SOCIAL-PROBLEM SOLVING IN HYPERACTIVE-AGGRESSIVE CHILDREN - HOW AND WHAT THEY THINK IN CONDITIONS OF AUTOMATIC AND CONTROLLED PROCESSING

Examined how and what children think under conditions of automatic and controlled processing within the context of social problem solving. I n a condition that elicited automatic processing, hyperactive-aggressi ve children did not differ in being able to identify the components of a problem or in the number of solutions generated to solve a problem, but were more aggressive in the types of solutions generated, as comp ared to nonhyperactive-nonaggressive children. Furthermore, in a condi tion eliciting controlled processing, hyperactive-aggressive children did not differ in identifying problem components, generating solutions , or in anticipating outcomes for solutions, but were less able to ant icipate consequences, and were more aggressive in choosing a best solu tion to solve a problem, as compared to nonhyperactive-nonaggressive c hildren. The study demonstrated a relation between problem-solving cod es that discriminated between groups, and overall child adjustment. Im plications for social problem-solving interventions are discussed.