Restricted accessResearch articleFirst published online 1998-06
The Relationship between Children's Reported Exposure to Interparental Conflict and Memory Biases in the Recogniton of Aggressive and Constructive Conflict Words
A total of 70 Latino children between the ages of 7 and 12 years completed measures of exposure to interparental conflict and listened to audio taped simulations of interparental conflict. Children's memory for aggressive and constructive conflict words used during the session was then assessed with a word recognition task. Results indicate that older children who report witnessing high levels of marital conflict made significantly more false positive and fewer false negative memory errors for aggressive words than did all other children. This study provides preliminary support for the theory that children develop marital conflict representations that reflect their socialization experiences with interparental conflict and that guide information processing in the context of novel marital conflict.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Andersen, S. M. , & Baum, A. (1994). Transference in interpersonal relations: Inferences and affect based on significant-other representations. Journal of Personality, 62, 459-498.
2.
Andersen, S. M. , & Cole, S. W. (1990). "Do I know you?" The role of significant others in general social perception. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 384-399.
3.
Andersen, S. M. , & Glassman, N. S. (in press). Responding to significant others when they are not there: Effects on interpersonal inference, motivation, and affect. In R. M. Sorrentino & E. T. Higgins (Eds.), Handbook of motivation and cognition (Vol. 3). New York: Guilford.
4.
Andersen, S. M. , Glassman, N. S., Chen, S., & Cole, S. W. (in press). Transference in social perception: The role of chronic accessibility in significant-other representations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
5.
Baldwin, M. W. (1992). Relational schemas and the processing of social information. Psychological Bulletin, 112, 461-484.
6.
Bowlby, J. (1980). Attachment and loss, Vol. 3: Loss, sadness and depressionNew York: Basic Books.
7.
Bugental, D. (1992). Affective and cognitive processes within threat oriented family systems. In I. E. Sigel, A. McGillicuddy-de Lissi, & J. Goodnow (Eds.), Parental belief systems: The psychological consequences for children. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
8.
Bugental, D. , Blue, J., Cortez, V., Fleck, K., & Rodriguez, A. (1992). Influences of witnessed affect on information processing in children. Child Development, 63, 774-786.
9.
Cantor, N. , & Mischel, W. (1977). Traits as prototypes: Effects on recognition memory. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35, 38-48.
10.
Carlson, B. E. (1990). Adolescent observers of marital violence. Journal of Family Violence, 5, 285-299.
11.
Crick, N. R. , & Dodge, K. A. (1994). A review and reformulation of social information-processing mechanisms in children's social adjustment. Psychological Bulletin, 115, 74-101.
12.
Davies, P. T. , & Cummings, E. M. (1994). Marital conflict and child adjustment: An emotional security hypothesis. Psychological Bulletin, 116, 387-411.
13.
Demorest, A. P. (1992). The role of social cognition in children's social maladjustment. Social Cognition, 10, 211-233.
14.
Dodge, K. A. (1993). Social-cognitive mechanisms in the development of conduct disorder and depression. Annual Review of Psychology, 44, 559-584.
15.
Doumas, D. , Margolin, G., & John, R. S. (1994). The intergenerational transmission of aggression across three generations. Journal of Family Violence, 9, 157-175.
16.
Fiske, S. T. , & Taylor, S. E. (1984). Social cognition. Reading, MA.Addison-Wesley.
17.
Grych,J. H. , & Fincham, F. D. (1990). Marital conflict and children's adjustment: A cognitive-contextual framework. Psychological Bulletin, 108, 267-290.
18.
Grych, J. H. , Seid, M., & Fincham, F. D. (1992). Assessing marital conflict from the child's perspective: The Children's Perception of Interparental Conflict Scale. Child Development, 63, 558-572.
19.
Markus, H. (1977). Self-schemata and processing information about the self. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35, 63-78.
20.
