Private and public investments in early childhood education have expanded significantly in recent years. Despite this heightened investment, we have little empirical evidence on whether children today enter school with different skills than they did in the late nineties. Using two large, nationally representative data sets, this article documents…

Parents' involvement in early intervention (EI) services fosters positive developmental trajectories in young children. Although EI research on parenting skills has been abundant, fewer data are available on parents' knowledge of normative child development. Sixty-seven mothers of children participating in a Midwestern city's EI program completed…

Racial disparities in child development in the United States are significant, with a particularly pronounced disadvantage among Black children. This report focuses on the development of children of Black immigrants, comparing against the outcomes for their peers in native-born and other immigrant families. The report also compares children in the…

There is a virtual consensus regarding the types of language processes, interactions, and material supports that are central for young children to become proficient readers and writers (Shanahan et al., 2008). In this study, we examine these supports in both home and school contexts during children's critical transitional kindergarten year.…

The relation of social and linguistic input measures to early vocabulary development was examined in 30 low-income African American mother-infant pairs. Observations were conducted when the child was 0 years, 1 month (0;1), 0;4, 0;8, 1;0, 1;6, and 2;0. Maternal input was coded for word types and tokens, contingent responsiveness, and…

Data from the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation study were used to examine the extent to which several factors mediate between- and within-ethnic-group differences in parenting beliefs and behaviors, and children's early cognitive development (analysis sample of 1198 families). The findings indicate that Hispanic-, European-, and…

This study examined the associations of exposure to early childhood education (ECE) services upon 2.5-year-old children's task persistence and enthusiasm and their mothers' authoritative and authoritarian behavior and support stimulation. Families participated in the Infant Health and Development Program, an eight-site randomized comprehensive ECE…

Study examined the cross-racial comparability of maternal quality of assistance and supportive presence coded from a video protocol using data from the Infant Health and Development Program for low birth weight, premature 30-month-olds and their mothers. Comparisons across groups indicated similar variances and correlation between child and…

The current study examines the social and behavioral development of school-age children with different histories of overweight onset. Eight thousand children from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Cohort (ECLS-K) participated. Three groups of children were identified for analysis: (1) those who were persistently overweight from…

Children who experience multiple transitions in family structure may face worse developmental outcomes than children raised in stable, two-parent families, and perhaps even worse than children raised in stable, single-parent families--a point denoted in much prior research. Multiple transitions and negative child outcomes, however, may be…

This study examined how family structure affected children's delinquency and math test scores, parenting practices as a mediator, and racial differences in these effects. Findings indicated that single parenthood related to reduced well-being among European American children, but not African American children. Cohabitation related to greater…

The purpose of this study was to determine whether there is a difference in opinion between early childhood professionals and low income parents of young children as to what the goals of early childhood programs should be. Three hundred forty parents in local Head Start centers were asked to list goals for their preschool children, and a…

Using diverse representative sources, child developmental outcomes (e.g., delinquency and achievement) are studied in black, Hispanic, Asian, and white ethnic groups. Covariance matrices computed for these ethnic groups and compared by a LISREL goodness-of-fit test indicate the similarity of developmental processes for different ethnic and racial…

This research examined 2 strategies for encouraging children's narratives. Twenty-five European American and 31 African American children from low-income backgrounds (M age = 4.76) participated. Children were assigned randomly to either high or low elaborative narrative style conditions and to either a draw-and-tell or tell-only reporting…

The fifth in a series of reports presenting analyses and discussions of data on height, weight, and 28 other body measurements taken from a probability sample of noninstitutionalized children in the United States aged 6-11 years, this document compares the growth patterns of white and Negro children for 20 body measurements. Emphasis is placed on…