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Updated: Mar 1, 2026

Assessing the Coherence of Parents' Short Narratives Regarding their Child Using the Five-Minute Speech Sample Procedure
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Assessing the Coherence of Parents' Short Narratives Regarding their Child Using the Five-Minute Speech Sample Procedure

Published on: September 19, 2019

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Pivotal behavior as the mediator of the relationship between parental responsiveness and children's symbolic behavior

Chun-Hao Chiu1, Chu-Sui Lin2, Gerald Mahoney3

  • 1Department of Psychology, Northern Illinois University, 1425 W. Lincoln Hwy, DeKalb, IL 60115, USA.

Infant Behavior & Development
|May 30, 2017
PubMed

Previous research with parents and children with developmental disabilities indicated that the relationship between mothers' responsive style of interaction and children's rate of development was mediated by the simultaneous relationship between mothers' responsiveness and children's social engagement, or pivotal behavior. In this study, we attempted to determine whether children's pivotal behavior might also mediate the relationship between responsiveness and child development in a sample of 165 typically developing toddlers and their Taiwanese parents. Child development was assessed with a parent report measure of children's symbolic behavior. Parental responsiveness and children's pivotal behavior were assessed from observations of parent-child play. Results indicated that parental responsiveness was correlated with children's pivotal behavior, and that both of these variables were correlated with children's symbolic behavior. Structural equation models indicated that the relationship between responsiveness and children's symbolic behavior was fully mediated by children's pivotal behavior.

Keywords:
Cross-culturalParental responsivenessPivotal behaviorSymbolic behaviorToddler development

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