On-Going Projects

The Center for Children, Relationships, and Culture (Director: Kenneth Rubin, Associate Director: Melanie Killen), was designed to promote collaborations among faculty at the University of Maryland as well as with affiliates from the National Institutes of Health (NICHD) and several universities (e.g., Catholic University, Georgetown University, Johns Hopkins University) within the greater Washington-Baltimore area. The Center has engaged several faculty in collaborative projects involving graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and Visiting Scholars.

As has been done for the past six years, Drs. Rubin and Killen divide the responsibility for chairing the Center for Children, Relationships, and Culture's weekly research seminar and colloquium series. All faculty affiliates and graduate students provide input regarding the topics to be discussed and the selection of speakers. The weekly colloquium series includes professional development sessions on topics such as writing and submitting manuscripts for publication, giving professional talks, applying for external funding for research, conducting ethical research, and designing and conceptualizing research projects. In addition,Visiting Scholars from other countries spend time at the Center each semester. For example, in the past few years, Visiting Scholars, often on sabbatical, have included Gustavo Faigenbaum [Argentina], Linda Rose-Krasnor [Canada], Avi Sagi [Israel], Ann Sanson [Australia], Jens Asendorpf [Germany], Ock Boon Chung [Korea] and Pei-Lin Wang [Taiwan].

Below are some of the topics that reflect ongoing projects being conducted by Center-affiliated faculty in the Department of Human Development.

Kim Burgess, Research Associate Professor

Child-behavioral emotional processes
Peer and parent-child relationships

James Byrnes, Professor

Decision-making models of development
Gender differences in achievement

Jane Doussard-Roosevelt, Associate Research Professor

Behavioral and physiological regulation in young children
Mother-child interaction and approach and withdrawal behavior

Allison Druin, Assistant Professor

The influence of educational technologies on children's social and cognitive development
Reading, storytelling, and media influences in the classroom.

Nathan A. Fox, Professor

Attachment
Development of emotion and emotion regulation
Developmental psychophysiology

Brenda Jones Harden, Assistant Professor

Young children at risk
Head Start and policy issues for infants and children

Melanie Killen, Professor and Associate Director of the Center

Social and moral reasoning
Conflict resolution and autonomy
Children's and adolescents' evaluations of group inclusion, exclusion, and rights

Peter Marshall, Research Associate Professor

Infant and child temperament
Developmental psychophysiology

Saundra Murray Nettles, Associate Professor

Development in community contexts
Resilience in children and adolescents

Kenneth H. Rubin, Professor and Director of the Center

Social, emotional, and personality development
Peer relationships
Parenting and parent-child relationships

Judith Torney-Purta, Professor

Cognitive psychology methods measuring social/political cognition
Peer interaction in technology-rich environments
Civic education cross-nationally

Kathryn Wentzel, Professor

Social relationships and social motivation as predictors of school adjustment and academic achievement
Interpersonal relationships and school adjustment

Allan Wigfield, Professor

Development and socialization of children's and adolescents' motivation and self-concept
Gender differences in motivation and self-concept