"Research Methods for Studying Young Children" is a volume developed to bring together in one source research techniques that researchers can use to collect data in early childhood education. These studies can then contribute to the knowledge in early childhood education. To conduct valid and reliable studies, researchers need to be…

Purpose: The challenges of language assessment in bilinguals include a lack of assessment tools and bilingual speech-language pathology services. Additionally, the weighting of subtests in standardized tests has not been empirically explored to maximize sensitivity and specificity. Language exposure might also inform the decision to diagnose…

Purpose: This study considered the impact of spectral and temporal smearing on vowel and consonant discrimination in school-age children and adults with normal hearing (NH). The overall purpose of this work was to test the hypothesis that degraded spectral cues preferentially impact vowel discrimination, while reduced access to temporal cues…

Children's knowledge of referential dependency involved in the interpretation of reflexives has been investigated mainly from a purely syntactic perspective. However, syntax alone is insufficient to account for various kinds of referential dependencies, as many of them require discourse interpretations. To fill this gap, the present study…

Children living with the consequences of paediatric acquired brain injury (pABI) may experience persistent challenges that impact their social interactions, academic performance and community integration. Participating in activities is of paramount importance for the development of social and academic skills. The participants in this qualitative…

Purpose: Speech disfluencies are common in individuals who do not stutter, with estimates suggesting a typical rate of six per 100 words. Factors such as language ability, processing load, planning difficulty, and communication strategy influence disfluency. Recent work has indicated that bilinguals may produce more disfluencies than monolinguals,…

Purpose: Personal narrative production, or the ability to talk about past events that have been personally experienced, relies on a wide range of linguistic skills and is influenced by memory and socio-emotional traits. This study investigated the predictive role of memory mechanisms and socio-emotional functioning on personal narrative production…

Employment in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields will continue to grow in the coming years. Those entering the STEM workforce will be expected to demonstrate proficiency in areas such as literacy and problem solving, among other domains. Early access to STEM concepts such as coding may support skill development and…

Dynamic fluctuations in respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) were modelled throughout an emotionally challenging laboratory task, and direct associations between temporal variation in RSA responding and the deployment of specific behavioural emotion regulation (ER) strategies were assessed. Sixty-three 2- to 6-year-old children (47% girls;…

Cognitive control shows two main developmental trends: greater self-directedness (i.e., children need less external scaffolding) and greater proactiveness (i.e., children increasingly anticipate and prepare for upcoming cognitive demands). The present study examined potential links between these major developmental transitions. Specifically, it…

Previous research has demonstrated early-emerging gender associations with musical instruments. We investigated whether pitch, loudness and size affect gender-instrument associations in older (M[subscript age] = 9.37 years, N = 57) and younger (M[subscript age] = 7.73 years, N = 63) children (approximately even gender split, mostly North…

Parent-child conflict interactions teach children about problem-solving and social conventions. We examined whether parents' sensitivity and the justifications they use during conflict discussions with children have unique and cumulative effects on changes in children's externalizing behaviors over time. Participants included 190 mothers and their…

Children's picturebooks have long been understood as a powerful medium for exploring aspects of children's lives, experiences, and identities serving as mirrors which allow children to see themselves reflected, as windows through which they can gain insight into the experiences of others, and as sliding glass doors when children are connected to…

The broaden-and-build theory is a prominent framework in positive psychology that considers positive emotions as essential for people to flourish. The theory does not specify the origins of positive emotions during development, although experiences in the first years of life are considered influential for long-term adjustment and well-being. In…

Prioritizing what information to learn based on value is a critical developmental skill. Across two studies, value-based memory was assessed predominately in White children aged 6- to 7-years-old and 9- to 10-years-old using a nationwide sample collected between 2020 and 2023. Children learned cue-target associations worth varying point values.…