Kate Freiberg - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Kate Freiberg

Frontiers in Developmental and Life-Course Criminology

Australian Journal of Social Issues

Proponents of social and developmental prevention start with the assumption that the conditions t... more Proponents of social and developmental prevention start with the assumption that the conditions that give rise to crime and antisocial behaviours lie in the processes of human socialization through families and communities, as well as in social arrangements1 that limit the opportunities for human flourishing and for full participation in mainstream institutions like school and work (France & Homel, 2006). In other words, what matters for social and developmental prevention practitioners is making conditions better for raising healthy, prosocial children, from before birth to at least early adulthood. In concrete terms, prevention scientists are concerned with reducing the impact on children and young people of a very wide variety of problems like family violence, harsh and inconsistent parenting practices, offending by parents, brutal, neglectful or discriminatory police practices, the absence of positive adult role models in the community, an individual’s inability to regulate emot...

Trends and issues in crime and criminal justice, 2015

The idea has been gathering momentum for fifty years or more that institutions of care like famil... more The idea has been gathering momentum for fifty years or more that institutions of care like families or schools are more important in preventing crime than institutions of regulation such as the police. However there are big gaps in our knowledge about how well civil society initiatives work, including the effectiveness of family support services that are often available in socially disadvantaged communities. This paper addresses this knowledge gap through an analysis of data from the child longitudinal database constructed through the Pathways to Prevention Project, a ten-year developmental crime prevention initiative that operated until 2011 as a partnership between Mission Australia, Education Queensland, and Griffith University. The authors use a matched groups design and multilevel modelling to show that relatively low levels of family support were strongly associated with improvements in teacher-rated classroom behaviour, especially for children of parents who initially report...

Violence has declined substantially in the Western world over the last 800 years, despite periodi... more Violence has declined substantially in the Western world over the last 800 years, despite periodic spikes due to wars, pogroms, and crime waves (Pinker, 2011). In recent decades, especially there has been a remarkable decline in most forms of crime, including crimes involving violence, in both the United States (US; Levitt, 2004) and other developed countries (European Commission, 2014). The picture in Australia is similar except for non-lethal violence. Property crime victimisation rates fell in the order of two-thirds from the mid- to late-1990s and a 29% decline in homicide victimisation rates occurred over the same period (Australian Institute of Criminology [AIC], 2013). However, for non-lethal violence the pattern in Australia leveled off in the new millenium and did not exhibit the spectacular plunges recorded in the United States. Disturbingly, Australian rates of self-reported victimisation for violence are consistently at the higher end relative to the range reported for countries participating in the International Crime Victimisation Surveys (van Dijk et al., 2007). This then is the Australian puzzle: in recent years property crime has declined substantially in line with other countries, but unlike most other countries our rates of violence are static or only down by a small amount. Part of the solution to this puzzle may lie in the changing nature of youth offending. Violent acts make up a higher proportion of all youth offences (Bricknell, 2008) and comparative statistics suggest Australian youth have high rates of youth violent offending compared to other nations (see below).

Applied Developmental Science

Social Science Research Network, Jun 1, 2010

Palgrave Studies in Education Research Methods, 2022

Pathways to Prevention Project. Kate Freiberg, a developmental psychologist, is

Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can... more Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can improve children’s language devel-opment by incorporating these dialogue levels in their classrooms. It has also been hypothesized that enhancing children’s early lan-guage development enhances children’s later reading development. This quasi-experimental research study investigated both of these hypotheses using a collaborative service delivery model for Grade 1 children with language difficulties from a socially and economically disadvantaged urban community in Australia. Comparing the end-of-year reading achievement scores for the 57 children who received the language intervention with those of the 59 children in the comparison group, the findings from this research are supportive of both hypotheses. The interrelationships between learning difficulties, reading difficulties, and language difficulties are discussed along with children’s development in vocabulary, use of memory strateg...

The Coalition Wellbeing Survey was designed in Phase 1 of the project (2013-14) to give people in... more The Coalition Wellbeing Survey was designed in Phase 1 of the project (2013-14) to give people in each Communities for Children (CfC) site in which we were working the opportunity to share information about their own unique experiences of Communities for Children and the way it operates as part of a collective network aimed at promoting positive outcomes for children. The survey encouraged participants to think of themselves as being part of a community coalition that helped many different people come together in the interest of the children and families who lived in the area. It was designed to give community workers and indeed everyone who was involved at any level of the community coalition, a chance to have a say about how it worked for them. Because the survey was anonymous, the questions allowed participants to express their opinions freely and to provide information about their own personal experiences and perceptions.