Miller, P. H. (1989). Theories of developmental psychology. San Francisco: Freeman.
21.
Nelson, K. , & Gruendel, J. (1986). Children's scripts. In K. Nelson (Ed.), Event knowledge: Structure and function in development. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
22.
Nuechterlein, K. H. (1991). Vigilance in schizophrenia and related disorders. In S. Steinhauer, J. Zubin, & J. H. Gruzelier (Eds.), Handbook of schizophrenia, Vol. 5: Neuropsychology, psychophysiology, and information processing (pp. 397-433). Amsterdam: Elsevier Science.
23.
O'Brien, M. , Balto, K., Erber, S., & Gee, C. (1995). College students' cognitive and emotional reactions to simulated marital and family conflict. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 19, 707-724.
24.
O'Brien, M. ,John, R., Margolin, G., & Erel, O. (1994). Reliability and diagnostic efficacy of parents' reports regarding children's exposure to marital aggression. Violence and Victims, 9, 45-62.
25.
O'Brien, M. , & Libhaber, J. (1993). The assessment of Children's Coping Responses to Marital Conflict Questionnaire. Unpublished manuscript, New York University.
26.
O'Brien, M. , Margolin, G., John, R. S., & Krueger, L. (1991). Mothers' and sons' cognitive and emotional reactions to simulated marital and family conflict. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 59, 692-703.
27.
Porter, B. , & O'Leary, K. D. (1980). Marital discord and childhood behavior problems. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 8, 287-295.
28.
Rogers, T. B. , Rogers, P.J., & Kuiper, N. A. (1979). Evidence for the self as a cognitive prototype: The "false alarms effect."Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 5, 53-56.
29.
Rosenbaum, A. (1988). Methodological issues in marital violence research. Journal of Family Violence, 3, 91-104.
30.
Roy, M. (1977). Battered women: A psychological study of domestic violence. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold.
31.
Ruble, D. N. , & Stangor, C. (1986). Stalking the elusive schema: Insights from developmental and social-psychological analyses of gender schemas. Social Cognition, 4, 227-261.
32.
Smith, J. P. , & Williams, J. G. (1992). From abusive household to dating violence. Journal of Family Violence, 7, 153-165.
33.
Srull, T. K. (1981). Person memory: Some tests of associative storage and retrieval models. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning and Memory, 7, 440-463.
34.
Stangor, C. , & Ford, T. (1992). Accuracy and expectancy-confirming processing orientations and the development of stereotypes and prejudice. European Review of Social Psychology, 3, 57-89.
35.
Stangor, C. , & Ruble, D. N. (1989). Differential influences of gender schemata and gender constancy on children's information processing and behavior. Social Cognition, 7, 353-372.
36.
Straus, M. A. (1979). Measuring intrafamily conflict and violence: The Conflict Tactics (CT) scales. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 41, 75-88.
37.
Straus, M. A. , & Gelles, R.J. (1990). Physical violence in American families. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.
38.
Straus, M. A. , Gelles, R.J., & Steinmetz, S. (1980). Behind closed doors. New York: Doubleday/Anchor.
39.
Stromquist, V.J. , & Strauman, T.J. (1991). Children's social constructs: Nature, assessment, and association with adaptive versus maladaptive behavior. Social Cognition, 9, 330-358.
40.
Thorndike, E. L. (1921). The teacher's word bookNew York: Columbia University, Teacher's College Press.
41.
Weber,J. , & O'Brien, M. (in press). Children's cognitive appraisals of interparental conflict as a function of dimensions of marital conflict, child characteristics, and children's family socialization experiences. Cognitive Therapy and Research.
42.
Wyer, R. S. , & Gordon, S. E. (1982). The recall of information about persons and groups. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 18, 128-164.
43.
Younger, A. J. , & Boyko, K. A. (1987). Aggression and withdrawal as social schemas underlying children's peer perceptions. Child Development, 58, 1094-1100.
