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The role of parental literacy skills in cross-linguistic transfer, the phenomenon of the sharing of skills and competence from one language to another, is under-researched. The present study tested 147 Hong Kong Chinese children and their parents (76 boys; mean age = 7.16). Parental literacy skills significantly explained children's reading and spelling in English after controlling for socioeconomic status, highlighting the role of parental skills in facilitating children's second language development. Cross-linguistic transfers between Chinese and English were found between reading and writing after controlling for age, grade, non-verbal intelligence, and socioeconomic status. The results were replicated with another twin sample.

Due to the impact of COVID-19, children and their parents are spending more time at home, which increases parent--child interactions. The goals of the present study were to examine the mediating effects of children's learning engagement on the relationships of parental involvement in Chinese, English, and math performance and to investigate whether parent-perceived parental involvement and child-perceived parental involvement consistently affected children's academic performance. Data were collected from 253 Chinese primary school students (117 boys, Mage = 10.53) during the COVID-19 pandemic. We included parental involvement perceived by the parents and by the children to comprehensively describe parental involvement (in wave 2); we collected children's learning engagement (wave 2); and we compared children's Chinese, English and math academic performances before (wave 1) and after (wave 3) China's first wave of COVID-19 in 2020. The results showed that after controlling for gender, age, and SES, the parental involvement perceived by parents could be directly and positively related to children's learning engagement, and it also indirectly influenced children's learning engagement through the children's perceived parental involvement. Learning engagement was a mediator of the relationship between parental involvement and children's academic performance. Parental involvement significantly predicted children's Chinese and English performances through their learning engagement, while parental involvement failed to predict children's mathematics performances during the COVID-19 pandemic. The current research provides insights into the underlying mechanisms of how parental involvement affects children's academic performances during school closures and hopes to guide parents and schools to consider how to cooperate and continue to use rapidly developing digital education resources amid the long-term impact of COVID-19 to provide children using more effective and suitable guidance in the future.

This study was to investigate how phonological processing and visual-spatial abilities contributed differently to arithmetic operations including addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Eighty-eight Chinese fifth graders completed a rapid digit naming task, a character rhyming task, a figure matching task, a 3D mental rotation task, and arithmetic calculation tasks. Results showed that when controlling for age, visual acuity, and nonverbal intelligence, phonological processing accounted for unique variance in both addition and multiplication, whereas visual-spatial processing explained unique variance in subtraction and division. In particular, rapid automatized naming (hereafter, RAN) explained more of the variance in addition than mental rotation did, although both were significantly associated with addition. Mental rotation explained more of the variance in subtraction than phonological awareness and RAN did, although the three skills were all related to subtraction. Importantly, RAN was a unique correlate of multiplication, while mental rotation was a unique correlate of division. These findings highlight different contribution of the phonological processing and visual-spatial skills underlying four arithmetic operations., Author(s): Xiao Yu [sup.1] , Kaichun Liu [sup.2] , Yuhan Wang [sup.2] , Xiujie Yang [sup.2] , Jingyuan Yang [sup.1] Author Affiliations: (1) https://ror.org/04xv2pc41, grid.66741.32, 0000 0001 1456 856X, Department [...]

The study used Bayesian and Frequentist methods to investigate whether the roles of linguistic, quantitative, and spatial attention skills are distinct in children's acquisition of reading and math. A sample of 175 Chinese kindergarteners was tested with measures of linguistic skills (phonological awareness and phonological memory), quantitative knowledge (number line task, symbolic digit comparison, and non-symbolic number estimation), spatial attention skills (visual span, mental rotation, and visual search), word reading, and calculation. After statistically controlling for age and nonverbal intelligence, phonological awareness and digit comparison performance explained unique variance in both math and reading. Moreover, number line estimation was specifically important for math, while phonological memory was specifically essential for reading. These findings highlight the possibility of developing early screening tools with different cognitive measures for children at risk of learning disabilities in reading and/or math.

The current study investigated whether and how each component of the working memory model was associated with kindergarten children's arithmetic performance. A total of 103 Chinese kindergarten children were administered tests of the visuospatial sketchpad, the phonological loop, the central executive, and basic number processing (i.e., number line estimation, nonverbal numerosity estimation and numerical magnitude comparison). The results showed that among the three working memory components, the central executive accounted for a significant proportion of the variance in young children's arithmetic performance. In terms of basic number processing, number line estimation and numerical magnitude comparison had significant influences on young children's arithmetic performance. Furthermore, numerical magnitude comparison played a mediating role between the visuospatial sketchpad and early arithmetic skills. These findings highlight the importance of working memory and basic number processing in early arithmetic skills and reveal different pathways through which the three working memory components influence young children's arithmetic performance., Author(s): Yue Qi [sup.1] [sup.2] , Yinghe Chen [sup.1] [sup.2] , Xiujie Yang [sup.1] , Yusi Hao [sup.1] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.20513.35, 0000 0004 1789 9964, Faculty of Psychology, Beijing [...]

