Early detection of autism spectrum condition is crucial for children to maximally benefit from early intervention. The study examined a machine learning model predicting the increased likelihood for autism from wellness records from 0 to 24 months. The study included 591,989 non-autistic and 12,846 autistic children. A gradient boosting model with…

An overarching framework in the field of developmental psychology highlights the close linkage of cognition with emotion; however, the extent to which this framework supports the relationship between executive functions and emotion understanding in young children remains unclear. Hence, we employ a longitudinal tracking study to investigate the…

In this study, maternal socialization goals in early childhood were linked to qualities of children's self in middle childhood, while also considering maternal education and child gender. Estonian mothers (N = 209; M[subscript age] = 33.6; 52.2% had university education) provided ratings of their socialization goals for children (52.2% girls;…

Purpose: Gesture delay in autistic infants and toddlers has been widely reported. The developmental trajectory of gesture production during early childhood is understudied. Thus, little is known about the possible changes of gesture production over time. The present study aimed to document the development of gesture production in autistic children…

Caregivers play an outsized role in shaping early life experiences and development, but we often lack mechanistic insight into "how" exactly caregiver behavior scaffolds the neurodevelopment of specific learning processes. Here, we capitalized on the fact that caregivers differ in how predictable their behavior is to ask if infants'…

Children who show elevated levels of indirect aggression (IA) from childhood to adolescence are at increased risks of experiencing detrimental outcomes. Some studies suggest that psychopathic traits could act as a predisposing vulnerability in the development of IA, but the contributions of all three dimensions of psychopathic traits in explaining…

Research Findings: The present study investigated the potential mediating role of maternal parenting in the intergenerational effects of maternal childhood traumatic experiences (CTEs) on prosocial behaviors of their offspring and examined whether the offspring's sensory processing sensitivity (SPS) moderates this association using a 1-year…

Training studies have shown the positive effects of play tutoring on children's social skills. This study investigates whether the theoretically suggested mechanism of change--social pretend play quality--explains the effect of play tutoring on social pretend play competence and social skills. Twenty-seven Swiss playgroups (N = 214 three- to…

Children's approaches to learning (AtL) are widely recognized as a critical predictor of educational outcomes, especially in early childhood. Nevertheless, there remains a dearth of understanding regarding the dimensionality of AtL, the reciprocal dynamics between AtL and learning outcomes, and how AtL operates in non-Western contexts. This paper…

This study aims to identify early childhood sociability trajectories and examine their longitudinal associations with behavior problems. Using a population-based data set presented by the Panel Study on Korean Children, sociability trajectories from age 2 to age 4 were identified by latent class growth analysis. Associations between sociability…

Purpose: Behavior and temperament (e.g., emotional reactivity, self-regulation) have been considered relevant to stuttering and its developmental course, but the direction of this relation is still unknown. Knowledge of behavior difficulties and temperament in childhood stuttering can improve screening and intervention. The current study examined…

The aim of our study is to describe the neuromotor development of preterm and low birth weight infants at 1 and 2 years of corrected age, and to examine the extent to which perinatal, neonatal, socio-demographic, and neuromotor development indices measured at the age of 1 are able to predict infants' development indices at the age of 2. Our sample…

Age-related developments in sleep during the preschool years are normative and consequential. Yet, very few studies have examined the antecedents of individual differences in such developments, and most have used parental reports of child sleep. This study aimed to investigate the roles of mutual responsiveness in mother-child interactions and…

Background: Dynamic, relational developmental systems-based models of development emphasize that developmentally-nurturant youth-adult relationships elicit in youth perceptions of being known and loved. Although such perceptions are foundations of positive youth development (PYD), such measures do not exist. Objective: We sought to create a…

At what ages are young people most open to political influence? We test the "formative years" model that underscores the importance of childhood experiences for political development against the "impressionable years" model that asserts the primacy of lessons learned during adolescence. To assess the relative merits of these…