Background: Many South African learners seem unprepared for formal education, and a need for intervention during early childhood has been identified. Aim: The present study explored the effect of infant exposure to an early childhood development programme aimed at the sensory developmental stage of the infant's brain. Setting: Participants were…

The present research explores the role of inhibitory control (IC) in young preschoolers' pretense ability using an ego depletion paradigm. In Experiment 1 (N = 56), children's pretense ability was assessed either before or after participating in conflict IC or control tasks, and in Experiment 2 (N = 36), pretense ability was measured after…

Introduction: Although recent research has focused on the effects of maternal eating disorders (EDs) on children, little is known about the effect of maternal EDs on neurobiological outcomes in newborns and infants. This study is the first to investigate neurobehavioural regulation and cognitive development in newborns and infants of mothers with…

The present study examines how attending the German model project "Kindergarten of the Future in Bavaria" (KiDZ), which provided 138 children (aged 3 to 6) with traditional preschool stimulation combined with cognitive and domain-specific stimulation, is associated with children's competencies in mathematics over time to age 12 compared…

Twenty-seven boys and eight girls with ASD and thirty-five controls matched for gender, age and total score intelligence were studied to ascertain whether boys and girls with ASD display stronger reactive aggression than boys and girls without ASD. Participants performed a computerized version of the Pulkkinen aggression machine that examines the…

Two studies investigated young 2- and 3-year-old Turkish children's developing understanding of normativity and freedom to act in games. As expected, children, especially 3-year-olds, protested more when there was a norm violation than when there was none. Surprisingly, however, no decrease in normative protest was observed even when the actor…

Human adults will sometimes help without being asked to help, including in situations in which the helpee is oblivious to the problem and thus provides no communicative or behavioral cues that intervention is necessary. Some theoretical models argue that these acts of "proactive helping" are an important and possibly human-specific form of…

Young children who listen to music regularly demonstrate better development than those who do not. As children grow, their social, cognitive and physical skills can be enhanced by their relationship with music. The music of Mozart was introduced into the children's environment as a sensory background for the standard curriculum. The purpose of…

Background: Preterm infants are at high risk for adverse neurodevelopmental and behavioral outcomes. Family Nurture Intervention (FNI) in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) is designed to counteract adverse effects of separation of mothers and their preterm infants. Here, we evaluate effects of FNI on neurobehavioral outcomes. Methods: Data…

Research Findings: This study aims to evaluate the efficacy of linguistic training based on the use of the Drežancic method in educational settings. It is hypothesized that characteristics of this method, based on the typical stages of linguistic and cognitive development, could influence both language competence and executive function (EF). A…

The effects of high- versus low-quality child care during 2 developmental periods (infant-toddlerhood and preschool) were examined using data from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care. Propensity score matching was used to account for differences in families who used different combinations of child…

Existing literature shows promising effects of physical activity on children's cognitive outcomes. This study assessed via a randomized, controlled design whether additional curricular physical activity during the school day resulted in gains for children's fluid intelligence and standardized achievement outcomes. Participants were children…

Use of multivariate analysis (e.g., multivariate analysis of variance) is common when normally distributed outcomes are collected in intervention research. However, when mixed responses--a set of normal and binary outcomes--are collected, standard multivariate analyses are no longer suitable. While mixed responses are often obtained in…

Using data ("n" = 3,790 with 2,119 in the 3-year-old cohort and 1,671 in the 4-year-old cohort) from 353 Head Start centers in the Head Start Impact Study, the only large-scale randomized experiment in Head Start history, this article examined the impact of Head Start on children's cognitive and parent-reported social-behavioral outcomes…

The current study evaluated the initial efficacy of three intervention programs aimed at improving school readiness in preschool children with externalizing behavior problems (EBP). Participants for this study included 45 preschool children (76% boys; M[subscript age] = 5.16 years; 84% Hispanic/Latino background) with at-risk or clinically…