Students growing up in socially disadvantaged environments typically experience poorer educationa... more Students growing up in socially disadvantaged environments typically experience poorer educational outcomes than students living in more advantaged circumstances. Strengthening parents' involvement in their children's learning is widely regarded as an important way of helping to reduce the achievement gap between disadvantaged students and their more affluent peers, but unfortunately policy interest in parent involvement has outpaced evidence of its effectiveness as an intervention strategy. A fundamental problem is the conceptual inconsistency, ambiguity and confusion in the literature on parent involvement. This confusion is exacerbated by the inherent complexity of the processes through which various forms of parent involvement are likely to have their effects on different aspects of children's learning. In addition, factors such as family socio-economic status and ethnic background are expected to act as moderators of these already complex relationships. Hence, it is...

The Palgrave Handbook of Australian and New Zealand Criminology, Crime and Justice, 2017

Australasian Journal of Early Childhood, 2006

A parent–child dialogic reading program was implemented across four preschools, involving 62 care... more A parent–child dialogic reading program was implemented across four preschools, involving 62 caregivers/parents in a low socioeconomic status, disadvantaged community where English was not the first language in 54 per cent of the homes. This socioculturally sensitive program aimed to enhance children's language and emergent literacy development, and increase parental involvement in their preschoolers' education. Over the six months of the program, the amount of parent–child reading more than doubled, from an average of 38 minutes of parent-child reading per week, to 89 minutes of parent–child reading per week. Year One teachers in the following year reported positively on the children's literacy readiness, compared to that of previous intakes. The program is described in the paper.

British Journal of Social Work, 2010

Journal of Learning Disabilities, 2007

Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can... more Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can improve children's language development by incorporating these dialogue levels in their classrooms. It has also been hypothesized that enhancing children's early language development enhances children's later reading development. This quasi-experimental research study investigated both of these hypotheses using a collaborative service delivery model for Grade 1 children with language difficulties from a socially and economically disadvantaged urban community in Australia. Comparing the end-of-year reading achievement scores for the 57 children who received the language intervention with those of the 59 children in the comparison group, the findings from this research are supportive of both hypotheses. The interrelationships between learning difficulties, reading difficulties, and language difficulties are discussed along with children's development in vocabulary, use of ...

Infant and Child Development, 2001

Frontiers in Developmental and Life-Course Criminology

Australian Journal of Social Issues

Proponents of social and developmental prevention start with the assumption that the conditions t... more Proponents of social and developmental prevention start with the assumption that the conditions that give rise to crime and antisocial behaviours lie in the processes of human socialization through families and communities, as well as in social arrangements1 that limit the opportunities for human flourishing and for full participation in mainstream institutions like school and work (France & Homel, 2006). In other words, what matters for social and developmental prevention practitioners is making conditions better for raising healthy, prosocial children, from before birth to at least early adulthood. In concrete terms, prevention scientists are concerned with reducing the impact on children and young people of a very wide variety of problems like family violence, harsh and inconsistent parenting practices, offending by parents, brutal, neglectful or discriminatory police practices, the absence of positive adult role models in the community, an individual’s inability to regulate emot...

Trends and issues in crime and criminal justice, 2015

The idea has been gathering momentum for fifty years or more that institutions of care like famil... more The idea has been gathering momentum for fifty years or more that institutions of care like families or schools are more important in preventing crime than institutions of regulation such as the police. However there are big gaps in our knowledge about how well civil society initiatives work, including the effectiveness of family support services that are often available in socially disadvantaged communities. This paper addresses this knowledge gap through an analysis of data from the child longitudinal database constructed through the Pathways to Prevention Project, a ten-year developmental crime prevention initiative that operated until 2011 as a partnership between Mission Australia, Education Queensland, and Griffith University. The authors use a matched groups design and multilevel modelling to show that relatively low levels of family support were strongly associated with improvements in teacher-rated classroom behaviour, especially for children of parents who initially report...

Violence has declined substantially in the Western world over the last 800 years, despite periodi... more Violence has declined substantially in the Western world over the last 800 years, despite periodic spikes due to wars, pogroms, and crime waves (Pinker, 2011). In recent decades, especially there has been a remarkable decline in most forms of crime, including crimes involving violence, in both the United States (US; Levitt, 2004) and other developed countries (European Commission, 2014). The picture in Australia is similar except for non-lethal violence. Property crime victimisation rates fell in the order of two-thirds from the mid- to late-1990s and a 29% decline in homicide victimisation rates occurred over the same period (Australian Institute of Criminology [AIC], 2013). However, for non-lethal violence the pattern in Australia leveled off in the new millenium and did not exhibit the spectacular plunges recorded in the United States. Disturbingly, Australian rates of self-reported victimisation for violence are consistently at the higher end relative to the range reported for countries participating in the International Crime Victimisation Surveys (van Dijk et al., 2007). This then is the Australian puzzle: in recent years property crime has declined substantially in line with other countries, but unlike most other countries our rates of violence are static or only down by a small amount. Part of the solution to this puzzle may lie in the changing nature of youth offending. Violent acts make up a higher proportion of all youth offences (Bricknell, 2008) and comparative statistics suggest Australian youth have high rates of youth violent offending compared to other nations (see below).

