Executive functions (EFs) emerge in the first years of life and are essential for many areas of child development. However, intraindividual developmental trajectories of EF during toddlerhood and their associations with ongoing development of language skills remain poorly understood. The present three-wave study examined these trajectories and…

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies with adults provide evidence that functional brain networks, including the default mode network and frontoparietal network, underlie executive functioning (EF). However, given the challenges of using fMRI with infants and young children, little work has assessed the developmental trajectories of…

Childcare services are widely used by families and thereby exert an important influence on many young children. Yet, little research has examined whether childcare may impact the development of child executive functioning (EF), one of the pillars of cognitive development in early childhood. Furthermore, despite persisting hypotheses that childcare…

Purpose: To investigate the language environments experienced by preterm-born infants, this study compared the linguistic and interactive features of parent--infant conversations involving 2-year-old preterm- and term-born infants. The study also explored how mother-infant and father-infant conversations may be differentially affected by…

This study aimed to explore whether early developmental abilities are related to future executive function (EF) in children with motor delays. Fourteen children with motor delays (Mean age = 10.76, SD = 2.55) were included from a larger study. Object interaction and developmental outcomes (Bayley-III) were evaluated at baseline and 3, 6, and 12…

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relations among children's symbolic functioning at 15 months, joint attention at 24 months, expressive communication at 24 and 36 months, and executive functioning at 36 months. With the sample from rural areas in the United States collected by the Family Life Project (N = 1,008), a longitudinal data…

This research aims to address the contribution of the immediate contexts of the home in the development of regulatory skills, specifically executive functions and emotional regulation abilities in a Latin American context using direct behavioural measures. The sample consisted of 75 mother-infant dyads of 18-24 months belonging to homes and…

Aim: This article is the second part of a systematic review updates and broadens a previous systematic review (Frolek Clark & Schlabach, 2010) to examine the evidence for of interventions within the scope of occupational therapy practice to enhance cognitive and pre-academic development in young children with or without at-risk factors. This…

Executive function (EF) plays a foundational role in development. A brain-based model of EF development is probed for the experiences that strengthen EF in the dimensional change card sort task in which children sort cards by one rule and then are asked to switch to another. Three-year-olds perseverate on the first rule, failing the task, whereas…

For young children, sleep is essential for healthy development. Inadequate sleep can affect emotional, behavioural, cognitive, and health outcomes. Low family income and resources can put children at risk for poor sleep quality, impairing their subsequent cognitive abilities. The current study examined low socioeconomic status (SES) as a factor…

This study examines the extent to which iron deficiency in infancy contributes to adverse neurocognitive and educational outcomes in young adulthood directly and indirectly, through its influence on verbal cognition and attention problems in childhood. Young adults (N = 1,000, M age = 21.3 years, 52% female; of Spanish or indigenous descent) from…

Understanding the role of negative emotionality in the development of executive functioning (EF) and language skills can help identify developmental windows that may provide promising opportunities for intervention. In addition, because EF and language skills are, in part, genetically influenced, intergenerational transmission patterns are…

Nutrition plays an important role in the development of a child, particularly in low- and middle-income countries where malnutrition is often widespread. The relation between diet, hemoglobin, nutritional status, motor development, stimulation and mental development was examined in a cross-sectional sample of 1,079 children 12-18 months of age…

Several theories of executive function (EF) propose that EF development corresponds to children's ability to form representations and reflect on represented stimuli in the environment. However, research on early EF is primarily conducted with preschoolers, despite the fact that important developments in representation (e.g., language, gesture,…

Interventions to enhance cognitive and executive function performance are essential for the child's performance in current and future occupations. Occupational therapy practitioners are critical members of early intervention, education, and healthcare teams. Practitioners are distinctly qualified to address cognitive functioning within the context…