In this longitudinal study, 64 kindergartners (mean age at T1 = 4.69 ± 0.33 years; 34 girls) were tested on visual perception skills (T2 and T3) and mathematics performance (T1 to T3) with 6-month intervals between the three testing waves. Cross-lagged path analysis showed a bidirectional relationship between visual perception and mathematics performance from T2 to T3. Specifically, children's visual perception at T2 significantly predicted their mathematics performance at T3 (B = 0.30, SE = 0.14, p = 0.03, [beta] = 0.19). Children's mathematics performance at T1 accounted for unique variance in visual perception at T2 (B = 0.79, SE = 0.11, p < 0.001, [beta] = 0.68) and visual perception at T3 (B = 0.27, SE = 0.12, p = 0.02, [beta] = 0.32). Their mathematics performance at T2 also significantly predicted visual perception at T3 (B = 0.21, SE = 0.10, p = 0.04, [beta] = 0.28). Totally, they explained 61% of the variance in mathematics performance and 39% of the variance in visual perception at T3. The results highlight the developmental courses as well as the reciprocal facilitations between visual perception and mathematics performance in the kindergarten period., Author(s): Xiao Yu [sup.1] , Yinghe Chen [sup.2] , Weiyi Xie [sup.3] , Xiujie Yang [sup.4] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.66741.32, 0000 0001 1456 856X, Department of Psychology, School of Humanities [...]

Almost 70% grandparents play important roles in the parenting of grandchildren in China. Although several studies have investigated the influence of grandparenting on children, few studies have taken the mutual impacts between parental and grandparental caregivers on children into account. The present study investigated the different associations of mother's and grandmother's parental control (psychological and behavioral control), mother-child attachment, grandmother-child attachment, and child depressive symptoms between paternal and maternal groups from 201 grandparenting families. Results of mediating effect indicated the different associations between groups. In paternal group, significant crossover effect was shown in the association between paternal grandmother's psychological control and mother-child attachment; mother's psychological control and behavioral control were indirectly associated with child depressive symptoms through mother-child attachment. In maternal group, we did not find the same crossover effect as in paternal group, but maternal grandmother's psychological control was indirectly associated with child depressive symptoms through maternal grandmother-child attachment. These findings expanded the crossover theory to grandmother-mother subsystem to reveal the mutual impacts on children between paternal and maternal group in grandparenting families., Author(s): Yuxin Tan [sup.1] , Wan Ding [sup.1] , Yongqiang Jiang [sup.1] , Xiujie Yang [sup.1] , Shaozheng Qin [sup.2] [sup.3] , Stephen P. Hinshaw [sup.3] , Xiuyun Lin [sup.1] [...]

Relying on the philosophy of the union of the body and mind, physical fitness has significant impacts on students' psychological health. The present study explored how physical fitness influences academic burnout from an interpersonal perspective in school aged children. School bullying victimization was examined as the interpersonal mediator in our research model. A total of 429 Chinese elementary students participated in this study. Physical fitness was objectively assessed by trained evaluators while school bullying victimization and burnout were self-reported in surveys. Interestingly, regression results showed that verbal and relational bullying rather than physical bullying mediated the relationship between physical fitness and burnout. Specifically, verbal bullying victimization mediated the relationship between physical fitness and academic exhaustion; and both verbal and relational bullying mediated the relationship between physical fitness and academic cynicism. These findings disclosed the nature of psychological functioning of physical fitness and provided initial evidence on the interpersonal mechanisms relating school aged children's physical fitness performance to academic burnout. The theoretical and practical implications for the interpersonal mediators and the nature of different types of school bullying were discussed., Author(s): Jiajin Tong [sup.1] , Zhanjia Zhang [sup.2] , Wenqing Chen [sup.1] , Zhonghui He [sup.2] , Xiujie Yang [sup.3] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.11135.37, 0000 0001 2256 9319, School of [...]

The present study presents a meta-analysis of the relations between phonological processing abilities and different mathematics subskills. Using a random-effects model with 94 studies (135 unique samples, 826 effect sizes), the present meta-analysis revealed a significant general association between phonological processing and mathematics (average r = 0.33, p < 0.001, 95% CI [0.30, 0.36]). Phonological awareness (PA) and rapid automatized naming (RAN) showed stronger correlations with mathematics than phonological memory (PM) did. The correlations among phonological processing abilities and mathematics skills were generally stronger among younger children than among older children. PA and PM manifested larger effect sizes when correlated with mathematics accuracy than with mathematics fluency, whereas RAN yielded larger effect sizes when associated with mathematics fluency than with mathematics accuracy. Metastructural equation modeling results revealed that, after statistically controlling for domain-general abilities (i.e., vocabulary knowledge, executive functioning, and nonverbal intelligence), phonological processing still made a unique contribution to different mathematics subskills ([beta]s = 0.20 [approximately] 0.54). These results suggest that children may use phonological processing abilities as one mechanism through which to represent, manipulate, and retrieve mathematics knowledge.

