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Dissertation
Developmental growth trajectories of infants and toddlers in the child welfare system
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann University
Aug 2000
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17918/00007397
Abstract
Many psychosocial stressors, such as foster care, abuse, neglect, and parental drug use have been theorized to impact negatively upon a child's development. Additionally, there is a growing body of evidence to suggest that it is the multiplicity of risk factors that have the most impact upon a child's development. Understanding the relationships between these risk factors and the development of very young at-risk children is crucial because the number of children under the age of five who are in the child welfare system is growing dramatically. Therefore, this project attempts to address this problem by employing individual risk variables as predictors of initial status and growth on four measures of development in a sample of infants and toddlers in the child welfare system who repeatedly attended an evaluation program for at-risk children. Additionally, this project created three indices of risk comprised of multiple risk factors. The indices of risk represented three spheres of the child's experience: Home Environment, Drug Exposure, and Foster Care Experience. These indices were then also employed to predict initial status and developmental growth in this sample of at-risk children. It was found that no individual variable of risk predicted initial status or growth in this sample of children. However, the "Foster Care Experience" factor significantly predicted higher initial scores on a measure of gross motor skills, and the "Home Environment" factor predicted significantly lower initial scores on a measure of receptive and expressive language. No factor was found to significantly predict growth, although the growth rates were found to be relatively homogeneous for this sample of children.
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Details
- Title
- Developmental growth trajectories of infants and toddlers in the child welfare system
- Creators
- Rebecca Christian-Parilla
- Contributors
- Ralph M. Turner (Advisor) - Drexel University, Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann University (1993-1996, 1998-2002)
- Awarding Institution
- Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann University
- Degree Awarded
- Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)
- Publisher
- Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann University; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
- Number of pages
- vii, 85 pages
- Resource Type
- Dissertation
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Clinical and Health Psychology [Historical]; Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann University (1993-1996, 1998-2002); College of Nursing and Health Professions (2000-2002)
- Other Identifier
- 991021888801304721