Potentially serving as the primary national literacy initiative, the Reading Seed Programme (RSP) by PUSTAKA Negeri Sarawak aims to enculturate a reading culture from an early age. For instance, RSP was invented to promote reading culture by having the pregnant mother read to their infant until the child was three years old. The process is vital…

Purpose: Infants rapidly acquire the sound patterns that characterize their native language. Knowledge of native language phonological cues facilitates learning new words that are consistent with these patterns. However, little is known about how newly acquired phonological knowledge--regularities that children are in the process of…

Despite a robust literature examining the association between sleep problems and cognitive abilities in childhood, little is known about this association in toddlerhood, a period of rapid cognitive development. The present study examined the association between various sleep problems, using actigraphy, and performance on a standardized test of…

Purpose: This study investigated vocabulary growth from 18 to 24 months of age in young children with repaired cleft palate (CP), children with otitis media, and typically developing (TD) children. In addition, the contributions of factors such as hearing level, middle ear status, size of consonant inventory, maternal education level, and gender…

This article investigates the early emergence of reason-giving. Toddlers are sensitive to disagreements, and they can track several kinds of informational access, such as visual perception. We investigated whether young children use these skills (a) when assessing whether providing reasons is needed and (b) when selecting appropriate behaviors to…

Recent modeling work shows that patterns of shared perceptual features relate to the group-level order of acquisition of early-learned words (Peters & Borovsky, 2019). Here we present results for two eye-tracked word recognition studies showing patterns of shared perceptual features likewise influence processing of known and novel…

Background: Indirect speech and language therapy, such as parent-implemented intervention, has been shown to be an effective approach for young children with speech and language disorders. However, relatively few studies have compared outcomes of parent-directed therapy with child-directed intervention, that is, individual therapy of a child…

Undertaking infant-toddler practicum during initial teacher education is critical to ensuring preservice teachers (PSTs) are well prepared for their future role as early childhood teachers. PSTs, however, can face challenges in infant-toddler practicum given the demands of this unique teaching and learning context. A knowledgeable, experienced…

Young children's communication is dependent upon caregivers' responsiveness to their behaviors; however, little is known about the responsiveness of toddler teachers to children in their classrooms. To increase teachers' responsiveness to children's behavior, a peer-coaching model was implemented in three Early Head Start classrooms. The…

Despite findings that developmental timing of maltreatment is a critical factor in predicting subsequent outcomes, children's developmental stage is understudied in maltreatment research. Moreover, childhood maltreatment is associated with the development of maladaptive peer relationships and psychopathology, with social cognition identified as a…

Parenting is a key factor for the development of children with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Therefore, early intervention programs should target parenting behaviors to improve children's developmental outcomes. The present study analyzed the effect of parental behaviors and other family factors on the cognitive and linguistic…

Adverse experiences superseding a child's capacity to sustain regulation of emotion and adaptive function are theorized to constitute "toxic stressors" when they induce a deleterious biological response within an individual. We ascertained presumptive parameters of toxic stress among 164 low-income infants and toddlers (ages 4-48 months)…

Since the enactment of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975 (EHA), Public Law (P.L.) 94-142 and its successor statute, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, or the Act), the Secretaries of the U.S. Department of Education and their predecessors, the Commissioners of Education at the U.S. Department of Health,…

Although there has been growing interest in utilizing robots for intervention in autism spectrum disorder (ASD), there have been very few controlled trials to assess the actual impacts of such systems on social communication vulnerabilities. This study reports a randomized controlled trial to investigate a robot-mediated response to joint…

Despite advances in evidence-based treatment for autism spectrum disorder (ASD), disparities in service access remain a serious concern. Current treatment models may not be feasible for families who live in remote geographical regions or have limited resources. To address this, studies have begun to explore parent-implemented interventions via an…