Theory and empirical work suggest inclusion preschool improves the school readiness of young children with special needs, but only 2 studies of the model have used rigorous designs that could identify causality. The present study examined the impacts of the Boston Public prekindergarten program-which combined proven language, literacy, and…

This is a report of an examination of gender differences in behavior problems and a prediction of their changes from 2.5 to 3.5 years from mothering qualities among 209 low-income Hispanic children. Externalizing behaviors declined over this time somewhat more for girls than for boys. Fewer externalizing behavior problems at age 3.5 were…

In a seminal study Simcock and Hayne (2002) showed that 3-year-olds were unable to use newly acquired words to describe a "magic" event experienced 6 or 12 months earlier. In the reference study the children's verbal recall was tested without props being present. Inspired by recent evidence, the original design was replicated, testing…

Few researchers have investigated the factors that influence children's tendency to indicate correctly when they do not know the answer to a question. In this study, 5- to 8-year-olds witnessed a staged event in their classroom and were subsequently interviewed about that event either the following day or after 5 months. Some of the questions were…

The size of an individual's phonological similarity effect for visually presented material is assumed to reflect his or her ability to recode, and by implication rehearse, information in verbal short-term memory. Many studies have shown that under these conditions, the size of this effect interacts with age, tending to be nonsignificant in…

The goals of this study were to investigate whether young children attending Head Start (N = 292; M[subscript age] = 4.3 years) selected peers based on their preschool competency and whether children's levels of preschool competency were influenced by their peers' levels of preschool competency. Children's peer interaction partners were…

It is well supported by behavioral and neuroimaging studies that typical language function is lateralized to the left hemisphere in the adult brain and this laterality is less well defined in children. The behavioral literature suggests there maybe be sex differences in language development, but this has not been examined systematically with…

Family processes and parenting practices help explain developmental differences between children in low- versus higher-income households. There are, however, few studies addressing the question of: what are the key family processes and parenting practices for promoting low-income children's growth? We address this question in the present study,…

Lying is a pervasive human behavior. Evidence to date suggests that from the age of 42 months onward, children become increasingly capable of telling lies in various social situations. However, there is limited experimental evidence regarding whether very young children will tell lies spontaneously. The present study investigated the emergence of…

We investigated links between persuasive behavior and theory of mind (ToM) understanding using a novel naturalistic peer persuasion task in which children were invited to convince an interactive puppet to eat raw broccoli or brush his teeth. Sixty-three 3- to 8-year-olds (M age = 6 years, 6 months) took part in the persuasion task and were also…

Visuomotor integration (VMI), or the ability to copy designs, and 2 measures of executive function were examined in a predominantly low-income, typically developing sample of children (n = 467, mean age 4.2 years) from 5 U.S. states. In regression models controlling for age and demographic variables, we tested the interaction between visuomotor…

Preschoolers, as a group, are highly attuned to causality, and this attunement is known to facilitate memory, learning, and problem solving. However, recent work reveals substantial individual variability in the strength of children's "causal stance," as demonstrated by their curiosity about and preference for new causal information. In…

Consequences of theory of mind (ToM) development for daily social lives of children are uncertain. Five to 13-year-olds (N = 195) with typical development, autism, or deafness (both native and late signers) took ToM tests and their teachers reported on their social skills for peer interaction (e.g., leadership, group entry). Groups differed in…

The present study investigated the contribution of morphological and cognate awareness to the development of English and French vocabulary knowledge among young minority and majority language children who were enrolled in a French immersion program. Participating children (n = 75) were assessed in English and French on measures of morphological…

Aging-related declines occur in many different domains of cognitive function during middle and late adulthood. However, whether a global dimension underlies individual differences in changes in different domains of cognition and whether global genetic influences on cognitive changes exist is less clear. We addressed these issues by applying…