This study examined how book features influence talk during shared book reading. We used data from a study in which parent-child dyads (n = 157; child's M[subscript age] = 43.99 months; 88 girls, 69 boys; 91.72% of parents self-reported as white) were randomly assigned to read two number books. The focus was comparison talk (i.e., talk in which…

This systematic review and meta-analysis considered evidence of guided play compared to direct instruction or free play to support children's learning and development. Interventions from 39 studies were reviewed (published 1977-2020); 17 were included in meta-analysis (N[subscript total] = 3893; M[subscript childage] = 1-8 years; M[subscript…

Gender bias exists in our language environment. We investigated personal name usage in two large corpora of language written for and by U.K. children aged 5-13. Study 1 found an overrepresentation of male names in children's books, largely attributable to male authors. In stories written by over 100,000 children, Study 2 found an overall male bias…

The biological world includes many negatively valenced activities, like predation, parasitism, and disease. Do children's books cover these activities? And how do parents discuss them with their children? In a content analysis of children's nature books (Study 1), we found that negatively valenced concepts were rarely depicted across genres and…

Because motivations for prosocial actions typically are unclear, sometimes even to actors but especially for observers, it is difficult to study prosocial motivation. This article reviews research that provides evidence regarding children's motives for prosocial behaviors. First, we present a heuristic model to classify motives on the dimension of…

Since Margaret Mead's field studies in the South Pacific a century ago, there has been the tacit understanding that as culture varies, so too must the socialization of children to become competent culture users and bearers. More recently, the work of anthropologists has been mined to find broader patterns that may be common to childhood across a…

This meta-analytic review of 42 studies covering 8,009 participants (ages 4-20) examines the relation of moral emotion attributions to prosocial and antisocial behavior. A significant association is found between moral emotion attributions and prosocial and antisocial behaviors ("d" = 0.26, 95% CI [0.15, 0.38]; "d" = 0.39, 95%…

An estimated 200 million children worldwide experience various forms of disability. This critical review extrapolates from existing literature in 2 distinct areas of scholarship: one on individuals with disabilities in disaster, and the other on children in disaster. The extant literature suggests that various factors may contribute to the…

Examines the relationship between class inclusion and age and indicates that class inclusion frequently appears to develop at a much later age than is suggested in Piaget's writings. (Author/MP)

Advances in the neurosciences have created exciting possibilities for interdisciplinary collaboration. The benefits of and barriers to collaboration with developmental psychology are discussed in this introduction to a special section of Child Development. (BN)

Factors influencing the psychological impact of menarche include age at time of first period, social factors, amount of preparation, and cultural factors. (Author/MP)

This paper provides a critical examination of the current status of metamemory. First, review of background influences and a critique of conceptualizations of metamemory are presented. Next, research methods are examined, and empirical results concerning the relationship between metamemory and memory are reviewed. Finally, several suggestions are…

The goals of this review are to: (1) provide a set of concepts to aid in the understanding of complex processes which occur during central nervous system (CNS) development; (2) illustrate how they contribute to our knowlege of adult brain anatomy; and (3) delineate how modifications of normal developmental processes may affect the structure and…

Recent research on the development of children's abilities to comprehend and produce metaphorical language is reviewed. It is argued that the ability to produce and comprehend metaphorical language emerges out of children's undifferentiated similarity notions and gradually develops into a capacity to encompass an increased variety of conceptual…

Bases for recent allegations of sex bias in Kohlberg's theory of moral development are discussed, and studies comparing the development of moral reasoning across the sexes are reviewed. A meta-analysis supported the conclusion that the overall pattern is one of nonsignificant sex differences in moral reasoning. (Author/RH)