Childhood disadvantage is associated with psychological distress throughout the lifespan. Poor children are alleged to give up more often than their more privileged peers when facing challenges. Yet little research has examined the role of task persistence in poverty and mental health. We test whether poverty-related deficits in persistence…

Previous research debated whether and to which extent normative views and own resource distribution behavior in childhood are dissociated or aligned. The present study aims to advance this debate by examining the relation from two different methodological viewpoints within the same study. Here, 4-6-year-old children's (N = 91) normative views and…

Prior research has demonstrated that teacher-student relationships characterized by high levels of closeness and low levels of conflict are associated with higher levels of academic achievement among children. At the same time: (a) some research suggests that the quality of teacher-student relationships in part reflects the quality of early…

To provide a comprehensive view of the unique contexts shaping adolescent development in the U.S., we utilized latent class analysis (LCA) with indicators of risk and protection across multiple domains (family, peers, school, neighborhood) and examined how latent class membership predicted heavy episodic drinking, illicit substance use, and…

Studies from both high and low-middle income (LAMI) countries have documented how being reared in poverty is linked to compromised child development. Links between poverty and development are mediated by the timing and extent of exposure to both risk factors nested under poverty and to protective influences which can attenuate the impact of risk.…

Poverty is a well-established risk factor for behavior problems, yet our understanding of putative family mediators during early childhood (i.e., before age 5 years) is limited. The present study investigated whether the association between poverty and behavior problems during early childhood is mediated simultaneously by perceived parenting,…

Conditional cash transfer programs (CCTs) have shown mixed effects on child development outcomes in the context of poverty. Direct parenting support integrated with CCTs may improve the effectiveness of CCTs for children's development, and benefits could occur via improvements in parenting practices or the home environment. Here, we use data from…

We investigated cultural influences on young children's acquisition of social-cognitive concepts. A theory of mind (ToM) scale (Wellman & Liu, 2004) was given to 129 children (71 boys, 58 girls) ranging in age from 3 years 0 months to 7 years 10 months. The children were from three distinct cultural groups: (a) trash pickers…

Children's sense and reasoning about territory and land ownership may develop differently in contexts of poverty and where narratives of dispossession are a part of daily life and are of political and historical significance, as is the case in the Palestinian refugee context in Lebanon. In this study we looked at how 3- and 5-year-old refugee…

Throughout the developing world, adolescents living in rural poverty face multiple and inter-related adaptive challenges. Using longitudinal data from the Gansu Survey of Children and Families, we adopt an approach grounded in resilience theory to investigate the relationship between cumulative adversity and internalizing problems among 1,659…

Taiwan has over the past three decades been experiencing demographic changes that may pose important concerns for children's quality of life. This study examines the relationships and potential pathways between family structure transitions and early childhood development. Our analysis is based on 19,499 children from the 2005 birth cohort who…

This 30-year longitudinal study examined pathways from problematic childhood behavior patterns to future disadvantaged conditions for family environment and child rearing in adulthood. Participants were mothers (n = 328) and fathers (n = 222) with lower income backgrounds participating in the ongoing Concordia Longitudinal Risk Project. Structural…

One of the main reasons poverty is bad for children's development is because it reduces maternal responsiveness. This study addresses a heretofore unanswered question: why do low-income children experience diminished maternal responsiveness compared with their more affluent counterparts? In addition, we examine this question among a largely…

Immigration presents both challenges and opportunities that affect students' academic achievement. Over the course of five years, varying academic trajectories were identified for recent immigrant students from Central America, China, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Mexico. Latent class growth curve analysis revealed that although some students…

Poverty is known to influence parenting values, parenting stress, psychological adjustment, and social support according to North American research. The purpose of this study was to determine whether poverty might work in similar ways in a collectivistic Latin culture. The participants were primary caregivers in two distinct communities in the…