother's attitude and activities, but sociability to another child was not correlated with maternal variables. Replicability in the four samples was examined in terms of methodological independence of variables, comparability of measures, p levels for correlation coefficients, differences in sample sizes and means, and predictability of relations from prior research and theory.