PEDAL Hub Library

Neuropsychology is one field that holds promise in the construction of comprehensive, developmental models for the promotion of social competence and prevention of problem behavior. Neuropsychological models of behavior suggest that children’s neurological functioning affects the regulation of strong emotions, as well as performance in social, cognitive, and behavioral spheres. The current study examines the underlying neurocognitive conceptual theory of action of one social-emotional development program. Hypothesized was that inhibitory control and verbal fluency would mediate the relationship between program condition and teacher-reported externalizing and internalizing behavior problems. Participants were 318 regular education students enrolled in the second or third grade. A series of regression analyses provided empirical support for (a) the effectiveness of the PATHS Curriculum in promoting inhibitory control and verbal fluency and (b) a partial mediating role for inhibitory control in the relation between prevention condition and behavioral outcomes. Implications are that programs designed to promote social and emotional development should consider comprehensive models that attend to neurocognitive functioning and development. Lack of consideration of neurocognitive pathways to the promotion of social competence may ignore important mechanisms through which prevention affects youth outcomes. Furthermore, the findings suggest that developers of social-emotional preventions should design curricula to explicitly promote the developmental integration of executive functioning, verbal processing, and emotional awareness. Doing so may enhance prevention outcomes particularly if those preventions are implemented during a time of peak neurocognitive development

Research on the outcomes of Montessori education is scarce and results are inconsistent. One possible reason for the inconsistency is variations in Montessori implementation fidelity. To test whether outcomes vary according to implementation fidelity, we examined preschool children enrolled in high fidelity classic Montessori programs, lower fidelity Montessori programs that supplemented the program with conventional school activities, and, for comparison, conventional programs. Children were tested at the start and end of the school year on a range of social and academic skills. Although they performed no better in the fall, children in Classic Montessori programs, as compared with children in Supplemented Montessori and Conventional programs, showed significantly greater school-year gains on outcome measures of executive function, reading, math, vocabulary, and social problem-solving, suggesting that high fidelity Montessori implementation is associated with better outcomes than lower fidelity Montessori programs or conventional programs.

In this study, the authors examined the extent to which children’s self-regulation upon kindergarten entrance and classroom quality in kindergarten contributed to children’s adaptive classroom behavior. Children’s self-regulation was assessed using a direct assessment upon entrance into kindergarten. Classroom quality was measured on the basis of multiple classroom observations during the kindergarten year. Children’s adaptive classroom behavior in kindergarten was assessed through teacher report and classroom observations: Teachers rated children’s cognitive and behavioral self-control and work habits during the spring of the kindergarten year; observers rated children’s engagement and measured off-task behavior at 2-month intervals from November to May. Hierarchical linear models revealed that children’s self-regulation upon school entry in a direct assessment related to teachers’ report of behavioral self-control, cognitive self-control, and work habits in the spring of the kindergarten year. Classroom quality, particularly teachers’ effective classroom management, was linked to children’s greater behavioral and cognitive self-control, children’s higher behavioral engagement, and less time spent off-task in the classroom. Classroom quality did not moderate the relation between children’s self-regulation upon school entry and children’s adaptive classroom behaviors in kindergarten. The discussion considers the implications of classroom management for supporting children’s early development of behavioral skills that are important in school settings.

This study examined the role of self-regulation in emerging academic ability in one hundred and forty-one 3- to 5-year-old children from low-income homes. Measures of effortful control, false belief understanding, and the inhibitory control and attention-shifting aspects of executive function in preschool were related to measures of math and literacy ability in kindergarten. Results indicated that the various aspects of child self-regulation accounted for unique variance in the academic outcomes independent of general intelligence and that the inhibitory control aspect of executive function was a prominent correlate of both early math and reading ability. Findings suggest that curricula designed to improve self-regulation skills as well as enhance early academic abilities may be most effective in helping children succeed in school.

