What do children do when they do not want to obey but cannot afford to disobey? Might they, like adults, feign misunderstanding and seek out loopholes? Across four studies (N = 723; 44% female; USA; majority White; data collected 2020-2023), we find that loophole behavior emerges around ages 5 to 6 (Study 1, 3-18 years), that children think…

This study explored differences in children's information seeking in the two exploration tasks aligned with proposed curiosity frameworks. One task provided an open-ended unlimited information seeking design assessing the frequency of exploration attempts across similar options; the second was a constrained information seeking design with limits…

Autistic children's play has routinely been determined to deviate from accepted trajectories and patterns and is consistently interpreted as a deficit requiring remediation. An extensive review of the literature on functional play in autistic children led to the identification of 10 articles comparing autistic and typically developing children's…

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of differential reinforcement of other behavior (DRO) on reducing unsafe playground behavior of young children at school and subsequently, if necessary, the additive effects of a brief time-out. The DRO procedure was effective in eliminating unsafe behavior for one of four participants. The…

Children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder are at high risk of being bullied, but research on teaching children with autism self-protection skills for bullying situations is scant. We taught five children self-protection skills for two types of bullying (threats and unkind remarks) and consecutive bullying occurrences. We first evaluated…

Research on educational television has overwhelmingly investigated the impact of viewing on children's knowledge acquisition. However, this content might influence other important outcomes, such as children's interest in learning about new topics. To investigate this possibility, we invited parents of 3- to 8-year-old children (N = 83) to answer…

The author looks at play-based learning as a concept that supports the holistic development of children, defining such learning as a continuum of a child-directed, collaborative, and adult-directed play and discussing the role of adults on this continuum. King introduces into the discussion the theory of the play cycle and reviews tensions in…

Emotional intelligence and drama-based intervention open up an innovative field in education. The current study describes the effectiveness of an innovative project based on the development of emotional intelligence through dramatization in Early Childhood Education. A total of 82 children range from 4 to 5 years old were divided into two groups:…

Purpose: Autistic children are reported to display higher levels of externalizing and internalizing behaviors than neurotypical children, and their parents report more stress than parents of neurotypical children. It is unclear whether child behavior difficulties contribute to increased parenting stress, whether parenting stress contributes to…

Cheating emerges early in development and has significant moral development implications. This research investigated whether cheating in 5- to 6-year-olds reflects strategic decision-making or impulsivity. Through four preregistered studies, we systematically manipulated adult presence and observability across multiple conditions using a…

Children with neurodevelopmental disorders are likely to experience cooccurring vision disabilities (Simmons et al., 2009), and, as such, may require prescription eyeglasses. However, some individuals with neurodevelopmental disorders may not, initially, tolerate wearing their prescription eyeglasses and may require intervention to do so. The…

Pedagogy is seen as a "double-edged sword": it efficiently conveys information but may constrain the exploration of the causal structure of objects, suggesting that pedagogy and exploration are mutually exclusive learning processes. However, research on children's active involvement in concept acquisition implies that pedagogical signals…

Reach-to-grasp behavior is a key developmental milestone in infants, involving coordinated actions such as arm transport, hand pre-shaping, and hand opening and closing. Vision guides the development of these skills, and delays in visual input can impact infants with early visual impairments. However, the effects of a congenital visual impairment…

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;…

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…