While there is considerable evidence that children's early ability to understand others' mental states, called "theory of mind," is shaped by family experiences, it remains unclear whether children's social interactions at school influence theory of mind (ToM) beyond early childhood. We tested whether the mean level…

It is theoretically plausible that social anxiety (SA) and social relationships (SR) can influence each other. However, the available empirical evidence is inconsistent, leading to substantial uncertainty regarding the cross-lagged relations between SA and SR. This meta-analysis systematically integrates data from 107 longitudinal studies,…

The goals of this study were to investigate (a) the dyadic relations of mothers' and children's perceptions of children's anxiety symptoms across development, (b) whether maternal perceptions of children's anxiety serve as a mediator of the association between maternal anxiety and child anxiety, and (c) whether sensitive/structured parenting…

Creating objects can increase our evaluation of them, even when we compare them to physically identical copies (IKEA effect). Here we evaluate the influence of collaboration on the IKEA effect in two societies--the United Kingdom and India. One hundred twenty-eight 5-to-6-year-old children (48% female, 50% British middle class, 50% Indian middle…

We leveraged nationally representative data from the Panel study of Income Dynamics-Child Development Supplement (N = 3,562) and the Early Childhood Longitudinal study (N = 18,174), to chart the development of working memory, indexed via verbal forward and backward digit span task performance, from 3 to 19 years of age. Results revealed nonlinear…

Dysregulation of biological stress response, as measured by cortisol output, has been a primary candidate mechanism for how social experiences become biologically embedded. Cortisol is the primary output of the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis. Cortisol levels vary systematically across the day and change in response to both sudden, acute…

Data from 83,423 parent reports of temperament (surgency, negative affectivity, and regulatory capacity) in infants, toddlers, and children from 341 samples gathered in 59 countries were used to investigate the relations among culture, gender, and temperament. Between-nation differences in temperament were larger than those obtained in similar…

A focal goal of development science in recent years has been to document and understand the psychological processes that underlie inequality toward the goal of promoting equity and justice (e.g., Killen, Rutland, & Yip, 2016). This timely special section on economic inequality broadens the empirical conversation, which has centered mostly on…

A growing body of literature shows that adherence to some aspects of Western masculinity norms, including the suppression of emotional vulnerability, avoidance of seeking support from others, and exaggerated physical toughness, is associated with poorer psychological and social outcomes. While existing research suggests that parental gender…

There is little research to date on the academic implications of teaching twins in the same or different classroom. Consequently, it is not clear whether twin classroom separation is associated with positive or negative educational outcomes. As a result, parents and teachers have insufficient evidence to make a well-informed decision when twins…

The transaction of children's core language skill and their home learning environment was assessed across 5 waves from infancy (15 months) up to adolescence (11 years) in 1,751 low-socioeconomic status families. Child core language skill and the quality of the home learning environment were each stable across waves, and the two covaried at each…

The reactivity-regulation model suggests that the origins and maintenance of shyness results from relatively high levels of reactivity in combination with relatively low levels of regulation. Although this model has received some empirical support, there are still issues regarding directionality of the relations among variables and a dearth of…

Computer vision algorithms have made tremendous advances in recent years. We now have algorithms that can detect and recognize objects, faces, and even facial actions in still images and video sequences. This is wonderful news for researchers that need to code facial articulations in large data sets of images and videos, because this task is time…

Little is known about how developmental experiences spanning early childhood through adolescence prepare children and youth to engage with society, and even less so for ethnically diverse Black children and youth. Building from work linking positive youth development (PYD) to civic engagement, this study examined how socialization trajectories…

We tested empirically a theoretical model of early origins of conscientiousness proposed by Eisenberg, Duckworth, Spinrad, and Valiente (2014). The model posited a developmental interplay between children's early effortful control (EC) and internalized or committed compliance with parents as leading to future conscientiousness. We followed a…