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This study examined the association between elementary students' (N = 1627; 51.3% girls, ages 4-12) engineering-related ability beliefs (competence), task-value beliefs (interest, importance), and career aspirations. Findings suggest that mean levels of children's engineering-related beliefs did not vary by gender. High levels of competence, interest, and importance beliefs were related to higher engineering-related career aspirations. Findings also revealed that the association of competence and interest with career aspirations was stronger for girls than boys; whereas, the association of importance with career aspirations was stronger for boys than girls. Last, results provide evidence of importance as a moderator of the link between competence and career aspirations, suggesting that there was a stronger positive association between competence and career aspirations under high levels of importance. Against the backdrop of the increasing urgency to teach engineering in elementary schools, this study highlighted the salience of examining children's engineering-related motivational beliefs. The study has practical implications for teachers and school psychologists on promoting inclusive instruction in elementary schools. Specifically, the implications of the results for instructional strategies as well as assessments and interventions in elementary schools are discussed.

Stress and coping frameworks posit that active coping may help mitigate stress experiences of individuals, such as the stress resulting from structural racism or anti-immigrant sentiments (i.e., sociocultural stress) Latinx adolescents experience in the United States. Active coping has been linked to better school functioning in mixed-ethnic adolescent populations. The current study examined the associations between active coping and school functioning, as well as the moderating role of gender among 288 Latinx adolescents (M = 13.69, SD = 0.56; 53% girls). Results revealed active coping related to higher levels of school belonging and grades. No gender differences were found, suggesting active coping works similarly for Latinx adolescent girls' and boys' school functioning. This study's findings contribute to the knowledge on Latinx school functioning by identifying active coping as a potential malleable target for intervention.

Instructors use a variety of online formative assessment (FA) activities to support learning outside class. Previous studies have revealed barriers for students in online courses, but little is known about the barriers students experience when completing online FA assignments. Understanding these barriers to access is critical to fostering more inclusive learning for all students. Using a framework from previous work in online learning, we examined student perceptions of online FA access with respect to five barrier categories: technical resources, instructor organization, social interactions, personal engagement, and learning environment. We developed and administered a survey to more than 1200 undergraduate biology students at 2-year and 4-year institutions. Students responded to statements using Likert scales and open-ended prompts. Statistical models indicated differences in access across the barrier categories and revealed that demographic characteristics were associated with certain barrier categories. Furthermore, technical resources, instructor organization, and personal engagement barriers were associated with lower course performance. In open-ended responses, students most frequently suggested that changes to scheduling logistics, course delivery, and FA format would improve their online FA experience. We discuss how these findings and student suggestions can inform instruction, particularly how instructors can alter their FA characteristics to better suit their student populations.

Conjoint behavioral consultation (CBC), a teacher-parent partnership intervention, has been shown to yield immediate improvements in problem-solving skills and communication quality with parents for kindergarten through third grade teachers in rural schools. The purpose of the present study was to determine whether CBC can yield maintained effects on teacher skills and communication over a 1-year follow-up period. We used an experimental design to examine maintenance effects of CBC (n[subscript CBC] = 84, n[subscript Control] = 68). Outcomes were assessed four times: baseline, 12-week posttest (immediate effects), and twice during a 1-year follow-up period (maintenance effects). Longitudinal growth modeling revealed that immediate improvements in perceived problem-solving competence and communication quality with parents for teachers in the CBC condition compared to teachers in the control condition were maintained 1-year postintervention. CBC appears to support teachers' professional practices over time. Implications for enhancing families' and schools' capacities to address student behavior concerns are discussed.

In the interest of understanding choices related to achievement, persistence, and performance that inform pursuit of careers in science, technology, engineering, and math, the current research pursued a novel approach to asking young children about their beliefs related to engineering. The Engineering-Related Activities and Skills (ERAS) items were developed to use instead of the term 'engineering' to measure children's achievement-related ability beliefs (competence) and subjective task values (importance, interest). A range of methods across three studies were implemented in the development and assessment of evidence related to the internal structure of the ERAS items across the domains of ability beliefs and subjective task values (N = 949 students). Results suggest initial evidence for the ERAS items being valid in measuring children's perceptions of engineering-related competence, importance, and interest. Theoretical and practical implications related to the factors that influence the academic and career choices in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields, as well as future directions are outlined.

