Recent years have seen a rise in the popularity of eye-tracking methods to evaluate infant and toddler interpretation of visual stimuli. The application of these methods makes it increasingly important to understand the development of infant sensitivity to the perceptual properties implicated in such methods. In light of recent studies that…

This investigation examined the existence of interconnectedness between developing linguistic subsystems. Spontaneous speech samples were collected from 31 typically-developing Greek-speaking toddlers across two age levels, at 28 and 36 months. Correlational analyses were performed synchronically and predictively, revealing significant positive…

During the second year of life, children acquire words and expand their receptive and expressive vocabularies at a rapid pace. At this age, toddlers' phonological abilities are also developing rapidly. The current study investigated the effect of phonological complexity of words on the order in which they are acquired, receptively and…

Infants are able to use the contexts in which familiar words appear to guide their inferences about the syntactic category of novel words (e.g. 'This is a' + 'dax' -> dax = object). The current study examined whether 18-month-old infants can rapidly adapt these expectations by tracking the distribution of syntactic structures in their input. In…

Children learn to perform actions on artifacts in their environments from infancy, but the ways caregivers support this learning during everyday interactions are relatively unexplored. This study investigated how naturalistic caregiver-child teaching interactions promoted conventional action learning in toddlers. Caregivers of 32 24- to…

Object exploration is considered a driver of motor, cognitive, and social development. However, little is known about how early childhood education and care settings facilitate object exploration. This study examined if children's exploration of objects during free play was facilitated by the use of particular spatial components (floor, tables,…

Early numeracy competencies are of great importance for children's competency development. Here, early digital intervention approaches offer the potential to support all children and their families. We investigated whether the provision of specific numeracy learning apps and parent information about children's numeracy development improves both,…

Supportive parent-child interactions are critical for facilitating typically developing children's language and social skill development. For children who are late-to-talk, parent-child interactions may be particularly important to address as a means of supporting growth in children's early language abilities. Target Word is one parent-implemented…

Feasible and accurate assessment tools developed for non-specialists are needed to scale community-based models of autism evaluation. The purpose of this study was to evaluate use of the Screening Tool for Autism in Toddlers and Young Children (STAT) when used by primary care practitioners (n = 10) across a statewide system of early diagnosis set…

The Reading Seed Programme (RSP), an in-house literacy program inaugurated by Sarawak's State Library (PUSTAKA Negeri Sarawak, Malaysia), has the potential to become the country's primary literacy initiative, particularly in terms of fostering a reading culture. The purpose of this paper is to empirically establish the reliability of survey…

Early intervention supports infants and toddlers with confirmed or suspected autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in achieving optimal outcomes, and caregiver-implemented NDBIs are recommended as a developmentally appropriate intervention approach for very young children and their families. Research highlights discrepancies between early…

There are a significant number of toddlers participating in early childcare (ECE) services in New Zealand. At the same time, there is a dearth of research examining these toddlers during their first ECE experiences. The extant literature has predominantly focused on adult-child relationships rather than toddlers' experiences with their peers. A…

Given the substantial increase in children attending center-based childcare over the past decades, the consequences of center-based childcare for children's development have gained more attention in developmental research. However, the relation between center-based childcare and children's neurocognitive development remains relatively…

Early identification of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) provides the best opportunity for children to receive evidence-based early intervention. Research indicates that accurate diagnosis can be made as early as the toddler period when an assessment is completed by experienced clinicians. Typical ASD evaluations involve an assessment of…

Internalising problems are common within Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD); early intervention to support those with emerging signs may be warranted. One promising signal lies in how individual differences in temperament are shaped by parenting. Our longitudinal study of infants with and without an older sibling with ASD investigated how parenting…