Over a decade ago, Bredekamp asserted (1996) that the field of early childhood education lacked a research base to document the effectiveness of approaches to producing highly skilled and effective early educators. The National Center for Research in Early Childhood Education's (NCRECE) Course and MyTeachingPartner (MTP) Coaching were developed to…

Associations between young children's developing theory of mind (ToM) and judgments of prototypical moral transgressions were examined 3 times across 1 year in 70 American middle class 2.5- to 4-year-olds. Separate path models controlling for cross-time stability in judgments, within-time associations, and children's age at Wave 1 indicated that…

From the moment infants are born, they seem to prefer orienting to social stimuli, over objects and non-social stimuli. This preference lasts throughout adulthood and is believed to play a crucial role in social-communicative development. By following up a group of infants at the age of 6, 8, and 12 months, this study explored the role of social…

Quantity and quality of caregiver input was examined longitudinally in a sample of 50 parent-child dyads to determine which aspects of input contribute most to children's vocabulary skill across early development. Measures of input gleaned from parent-child interactions at child ages 18, 30, and 42 months were examined in relation to children's…

This presentation examines child and adolescent social networking with an emphasis on how this unprecedented form of communication can be used to contribute to healthy growth and development. Most literature about child and adolescent relationships reflects yesterday's world, a time when face-to-face encounters were the only concern. Students saw…

Current literature regarding the prevalence of child abuse and neglect, resulting developmental impacts on children, and early intervention services for children and families involved in the child welfare system is summarized. While early intervention eligibility referrals are mandated for this population under the Child Abuse Prevention and…

The high prevalence and early onset of anxiety disorders have inspired innovative prevention efforts targeting young at-risk children. With parent-child prevention models showing success for older children and adolescents, the goal of this study was to evaluate a parent-child indicated preventive intervention for preschoolers with mild to moderate…

We report new clinical features of delayed motor development, hypotonia, and ataxia in two young children with mutations (R756H and D923N) in the "ATP1A3" gene. In adults, mutations in "ATP1A3" cause rapid-onset dystonia-Parkinsonism (RDP, DYT12) with abrupt onset of fixed dystonia. The parents and children were examined and videotaped, and…

Three- to 5-year-old (N = 61) religiously schooled preschoolers received theory-of-mind (ToM) tasks about the mental states of ordinary humans and agents with exceptional perceptual or mental capacities. Consistent with an anthropomorphism hypothesis, children beginning to appreciate limitations of human minds (e.g., ignorance) attributed those…

Pediatric NCCP may be characterized by recurrent pain accompanied by emotional distress and functional impairment. This paper reviews and critiques literature on pediatric noncardiac chest pain (NCCP) and introduces a theoretical conceptualization to guide future study of NCCP in children and adolescents. A developmentally informed biopsychosocial…

The current study tests if the type of children's daily main meal (slow versus fast food) mediates the association of socioeconomic status (SES) with cognitive ability and cognitive growth in childhood. A Scottish birth cohort (Growing Up in Scotland) was assessed at ages 3 (N = 4512) and 5 years (N = 3833) on cognitive ability (i.e. vocabulary…

The purpose of this study was to obtain an understanding of the unique experiences of families who have a young child at risk for or identified with an autism spectrum disorder and their experiences with early intervention. Thirty-nine parents of children with or at risk for an autism spectrum disorder receiving Part C services in a state in the…

Early intervention for children with behavioural difficulties can be effective in terms of outcomes for both the children and their families. Early intervention can save a child from long-term outcomes such as school failure, peer rejection and later offending. However, in terms of accurate assessment of young children's behavioural difficulties,…

The aim of this study was to examine the combined influences of infants' attention and use of social cues in the prediction of their language outcomes. This longitudinal study measured infants' visual attention on a distractibility task (11 months), joint attention (14 months), and language outcomes (word-object association, 14 months; MBCDI…

Despite reasonably high economic growth in recent years, many countries in the Central Eastern Europe/Commonwealth of Independent States (CEE/CIS) region struggle to achieve high national standards to guarantee basic rights for all their citizens. Families with young children are particularly vulnerable and are often unable to provide a stable and…