Immordino-Yang and Gotlieb provide an elegant and helpful framework that integrates neuroscientific and education research on social affective development in their article, "Embodied Brains, Social Minds, Cultural Meaning: Integrating Neuroscientific and Educational Research on Social-Affective Development." Based on previous research,…

Though there is extensive research on the health outcomes of individuals who have experienced adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), society at large has not embraced this ground-breaking research and many still believe that the use of harsh punishment for students provides the same intended result as a discipline approach that teaches coping…

The promotion of social, emotional, and academic learning is not a shifting educational fad; it is the substance of education itself. It is not a distraction from the "real work" of math and English instruction; it is how instruction can succeed. And it is not another reason for political polarization. It brings together a traditionally…

Suor et al. (2017) present a compelling new evolutionary framework that offers an alternative interpretation of the well-established findings of cognitive deficits in children raised in harsh early environments. They argue that such findings do not convey a complete picture of those children's cognitive development, because children's cognition…

We greatly appreciate the astute comments on Lillard et al. (2013) and the opportunity to reply. Here we point out the importance of keeping conceptual distinctions clear regarding play, pretend play, and exploration. We also discuss methodological issues with play research. We end with speculation that if pretend play did not emerge because it…

Lillard et al. (2013) concluded that pretend play is not causally related to child outcomes and charged that the field is subject to a "play ethos", whereby research is tainted by a bias to find positive effects of play on child development. In this commentary, we embrace their call for a more solidly scientific approach to questions in this…

In 2004, McMurray and Aslin edited for "Infancy" a special section on eye tracking. The articles in that special issue revealed the enormous promise of automatic eye tracking with young infants and demonstrated that eye-tracking procedures can provide significant insight into the emergence of cognitive, social, and emotional processing in infancy.…

A review of education reform policies reveals a shift from an input guarantee approach aimed at providing funds to level the playing field for all students to an output guarantee approach based on the expectation of achieving standardized results regardless of inputs. The shift reflects a belief that where a child starts his or her cognitive,…

Research suggests that self-control or self-regulation may play a role in the connections among spirituality, health, well-being, and social behavior. Within the framework of social-cognitive developmental theory, we explore the question of how do children and adolescents learn to think of themselves as gendered and spiritual beings within the…

In his testimony before the Joint Economic Committee of the United States Congress, the author discusses what he considers to be the underlying question concerning issues of early childhood education: How to invest in preschool programs so that they have a reasonable chance of being a success. The testimony takes the form of a series of questions…

Joe L. Frost is Parker Centennial Professor Emeritus at the University of Texas, Austin, and one of America's leading experts on play and playgrounds. In addition to having taught child development and early childhood education at Texas and several other universities, he has written or edited fifteen university-level textbooks and more than one…

Briefly highlights the artificial dualism between the affective and cognitive areas of human functioning in terms of history, physiology, and psychology. Previews topics of current research and theory in the area of social/emotional development. (DST)

Outlines how levels of the interpretation of reality and categories of a naive theory of action that constitute these levels are differentiated and coordinated in a specific developmental sequence. Subsumed within this theoretical framework are the distinction between action on physical objects and social interaction and the distinction between…

Presents a model of the development of desociocentering, decentering relative to the social group, which is based on Piagetian research and theory and Wernerian concepts. (Author/SS)

Briefly discusses similarities and differences between social and physical knowledge. Argues that the study of social cognition cannot be derived from, nor reduced to, the study of physical cognition, and that the social origins of knowledge need to be emphasized more in contemporary developmental theory. (Author/SS)