Although it is well established that reading with young children supports early language and literacy development, few studies have focused on the importance of parental beliefs about reading with infants. The current study, which sheds light on parental beliefs had three main aims. The first was to examine practices of shared reading in infancy…

Infants and toddlers spend a substantial amount of their time in out-of-home care, and are thus being tended to not only by their mothers but also by their caregivers. It is therefore of considerable importance to study the effects of caregiver-infant compared to mother-infant interactions. To address this issue, first, various variables of…

In this study, we investigate the association between family environment and early childhood development among children aged 6-24 months in rural counties in China. To do this, we used cross-sectional data from a large scale survey, including 1809 child-caregiver dyads across 22 nationally designated poverty counties. We found that 53.95% of…

Although the social-emotional competence of preservice early childhood professionals (ECPs) has been associated with the quality of their interactions with young children, there is limited understanding of these associations during preservice training. Utilizing a sample of students with career goals in early childhood (N=473), we examined the…

This study investigated whether higher maternal psychological distress, lower provision of psychosocial stimulation and a negative appraisal of parenting experience were associated with lower cognitive, motor, social-emotional and adaptive behaviour development in children under 3 years of age in Kenya. A cross-sectional design was used, with 81…

The standard model of the role of early experience in human development assumes that children's environments in their first years of life are dominant influences on who they become as adults. The standard model favors interventions to improve children's long-term outcomes that start early in life and are intensive in time and attention from…

This study evaluated whether parenting and childcare experience across infancy and toddlerhood were associated with children's reading, math, and social-behavioural skills prior to kindergarten entry. Analyses also examined whether race or ethnicity moderated associations. A representative sample of Hispanic, Black, and White children from the…

Emotion regulation is essential to cognitive, social, and emotional development and difficulties with emotion regulation portend future socioemotional, academic, and behavioral difficulties. There is growing awareness that many developmental outcomes previously thought to begin their development in the postnatal period have their origins in the…

While factors influencing maternal emotional availability (EA) have been well investigated, little is known about the development of child EA. The present longitudinal study investigated the role of frontal brain asymmetry in young children with regard to child EA (child responsiveness and involvement) in mother-child interaction in a sample of 28…

Postnatal maternal depression is associated with poorer child emotional and behavioral functioning, but it is unclear whether this occurs following brief episodes or only with persistent depression. Little research has examined the relation between postnatal anxiety and child outcomes. The present study examined the role of postnatal major…

In recent years, a literature has emerged describing contributions fathers make to the development of very young children. Scholars suggest that active play may be a specific area of parenting in which fathers are primary and, further, that this type of play helps children experience intense emotions and learn to regulate them. However, this…

Research Findings: This study examined the transactional nature of harsh parenting and emotion regulation across toddlerhood, including the moderating role of teacher sensitivity in child care. Secondary data analyses were conducted with a subsample of families from the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation Project who participated in…

Infant development plays a foundational role in optimal child development and health. Some studies have demonstrated an association between maternal psychological distress and infant outcomes, although the main emphasis has been on postpartum depression and infant-maternal attachment. Prevention and early intervention strategies would benefit from…

Temperament works in combination with a child's environment to influence early socioemotional development. We examined whether maternal caregiving behavior at infant age 9 months moderated the relation between infant temperamental fear (9 months) and observations of children's social behavior with an unfamiliar peer at age 2 in a typically…

Taiwan has over the past three decades been experiencing demographic changes that may pose important concerns for children's quality of life. This study examines the relationships and potential pathways between family structure transitions and early childhood development. Our analysis is based on 19,499 children from the 2005 birth cohort who…