Pre-school education has been greatly expanded in the United Kingdom in the last two decades and further expansion is planned. Its provision allows parents to take up employment thus increasing family incomes and it is expected to narrow the gap between socially disadvantaged children and their peers. The latter is important as studies have shown…

Background: Building on reports that parental maltreatment and neglect adversely affect young children's executive function (EF), this longitudinal study examined whether exposure to a more common risk factor, mothers' depressive symptoms, predicted individual differences in EF at school-age. Methods: We followed up at age 6 a socially diverse…

Speech and language difficulties can be indicative of other cognitive, social and developmental problems. Tools used in the UK have not (1) targeted two-year-old children, (2) included both parents' reports and independent observations, and (3) simultaneously evaluated expression, understanding and speech. This cross-sectional study of two…