This study examined the relation of negative emotionality in infancy to child social and cognitive developmental outcomes among low birth weight (LBW) preterm infants participating in the Infant Health and Development Program (IHDP), a comprehensive compensatory education intervention beginning in infancy and lasting through age 3 years. In this analysis, intervention effects at age 36 months on maternal report of child behavior as assessed by the Child Behavior Checklist externalizing and internalizing scales and on intelligence as measured by the Stanford–Binet scale were largest among children characterized by higher levels of negative emotionality in infancy. Findings indicate that for LBW preterm infants characterized by negative emotionality at age 12 months the intervention was associated with a twofold decrease in the occurrence of clinically meaningful levels of behavior problems at age 3 years and a fourfold decrease in the occurrence of a high-risk profile in which both internalizing and externalizing scores are in the clinically meaningful range. The intervention was also associated with a fivefold decrease in the occurrence of IQ ≤ 75 at age 3 years among children with higher levels of negative emotionality and heavier LBW (2001–2500 g). However, specific aspects of temperamental difficulty such as fearfulness and anger were related to internalizing and externalizing, respectively, in both the intervention and control groups. Findings are consistent with research linking negative emotionality in infancy with social and cognitive developmental outcomes in early childhood among normal birth weight infants. Results suggest the need for further attention to child temperament in early intervention research.

Self-regulation is a core aspect of adaptive human behavior that has been studied, largely in parallel, through the lenses of social and personality psychology as well as cognitive psychology. Here, we argue for more communication between these disciplines and highlight recent research that speaks to their connection. We outline how basic facets of executive functioning (working memory operations, behavioral inhibition, and task-switching) may subserve successful self-regulation. We also argue that temporary reductions in executive functions underlie many of the situational risk factors identified in the social psychological research on self-regulation and review recent evidence that the training of executive functions holds significant potential for improving poor self-regulation in problem populations.

The Learning Through Play project utilizes games and play coaching to improve executive function skills in children. This intervention strategy utilizes games and play coaching to improve executive function skills in children. The Learning Through Play team has tested this intervention in a center-based, trauma-informed early education setting, where it also ran coaching sessions for adult caregivers on how to scaffold play and support children’s skill development. Based on lessons learned in those pilots, the intervention has now been adapted to enhance a home visiting program to increase the impact of supporting the development of children’s executive function skills.

Normative‐developmental performance on a battery of executive function tasks was investigated. Executive function was defined as goal‐directed behavior, including planning, organized search, and impulse control. Measures were drawn from clinical neuropsychology (visual search, verbal fluency, motor sequencing, and Wisconsin Card Sorting Task [WCST]) and from developmental psychology (Tower of Hanoi [TOH] and Matching Familiar Figures Test [MFFT]). A discriminant task, recognition memory, was administered, and IQ scores were available on a subset of the sample. One hundred subjects ranging from 3 to 12 years old participated; an adult group was also studied. Three major results were found: (a) adult‐level performance on different subsets of the executive function tasks was achieved at three different ages—6 years old, 10 years old, and adolescence; (b) the measures clustered into three different factors reflecting speeded responding, set maintenance, and planning; and (c) most of the executive function tasks were uncorrelated with IQ. The implications of these results for our understanding of the development of prefrontal lobe functions are discussed.

The emergence of pro-social behaviors and social interaction skills is a major focus of research on children’s development. Here, we consider one important feature of human social interactions, interpersonal movement synchrony, and explore its effects on pro-sociality among young children. Coordinated movements are a crucial part of mother–infant interactions, with important social effects extending well into childhood. Musical interactions are also known to facilitate bonding between infants and caretakers and pro-sociality among peers. We specifically examine the pro-social effects of interpersonal movement synchrony in a naturalistic peer-play context among 4- to 6-year-old children. We assessed the amount of helping behavior between pairs of children following an activity that they performed synchronously or non-synchronously. Children who engaged in synchronous play, as compared with non-synchronous play, showed significantly more subsequent spontaneous helping behavior. Further, more mutual smiling and eye contact were observed in the synchronous condition and amounts of mutual smiling and eye contact during the movement task correlated with amount of helping behavior observed. Neither measure mediated the condition-wise effects on helping, however. These results are discussed in terms of their contribution to existing literature and their broader implications for the development of pro-sociality and coordinated movements in early childhood.

In his final contribution to the psychoanalytic literature published two months before his untimely death on December 21, 2000, the late Stephen A. Mitchell provided a brilliant synthesis of the interrelated ideas that hover around, and describe aspects of, the relational matrix of human experience.  Relationality charts the emergence of the relational perspective in psychoanalysis by reviewing the contributions of Loewald, Fairbairn, Bowlby, and Sullivan, whose voices converge in apprehending the fundamental relationality of mind.  Mitchell draws on the multiple dimensions of attachment, intersubjectivity, and systems theory in espousing a clinical approach equally notable for its responsiveness and responsible restraint.  Relationality “signals a new height in Mitchell’s always illuminating writing” (Nancy Chodorow) and marks the “coming of age” of the relational perspective in psychoanalysis (Peter Fonagy).