Being teased about one's physical appearance in childhood has been found to have a strong impact on the way in which adolescent and adult women perceive their bodies. Teasing is also strongly related to self-esteem in children. However, little is known about the impact of teasing on the development of body image in childhood. Through a…

This article compares patterns of television use between African American and Latino child care providers in low-income households that are caring for children under the age of 5 years. Everyday experiences such as television viewing may impede or support healthy child development. Because both poverty and minority status put children at risk for…

In the current context of accountability, analysis of early intervention program costs can help decision makers allocate resources. This paper describes a cost analysis approach, known as the ingredient method, and demonstrates its applicability for evaluating the costs of a universal home visiting program designed to reduce child abuse and…

Social skill development is one of the primary areas of intervention for young children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). The purpose of this article was to conduct a retrospective review of social skills intervention research for preschool children with ASD. A review of 17 single-subject design studies from twelve journals (1999-2006) was…

Purpose: The primary objectives of this study were to determine the prevalence of late language emergence (LLE) and to investigate the predictive status of maternal, family, and child variables. Method: This is a prospective cohort study of 1,766 epidemiologically ascertained 24-month-old singleton children. The framework was an ecological model…

The article reports results from a Human Early Learning Partnership initiative that aims to address limitations within the literature concerning neighborhood effects on child development. Problems include the tendency for studies to (a) rely on small samples of children, (b) focus on high-risk populations, (c) define neighborhood by Census…

Infants placed in foster care are at high risk for emotional and behavioral problems. Assessment of their mental health must account for their often-adverse life experiences prior to placement and the involvement of multiple systems that shape their lives in lieu of parents' authority. This article presents practice guidelines for infant mental…

Caring is the core value that empowers families and early childhood professionals. This article articulates the meaning and power of caring in the lives of children and families. It also explores family, professional, and community strategies for creating caring and nurturing children and families. In particular, insights that show that caring is…

This article features the Project of Excellence, a program that was designed to engage families in an interactive community-based school literacy program. The authors discuss how they created the Project of Excellence. Although the goal of the Project was to improve the reading skills of young children, the focus of the Project was directed toward…

The claim that Hallowe'en has been eliminated from English primary schools is tested through empirical research in south-east England. The reasons given by teachers for their inclusion or non-inclusion of the subject are then explored. Finally, questions are raised about the implications of the findings for children's ongoing personal development,…

The first step in documenting children's progress toward important goals, such as developing strong oral language and early literacy skills, requires measurable outcomes. Measurable outcomes contribute to teachers' understanding of whether the gains they observe in children are meaningful by adding quantitative evaluation of a child's progress…

Communities in the UK are seeing a sustained shift in the balance of care of babies and the youngest children from families to nurseries, with a particular emphasis being placed on early learning. Yet a basic question of whether nurseries should be modelled on the intimacy and spontaneity of family interactions or the more professional and planned…

Young children's naive beliefs about physics are commonly studied as isolated pieces of knowledge. The current paper takes a different approach. It asks whether preschoolers interlink individual beliefs into larger configurations or Gestalts. Such Gestalts bring together knowledge such as how an object's mass relates to its sinking speed, how an…

The perceived spatiotemporal continuity of objects depends on the way they appear and disappear as they move in the spatial layout. This study investigated whether infants' predictive tracking of a briefly occluded object is sensitive to the manner by which the object disappears and reappears. Five-, 7-, and 9-month-old infants were shown a ball…

Three early transitions are significant for young children with disabilities and their families: (1) into Early Intervention, (2) between that program and preschool services, and (3) from Early Childhood Special Education into kindergarten special education. Each of these transitions is significant for families in terms of obtaining appropriate…