Mental rotation is positively related to arithmetic ability; however, the mechanism underlying this relationship remains unclear. The possible roles of working memory, place-value concept, and number line estimation in the correlation between mental rotation and whole-number computation were investigated. One hundred and fifty-five first-grade students were tested to determine their mental rotation ability, arithmetic ability, and non-verbal intelligence. One year later, their working memory, place-value concept, number line estimation, and overall arithmetic ability were assessed. After controlling for age, gender, and prior arithmetic ability, we found that mental rotation uniquely predicted arithmetic ability after one year. Further mediation analyses demonstrated that number line estimation significantly mediated the relationship between mental rotation and arithmetic ability. In contrast, neither working memory nor place-value concept significantly mediated the relationship between mental rotation and arithmetic ability. This study highlights that mental number line estimation is the most important element explaining the influence of a dynamic spatial skill, that is, mental rotation, on arithmetic ability among young Chinese children.

The present study aimed to examine how visual skills, verbal working memory, visuospatial working memory, and other general cognitive skills (inhibitory control, attention, and decision speed) were simultaneously correlated with the early acquisition of reading among kindergarten children. A total of 99 Chinese children were tested individually on the Chinese character recognition task, the block design task, the digit span task, the visuospatial sketchpad task, the continuous performance task (CPT), the flanker task, and the choice reaction time task. The results showed that visual skills and working memory accounted for 15% of the unique variance in character reading, whereas other general cognitive skills, including decision speed, inhibitory control and attention, did not significantly explain the variance in character reading when visual skills and working memory were considered. Specifically, verbal working memory, rather than visuospatial working memory, explained the unique variance in children's learning of character reading. These findings highlighted that visual skills and verbal working memory were among the most important precursors of reading in children at the beginning stage of learning Chinese characters.

This 13-month longitudinal study investigated whether different phonological processing components independently predicted individual differences in Chinese word reading and arithmetic. Three phonological processing skills [phonological awareness, phonological memory, and rapid automatized naming (RAN)], word reading, and arithmetic were assessed among eighty-eight Hong Kong Chinese first graders (Mean age = 79.88 months, SD = 4.71), along with vocabulary and nonverbal intelligence. These abilities were measured again at second grade (Mean age = 92.89 months, SD = 5.14). Simple correlations showed that phonological awareness and RAN at grade one were significantly associated with word reading and arithmetic both at grade one and at grade two, while phonological memory at grade one was associated with arithmetic, but not word reading, at both grades. Among the three phonological skills, RAN at grade one uniquely predicted 4% of the variance in children's reading performance and 15% of the variance in arithmetic at second grade, beyond autoregressive effects, vocabulary, and nonverbal intelligence (model 3a). In contrast, neither phonological awareness nor phonological memory significantly predicted children's later reading and arithmetic performance. There was also a reciprocal influence of Chinese word reading, rather than arithmetic skills, on later RAN performance.

Vocabulary knowledge was tested in a native (Cantonese-Chinese) and foreign (English) language in 150 twins and 150 singletons aged 6-11 years, matched on age, gender, grade level, nonverbal intelligence, parents' education, family income, and number of siblings and household members. The singletons clearly outperformed the twins on the native vocabulary, but this "twinning effect" was much less noticeable for the foreign vocabulary. The effect on English vocabulary was further reduced after exposure to English at home was controlled. Given that these participants learned most of their English in school rather than home, the present findings support the notion that the twinning effect is associated with increased competition for family interaction in twins compared with singletons.

The present study examined phonological processing skills (phonological memory, phonological awareness, and rapid automatised naming, RAN) in relation to early Chinese reading and early Chinese mathematics for young children. Early Chinese reading was assessed with single character reading and multi-character word reading, and early mathematics was assessed with procedural arithmetic and arithmetic story problems. Among 86 Chinese kindergarteners, phonological processing skills explained 20% of the variance in character reading and 28% of the variance in word reading; they accounted for 8% of the variance in arithmetic and 11% of the variance in story problem performance. Specifically, findings further highlight the general importance of phonological awareness in early Chinese single character reading, word reading, simple arithmetic and story problems, and the specific role of RAN in single character reading and simple arithmetic.