This meta-analysis examined the relationship between prenatal maternal stress and/or anxiety and the outcomes of children aged 3 months to 9 years. Of the 8754 studies published before June 2021 that were synthesized, 17 conducted in Western countries were included in the meta-analysis (N[subscript total] = 23,307; M[subscript males] 54%;…

This meta-analysis synthesizes research on media use in early childhood (0-6 years), word-learning, and vocabulary size. Multi-level analyses included 266 effect sizes from 63 studies (N[subscript total] = 11,413) published between 1988-2022. Among samples with information about race/ethnicity (51%) and sex/gender (73%), most were majority…

Previous work suggests that key factors for replicability, a necessary feature for theory building, include statistical power and appropriate research planning. These factors are examined by analyzing a collection of 12 standardized meta-analyses on language development between birth and 5 years. With a median effect size of Cohen's d = 0.45 and…

This meta-analytic review of 42 studies covering 8,009 participants (ages 4-20) examines the relation of moral emotion attributions to prosocial and antisocial behavior. A significant association is found between moral emotion attributions and prosocial and antisocial behaviors ("d" = 0.26, 95% CI [0.15, 0.38]; "d" = 0.39, 95%…

This article examines associations between observed quality in preschool center classrooms for approximately 6,250 three- to five-year-olds and their school readiness skills at kindergarten entry. Secondary analyses were conducted using data from four large-scale studies to estimate the effects of preschool center quality and interactions between…

This meta-analytic review of 148 studies on child and adolescent direct and indirect aggression examined the magnitude of gender differences, intercorrelations between forms, and associations with maladjustment. Results confirmed prior findings of gender differences (favoring boys) in direct aggression and trivial gender differences in indirect…

Numerous studies show that children's language ability is related to false-belief understanding. However, there is considerable variation in the size of the correlation reported. Using data from 104 studies (N=8,891), this meta-analysis determines the strength of the relation in children under age 7 and examines moderators that may account for the…

Home visiting programs for families with young children have been in effect for many years; however, this is the first comprehensive meta-analytic effort to quantify the usefulness of home visits as a strategy for helping families across a range of outcomes. Sixty home visiting programs contributed data to analysis within 5 child and 5 parent…

Shares three ideas concerning how to evaluate the practical importance of developmental findings to make them more useful to policymakers: (1) statistical significance tests need to be accompanied by effect size estimates; (2) meta-analyses are helping in using all existing data when examining issues involved in policy debates; and (3) researchers…

Maintains that it is important to distinguish theory testing from effect-size evaluation when considering the impact of mothering on attachment security. Contends that it is possible that the De Wolff and van IJzendoorn meta-analysis both over- and underestimates mothering effects, as would be the case if infants varied in their susceptibility to…