THE ORIGINS OF NONVERBAL SENSITIVITY

A prospective longitudinal design was used to examine the relation bet ween temperament and early parenting variables at age 5 and sensitivit y to nonverbal cues at age 31 as measured by the Profile of Nonverbal Sensitivity (PONS). The results showed that 26 % of the variance in ad ult nonverbal sensitivity was accounted for by the childhood variables . Three predictors contributed to good adult decoding skills: easy chi ld temperament, parental harmony, and moderate father strictness. Temp erament accounted for the largest percentage of unique variance in adu lt nonverbal sensitivity (8.8 %). No sex differences were found.