The current study sought to examine the prospective relationship of peer victimization on changes in Asian American youth's depressive symptoms during early adolescence, a crucial period for the development of depression and engagement in peer victimization among youth. Further, as guided by cultural-ecological frameworks, the current study also sought to examine the role of school-based peer support and gender as moderators on the relationship between peer victimization and depressive symptoms among this understudied population. Participants included Asian American youth (N = 232; M age = 12.96, SD = 1.40; 51% girls) who completed questionnaires in the school context. Data for this study included two measurement occasions over a 1-year interval. Results indicated that high levels of adolescents' perceptions of peer victimization were associated with increased levels of depressive symptoms 1 year later. Additionally, results indicated that peer victimization interacted with reports of peer support within school, such that under conditions of moderate to high levels of school-based peer support, high levels of peer victimization related to increased depressive symptoms. Findings contribute to our understanding of the development of depressive symptoms among early adolescent Asian American youth and have implications for school-based depression prevention programming for Asian American youth.

Nebraska is often referred to as "the good life" by state residents. In 2022, Nebraska was comprised of over 800,000 family households and had a population nearing two million. Nebraska is the only state in the U.S. with a unicameral legislature and is comprised of both rural and urban contexts over a diverse geography. Like other states, in the past decade, there have been changes in the demographic makeup of the population, due in part to immigration, an aging population, and out migration. Given this context, we focus our review of Nebraska families on state priorities identified in a Nebraska Cooperative Extension needs assessment that include attracting and retaining a skilled workforce, and enhancing economic vitality, health, and wellbeing. We describe the state geography, demographics, and government contexts. We then describe where current policy programming, and resources stand in addressing relevant family-focused needs and issues of the key working age population. We end with recommendations focused on the strengths of Nebraska, given its relatively small population and community-oriented nature that can be leveraged to support innovations in policies and programs to create a healthy environment for families, that ultimately enhance the economic vitality of the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parent-teacher relationships are germane to child outcomes and are especially important when children experience social-behavioral difficulties. We used dyadic methods to assess levels and congruence in parent-teacher relationship joining (affective quality) and communication-to-other (communication behaviors). The study also examined whether teacher beliefs about parent involvement and years of experience and parents' educational attainment and ethnic-racial identity related to relationship qualities. Data come from three randomized controlled trials of a family-school partnership intervention for children with social-behavioral difficulties. Results indicated dyad levels of joining were higher than communication-to-other and identified a degree of mismatch in parent-teacher relationships. Parents reported more positive joining and communication-to-other than teachers. Parent-teacher dyads reported higher-quality relationships when parents identified as White and teachers held positive beliefs about parent involvement. Congruence was greater when teachers held positive beliefs about parent involvement and when parents had higher educational attainment. Implications for school-based family engagement efforts are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both behavioral and pharmacological interventions have short-term efficacy for reducing symptomology of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). However, intervention effects typically dissipate once interventions are removed. Scholars have advocated for a life-course model of intervention to sustain outcomes for students with ADHD. This model of service delivery is collaborative, individually tailored, and responsive to the culture and context of the student. Conjoint behavioral consultation (CBC) is a family-school partnership intervention that is consistent with a life-course model and has demonstrated efficacy in the short- and long-term reductions of problem behaviors; however, little is known about the efficacy of CBC for students with ADHD specifically. The present study sought to evaluate the efficacy of CBC for students exhibiting symptoms of ADHD immediately following treatment and 12 month later using data from a larger randomized controlled trial. Results indicated that students in the CBC condition (n = 29) had significantly lower parent ratings of hyperactivity and behavioral symptoms at post-treatment relative to students in the "business as usual" control condition (n = 16). However, at follow-up, differences were no longer statistically significant. Additionally, although both groups demonstrated significant improvements in teacher-reported attention problems at post-treatment, students in the control group had significantly lower scores at follow-up. Implications for the use of CBC for students with ADHD symptomology and future research directions are discussed.

Challenging behavior problems are common in early childhood and, if left untreated, may escalate into more severe and intractable problems in adolescence and early adulthood. This trajectory is of particular importance in rural schools, where disruptive behaviors are more prominent than in urban and suburban schools. Conjoint behavioral consultation (CBC) is a family-school partnership intervention with documented efficacy in producing immediate decreases in child problem behaviors and increases in child adaptive behaviors and social skills. The purpose of the present study was to determine whether the immediate effects of CBC maintain over a 1-year follow-up period. Participants at study enrollment were students (N = 267) and their parents, as well as both the students' original (N = 152) and subsequent (N = 135) teachers in 45 Midwest rural schools. At the time of initial study enrollment, students were assigned randomly to an active CBC intervention or "business as usual" control condition. Results demonstrated that immediate effects of parent-rated adaptive and social skills and teacher-rated school problems were maintained at the 1-year follow-up. Additionally, for parent-rated adaptive skills and teacher-rated school problems, improvements during the maintenance phase were statistically equivalent to gains in the control group. However, increases in parent-rated social skills for the control group during the follow-up phase significantly outpaced increases among the CBC group. Implications for use of CBC in rural communities, as well as future research directions, are discussed.

