Author: Vivienne

Our research on temperament focuses on the assessment of its base dimensions in toddlers, preschoolers, and school-aged children. The Integrative Child Temperament Inventory (ICTI; Zentner & Ihrig, 2011) assesses five temperament dimensions in children aged 2 to 8 years. The term integrative was chosen because the ICTI covers temperament dimensions that are included in most temperament theories and generally acknowledged. In our current project we are working on an adaption of the ICTI for older children. As a part of this project, we are also analyzing the interrater agreement on temperament between parents, children and teachers and investigate factors that are influencing the amount of agreement. For this project, we created a comic for children. It follows the siblings Anna and Leo and their dog time as they discover different temperament traits in everyday life. They learn a lot about the the origin and the reasons for behavior differences as well. We used the comics in schools when we did our data collection. read the comic A German version of the comic is also available. read the German comic

The Integrative Child Temperament Screener (ICTS) is a nine item short version of the Integrative Child Temperament Inventory (ICTI) It captures three temperament traits (frustration, inhibition, attention) that are known as risk factors for the development of emotional and behavior problems. Our new article demonstrates the comparability of results across different countries (Germany, UK,US, Spain and China) and age groups (toddlers, preschoolers, school-age children). The ICTS can be used from the age of two, when the effectiveness of interventions is highest due to the high plasticity of neuronal structures and behaviors. read the article The clinical utility of the ICTS was recently supported in a study comparing clinical-referred and general population children (Zentner et al., 2021). read the article