The authors investigated how children and adults evaluate the "niceness" of individuals who engage in resource distribution, with a focus on their sensitivity to the proportion of resources given. Across 3 experiments, subjects evaluated the niceness of a child who gave a quantity of pennies to another child. In Study 1 (N = 30), adults showed…

In this observational study, the concurrent relationships between the verbal and play responsiveness of 16 mothers and fathers and the object play skills of 16 children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) were investigated. First, the frequencies of children's play at four levels (i.e., exploratory, relational, functional, and symbolic) across…

Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) show differences in face processing abilities from early in development. To examine whether these differences reflect an atypical versus delayed developmental trajectory, neural responses to familiar and unfamiliar faces in twenty-four 18- to 47-month-old children with ASD were compared with…

This study examined influences on delinquency and recidivism using structural equation modeling. The sample comprised 199,204 individuals: 99,602 youth whose cases had been processed by the South Carolina Department of Juvenile Justice and a matched control group of 99,602 youth without juvenile records. Structural equation modeling for the…

Background: There is a noticeable publication gap in the speech-language pathology literature regarding the language abilities of children with common types of epilepsy. This paper reviews studies that suggest a high frequency of undetected language problems in this population, and it proposes the need for pragmatically based assessment of…

Prior research has demonstrated intersensory facilitation for perception of amodal properties of events such as tempo and rhythm in early development, supporting predictions of the Intersensory Redundancy Hypothesis (IRH). Specifically, infants discriminate amodal properties in bimodal, redundant stimulation but not in unimodal, nonredundant…

This study aims to examine the effects of Family Supported Preschool Education programs on the development of preschool children. By measuring the effects of family-supported preschool education on cognitive development, this study helps support alternative methods of making preschool education more widespread. The study uses the experimental…

Purpose: In this study, the authors aimed to determine how between-language interaction contributes to phonological acquisition in bilingual Spanish-English speaking children. Method: A total of 24 typically developing children, ages 3;0 (years;months) to 4;0, were included in this study: 8 bilingual Spanish-English speaking children, 8…

Reaching and grasping skills have been described to emerge from a dynamic interaction between intrinsic and extrinsic factors. The aims of the study were to investigate the effect of such intrinsic factors as age and Down syndrome on the development of reaching and grasping skills and on overall gross motor skill, and to test the influence of the…

Background: To help children with Down syndrome reach optimum levels of adaptive behaviour, caretakers need to know how and to what extent children with Down syndrome acquire adaptive skills. Method: The adaptive levels of motor, daily living, communicative and social behavioural skills were determined in a group of 984 Dutch children with Down…

Purpose: In this study, the authors aimed to examine the long-term effects of prenatal cocaine exposure (PCE) on the language development of 12-year-old children using a prospective design, controlling for confounding prenatal drug exposure and environmental factors. Method: Children who were exposed to cocaine in utero (PCE; "n" = 183)…

We examined growth trajectories of writing and the relation of children's socioeconomic status and language and/or speech impairment to the growth trajectories. First-grade children (N = 304) were assessed on their written composition in the fall, winter, and spring, and their vocabulary and literacy skills in the fall. Children's SES had a…

This work investigates the developmental aspects of the duration of point vowels in children with normal hearing compared with those with hearing aids and cochlear implants at 4 and 5 years of age. Younger children produced longer vowels than older children, and children with hearing loss (HL) produced longer and more variable vowels than their…

The current study prospectively examined trajectories of change in symptoms of irritability, hyperactivity, and social withdrawal, as well as predictors of such behaviors, for ages 9-18 years for youths with autism spectrum disorder and a comparison group with nonspectrum developmental delays. Children with more severe core features of autism had…

The initial cognitive ability to coordinate experience into a hierarchically organized, multi-episode narrative occurs in youth, beginning a narrative record of ego identity development that continues throughout the life span (Habermas and Bluck in "Psychological Bulletin" 126:748-769, 2000; Habermas and de Silveira in "Developmental Psychology"…