This study examined the role of sibling and friend characteristics in Mexican-American youth's gender-typed characteristics (i.e., attitudes, interests, and leisure activities) in early versus middle adolescence using a sibling design. Mexican-American 7th graders (M = 12.51 years; SD = .58) and their older siblings (M = 15.48 years; SD = 1.57) from 246 families participated in home interviews and a series of seven nightly phone calls. Results revealed that younger/early adolescent siblings reported more traditional gender role attitudes than their older/middle adolescent siblings and older brothers were more traditional in their attitudes than older sisters. When comparing siblings' gender-typed interests and leisure activities, boys reported more masculine orientations than girls and girls reported more feminine orientations than boys. Older brothers' gender-typed characteristics were associated with the amount of time spent with and gender characteristics of their friendship group, but for younger brothers, sibling characteristics were associated with their gender-typed characteristics. In contrast, both sibling and friendship characteristics were significantly associated with older and younger sisters' gender-typed characteristics. The discussion addressed the different correlates of older and younger sisters' and brothers' gender-typed characteristics.

The efficacy of conjoint behavioral consultation (CBC), a family-school partnership intervention, for teachers' practices and process skills was evaluated. Participants were 152 teachers of grades K-3 in 45 Midwest rural schools randomly assigned to treatment or control conditions. Treatment group teachers participated in an 8- to 10-week CBC intervention. Outcome measures were (a) self-reports of classroom practices and collaborative process skills and (b) direct observations of teachers' use of effective behavioral strategies. Relative to control group participants, there was a significant positive intervention effect on CBC teachers' self-report of appropriate behavioral strategies (ß = 0.47, p < 0.001), observations of their use of positive attention (ß = 0.50, p < 0.001) and positive consequences (ß = 0.72, p < 0.001), and competence in addressing problems (ß = 0.95, p < 0.001). Teachers' appropriate strategy use was mediated by their use of problem-solving processes. Implications for rural settings are discussed.

This study, as guided by cultural-ecological frameworks, examined multiple contextual stressors, including subjective economic hardship, acculturation, discrimination, and negative perceptions of school safety, as simultaneously linked to adolescents' depressive symptoms, as well as the role of gender, familism values, family cohesion, and school connectedness on these associations. Data come from the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study (Portes and Rumbaut 2012) that included second-generation 8th- and 9th-grade children of foreign-born parents from the Mexican-origin subsample (n = 755; 52% male; time 1 M age = 14.20 years). Adolescents were either born in (60%) or immigrated prior to age 5 to the USA. Results of the regression analysis conducted via M"plus" indicated that Mexican-origin female adolescents had higher levels of depressive symptoms at age 17. Subjective economic hardship, general discrimination, and negative perceptions of school safety were related to higher levels of depressive symptoms. Family cohesion was related to lower levels of depressive symptoms. Youth gender, familism values, family cohesion, and school connectedness were significant moderators. The present findings point to not only the harmful effects of subjective economic hardship, general discrimination, and negative perceptions of school safety on second-generation Mexican-origin adolescents' mental health but also the significant protective role of school connectedness and family cohesion in promoting adolescents' well-being. Implications for school psychology research and practice are discussed.

