FACULTY

Jonathan Tudge

Most of my research focuses on the interrelations between the social world and children's social, moral, and cognitive development. My current line of research is on the development of gratitude, and the decline of materialism, in children and adolescents. Those who feel grateful for what they have typically feel better about themselves, their family, and their teachers and have a less materialistic outlook on life than their less grateful peers. Colleagues and I are therefore exploring the development of these characteristics in children and adolescents, and the role of their parents, in different cultures. Our ultimate goal is to use our findings to design materials that will help teachers and parents encourage gratitude in their children.

In much of my research I use cultural-ecological theory, a contextualist theory that draws on the ideas of Lev Vygotsky and Urie Bronfenbrenner. The major line of research is longitudinal and cross-cultural in design, dealing with the ways in which young children become part of the cultural group in which they live. This work involves extensive observations of the everyday activities of children when they are three years of age as well as interviews and questionnaires with their parents regarding their child-rearing values and beliefs. The children are followed through their first years of school, when data on parents' and teachers' perceptions of the children's social and academic competence are also gathered. This research is cross-cultural (US, Russia, Estonia, Finland, Korea, Kenya, and Brazil) and examines within-societal variations as a function of ethnicity and social class. A book, based on this research, was recently published: Tudge, J. R. H. (2008). The everyday lives of young children: Culture, class, and child rearing in diverse societies. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Publications on these and other topics can be found in the papers or presentations section of my web site, and a link to the book based on the observations of 3-year-olds around the world can be found here.