Applied Developmental Science

Social Science Research Network, Jun 1, 2010

Palgrave Studies in Education Research Methods, 2022

Pathways to Prevention Project. Kate Freiberg, a developmental psychologist, is

Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can... more Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can improve children’s language devel-opment by incorporating these dialogue levels in their classrooms. It has also been hypothesized that enhancing children’s early lan-guage development enhances children’s later reading development. This quasi-experimental research study investigated both of these hypotheses using a collaborative service delivery model for Grade 1 children with language difficulties from a socially and economically disadvantaged urban community in Australia. Comparing the end-of-year reading achievement scores for the 57 children who received the language intervention with those of the 59 children in the comparison group, the findings from this research are supportive of both hypotheses. The interrelationships between learning difficulties, reading difficulties, and language difficulties are discussed along with children’s development in vocabulary, use of memory strateg...

The Coalition Wellbeing Survey was designed in Phase 1 of the project (2013-14) to give people in... more The Coalition Wellbeing Survey was designed in Phase 1 of the project (2013-14) to give people in each Communities for Children (CfC) site in which we were working the opportunity to share information about their own unique experiences of Communities for Children and the way it operates as part of a collective network aimed at promoting positive outcomes for children. The survey encouraged participants to think of themselves as being part of a community coalition that helped many different people come together in the interest of the children and families who lived in the area. It was designed to give community workers and indeed everyone who was involved at any level of the community coalition, a chance to have a say about how it worked for them. Because the survey was anonymous, the questions allowed participants to express their opinions freely and to provide information about their own personal experiences and perceptions.

Students growing up in socially disadvantaged environments typically experience poorer educationa... more Students growing up in socially disadvantaged environments typically experience poorer educational outcomes than students living in more advantaged circumstances. Strengthening parents' involvement in their children's learning is widely regarded as an important way of helping to reduce the achievement gap between disadvantaged students and their more affluent peers, but unfortunately policy interest in parent involvement has outpaced evidence of its effectiveness as an intervention strategy. A fundamental problem is the conceptual inconsistency, ambiguity and confusion in the literature on parent involvement. This confusion is exacerbated by the inherent complexity of the processes through which various forms of parent involvement are likely to have their effects on different aspects of children's learning. In addition, factors such as family socio-economic status and ethnic background are expected to act as moderators of these already complex relationships. Hence, it is...

The Palgrave Handbook of Australian and New Zealand Criminology, Crime and Justice, 2017

Australasian Journal of Early Childhood, 2006

A parent–child dialogic reading program was implemented across four preschools, involving 62 care... more A parent–child dialogic reading program was implemented across four preschools, involving 62 caregivers/parents in a low socioeconomic status, disadvantaged community where English was not the first language in 54 per cent of the homes. This socioculturally sensitive program aimed to enhance children's language and emergent literacy development, and increase parental involvement in their preschoolers' education. Over the six months of the program, the amount of parent–child reading more than doubled, from an average of 38 minutes of parent-child reading per week, to 89 minutes of parent–child reading per week. Year One teachers in the following year reported positively on the children's literacy readiness, compared to that of previous intakes. The program is described in the paper.

British Journal of Social Work, 2010

Journal of Learning Disabilities, 2007

Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can... more Researchers have hypothesized four levels of instructional dialogue and claimed that teachers can improve children's language development by incorporating these dialogue levels in their classrooms. It has also been hypothesized that enhancing children's early language development enhances children's later reading development. This quasi-experimental research study investigated both of these hypotheses using a collaborative service delivery model for Grade 1 children with language difficulties from a socially and economically disadvantaged urban community in Australia. Comparing the end-of-year reading achievement scores for the 57 children who received the language intervention with those of the 59 children in the comparison group, the findings from this research are supportive of both hypotheses. The interrelationships between learning difficulties, reading difficulties, and language difficulties are discussed along with children's development in vocabulary, use of ...

Infant and Child Development, 2001

Preventing Crime and Violence, 2016

In this chapter, we argue that to achieve sustained reductions in crime, violence or injuries on ... more In this chapter, we argue that to achieve sustained reductions in crime, violence or injuries on a large scale, it is necessary to transform prevention delivery systems so that they conform in their practices, on a continuing basis, with scientific evidence. We explain and defend our proposition, drawing on examples and case studies from our own research and that of others. Although we highlight two very successful innovations (random breath testing in Australia and the Evidence Based Prevention and Intervention Support Center (EPISCenter) in Pennsylvania), we take the view that failures are as instructive as successes, and include some brief examples of the former in our discussion. We also touch upon some of the lessons about Type 2 translation from crime prevention initiatives that have been designed and implemented on the basis of contrasting theoretical models and empirical methods, including criminal justice approaches, situational initiatives, and community-based developmental interventions.