The present research applied a multidimensional framework to the study of gender stereotypes by investigating whether elementary school children display different levels of endorsement when considering distinct gender stereotype constructs (ability, category, and interest) and feminine versus masculine stereotypes. Study 1 (N = 403) compared children's ability and category beliefs using a set of gender‐neutral skill items. Study 2 (N = 539) extended this research by examining whether children showed different patterns of ability and category decisions for feminine versus masculine occupational items. Study 3 (N = 974) furthered our understanding of the construct dimension by comparing children's interest and ability decisions within the STEM domain. Findings revealed that older elementary school children endorsed ability stereotypes more strongly than category stereotypes and, across all age groups, children endorsed interest stereotypes more strongly than ability stereotypes. Findings also revealed age differences in how children think about masculine versus feminine stereotypes. For masculine stereotypes, younger children showed stronger endorsement than older children; however, for feminine stereotypes, the reverse pattern was found such that older children showed more stereotyped thinking than younger children. The present study illustrates the benefits of employing a multidimensional framework to gain a more nuanced understanding of how children apply their increasing knowledge of gender stereotypes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The lack of child sexual exploitation (CSE) measures for high school youth hinders research to inform the development and evaluation of CSE prevention and response efforts. The purpose of the current study was to describe the development (via community-based participatory processes), descriptive statistics, and psychometric properties of a suite of instruments to assess CSE attitudes and behaviors for high school personnel and youth. Study results provide initial evidence of validity (i.e. face validity, internal consistency, factor structure) for the suite of measures. Implications for measurement refinement and use of instruments for program development and evaluation are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sexual minority, individuals who are not heterosexual, college students experience high rates of intimate partner violence (IPV), which is linked to a myriad of deleterious outcomes. However, little work has evaluated whether there are differences in IPV outcomes among sexual minority college students as compared to heterosexual college students. Further, the extent to which minority stress at the institutional and individual level relates to IPV outcomes among sexual minority students is understudied. As such, the purpose of the current study was to evaluate IPV outcomes in a large sample of undergraduate students attending 18 medium- to large-sized universities across the contiguous U.S. Results supported that sexual minority victims of IPV had more anxious and depressive symptoms than heterosexual victims of IPV but were not more likely to engage in hazardous drinking. Further, analyses supported that several campus-level (but not individual-level) indicators of minority stress moderated the relation between IPV victimization and negative outcomes among sexual minority students, such that the association between IPV and negative outcomes was stronger among students embedded in campuses with higher levels of minority stressors. Results support the critical importance of interventions addressing campus-level minority stressors to reduce deleterious IPV outcomes among sexual minority college student victims. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examined profiles of sibling relationship qualities in 246 Mexican-origin families living in the United States using latent profile analyses. Three profiles were identified: "Positive," "Negative," and "Affect-Intense." Links between profiles and youths' familism values and adjustment were assessed using longitudinal data. Siblings in the "Positive" profile reported the highest familism values, followed by siblings in the "Affect-Intense" profile and, finally, siblings in the "Negative" profile. Older siblings in the "Positive" and "Affect-Intense" profiles reported fewer depressive symptoms than siblings in the "Negative" profile. Further, in the "Positive" and "Negative" profiles, older siblings reported less involvement in risky behaviors than younger siblings. In the "Negative" profile, younger siblings reported greater sexual risk behaviors in late adolescence than older siblings; siblings in opposite-sex dyads, as compared to same-sex dyads, engaged in riskier sexual behaviors. Our findings highlight sibling relationship quality as promotive and risky, depending on sibling characteristics and adjustment outcomes.

Engagement in risk behavior has implications for individuals' academic achievement, health, and well-being, yet there is a paucity of developmental research on the role of culturally relevant strengths in individual and family differences in risk behavior involvement among ethnic minority youth. In this study, we used a longitudinal cohort-sequential design to chart intraindividual trajectories of risk behavior and test variation by gender and familism values in 492 youth from 12 to 22 years of age. Participants were older and younger siblings from 246 Mexican-origin families who reported on their risk behaviors in interviews spaced over 8 years. Multilevel cohort-sequential growth models revealed that youth reported an increase in risk behavior from 12 to 18 years of age, and then a decline to age 22. Male youth reported greater overall levels and a steeper increase in risk behavior from ages 12 to 18, compared to female youth. For familism values, on occasions when youth reported higher levels, they also reported lower levels of risk behavior (i.e., within-person effect). For sibling dyads characterized by higher average levels of familism values, youth reported lower average levels of risk behavior (i.e., between-family effect). Findings provide unique insights into risk behavior from adolescence to young adulthood among Mexican-origin youth.

Latinx students are the largest ethnic minority school-age population, yet they have some of the lowest reading proficiency levels and highest rates of school dropout and experience significant unmet behavioral health needs. School-based interventions addressing behavioral challenges and parent engagement are recommended to support Latinx students. Conjoint behavioral consultation is an evidence-based intervention that supports behavioral improvements and home-school partnerships for students. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of CBC for a subsample of Latinx students enrolled in two large-scale randomized efficacy trials. ANCOVA and t-test analyses revealed generally positive effects for CBC on Latinx student and parent outcomes and parent-teacher relationships. These findings suggest CBC may be a promising school-based intervention addressing gaps in educational and behavioral health services for Latinx students. Given the small sample size, further research is needed to evaluate the efficacy of CBC for Latinx students and their families.

Intimate partner abuse (IPA) is a public health crisis that disproportionately impacts indigenous women. We know little about rates and correlates of IPA victimization (IPAV) and abuse directed at one's partner (ADP) among indigenous women caregivers (people who take care of children). The purpose of the current study was to address this critical gap in the literature. Participants were 44 indigenous women caregivers in the United States in a current relationship who completed a survey. Most women reported IPAV and ADP experiences in the past 6 months, and IPAV and ADP abuse directed at partner were positively associated. Further, IPAV was positively associated with adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), participants' engagement in harsh parenting, and depressive symptoms. IPAV was negatively associated with age, income, indigenous cultural identity, and social support. ADP was positively associated with ACEs, harsh parenting, and depressive symptoms. ADP was negatively associated with age and income. ADP was not associated with indigenous cultural identity and social support. These data suggest the urgency with which efforts are needed to prevent and respond to IPA among indigenous women caregivers, especially those who are younger and of lower income, and that culturally grounded initiatives that seek to build social support may be especially impactful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]