This study examined the development of executive function (EF) in a typically developing sample from middle childhood to adolescence using a range of tasks varying in affective significance. A total of 102 participants between 8 and 15 years of age completed the Iowa Gambling Task, the Color Word Stroop, a Delay Discounting task, and a Digit Span…

To speak of cognitive regulation versus emotion regulation may be misleading. However, some forms of regulation are carried out by executive processes, subject to voluntary control, while others are carried out by "automatic" processes that are far more primitive. Both sets of processes are in constant interaction, and that interaction gives rise…

A longitudinal study of 31 babies in their twelfth through twenty-third weeks of age tested the Neo-Piagetian theory of a shift or spurt in infants' cognitive development at the age of 4 months. Results were consistent with this neo-Piagetian concept of stage change. (MDM)

Argues that dynamic systems approaches may provide an explanatory framework based on general scientific principles for developmental psychology, using principles of self-organization to explain how novel forms emerge without predetermination and become increasingly complex with development. Contends that self-organization provides a single…

Brain development is self-organizing in that the unique structure of each brain evolves in unpredictable ways through recursive modifications of synaptic networks. In this article, I review mechanisms of neural change in real time and over development, and I argue that change at each of these time scales embodies principles of self-organizing…

To resolve tension between general stages and conceptual specificity in neo-Piagetian theory, R. Case introduced the idea of central conceptual structures. To resolve difficulties of separating developmental level and conceptual diversity, this article reconceptualizes central conceptual structures as self-organizing systems that stabilize in…

By the age of 1 year toddlers demonstrate distinct coping habits for dealing with frustration. However, these habits may be open to change and reorganization at subsequent developmental junctures. We investigated change in coping habits at 18-20 months, a normative age for major advances in social cognition, focusing on the dynamic systems…

Investigates the relationship between early interactional patterns and later cognitive performance in 29 infant-mother pairs. Results indicate that cognitive milestones are relatively uniform in the first two years of life. Socio-emotional development showed a variety of profiles. (RJC)

Describes the personality development of a normal infant during the child's first year. Development is interpreted in terms of psychoanalytic, cognitive-developmental, and mother-infant systems perspectives. A working relationship among the theories is demonstrated through analysis of case material. (RJC)