Infants engage with a variety of objects in their environments that offer unique opportunities for action and learning. This study experimentally tested 3 hypotheses: (1) Different objects instigate different types of infant action, and (2) caregivers offer contingent verb input, such that (3) infants' actions temporally align with caregiver verb input. Thirty infant-mother dyads (12-22 month-old, 14 girls, 21 White, 4 Black, 2 Asian, 3 Hispanic, 3 Multiracial) played in two conditions-with gross-motor toys to incentivize locomotor play and fine-motor toys to incentivize stationary play. As hypothesized, infant locomotion and caregiver verb use differed by condition. Moreover, infants' in-the-moment locomotion temporally aligned with caregivers' verbs. Effects ranged from η2 = .416-.778. Findings provide experimental evidence that objects for play shape infant actions and caregiver verb input.

Prejudice confrontations can be effective in reducing bias, but few studies have examined them in childhood. This study, in the United States, investigated 8- to 14-year olds' (N = 196; Mage = 11.64; 114 girls, 82 boys; 33.7% White, 27.6% Multiracial/Multiethnic, 12.2% Black, 8.2% Latino, 7.7% Asian, 4.5% Other, and 6.1% not reported) evaluations of, reasoning about, and confrontations of gender-based Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) inequalities within peer groups. Data were collected in 2024. Participants who evaluated inequalities more negatively were more likely to confront them. Evaluations of inequalities that disadvantaged boys, but not girls, were more positive with age. Finally, evaluations of inequalities uniquely predicted participants' use of different reasoning categories to justify their evaluations. These findings demonstrate children's and adolescents' capacities to make STEM contexts more equitable for all children.

This study examined whether parental warmth protects against the effects of parental harshness on disruptive child behavior. Between Spring 2023 and Summer 2024, community sample parents (N = 205; 93% were Dutch) of children (Mage = 5.84 years, 53% girls) reported up to 6 times a day for 12 consecutive days on parental harshness, warmth, and disruptive child behavior. Momentary increases in parental harshness and decreases in warmth predicted more subsequent disruptive child behavior. Overall levels of warmth did not buffer the effects of momentary parental harshness on disruptive child behavior. Findings suggest that moment-to-moment fluctuations in parenting can immediately influence child behavior, thereby providing support for parenting programs aiming to increase warmth as well as reduce harshness.

We conducted a modified cluster randomized controlled trial examining Story Detective, a multicomponent listening comprehension intervention, with 351 students (47% girls; pretest Mage = 5.55; 39% Hispanic, 32% White, 16.5% Asian-American, 6.8% multiracial, 2.6% African-American) in the U.S. Classes were randomly assigned to Story Detective or business-as-usual conditions. Results showed significant effects for Story Detective on proximal vocabulary (g = 1.28), comprehension monitoring (g = 0.27), and distal grammatical knowledge (g = 0.26), but not on distal listening comprehension. Students with stronger initial vocabulary benefited more. Classroom observations revealed business-as-usual instruction included vocabulary and inferential questioning but lacked comprehension monitoring and grammatical instruction-precisely where significant effects occurred. Findings suggest multicomponent interventions improve specific skills, but transfer to comprehension may require extended implementation.

This study examined the intergenerational transmission of effortful control and reactive control between parents and their children in middle childhood. We further partitioned environmental and genetic contributions to individual differences in effortful control and reactive control. Participants included 935 twins (51.9% female, 53.2% White, Myear 8 = 8.43 years, SD = 0.68, and Myear 10 = 10.61 years, SD = 1.14) from the Arizona Twin Project. When children were age 8, mothers and fathers reported their own activation control, attentional focusing, inhibitory control, and effortful control; at ages 8 and 10, the primary caregivers (93.3% mothers) and teachers rated twins' activation control, attentional focusing, inhibitory control, and impulsivity. Regression models showed that higher maternal effortful control was consistently associated with better twin activation control, attentional focusing, and inhibitory control, and lower impulsivity across waves and informants, whereas paternal attentional focusing was linked to twins' attentional focusing at age 10. Bivariate twin models revealed distinct etiological patterns: activation control showed stable and novel genetic influences; attentional focusing was largely heritable; inhibitory control exhibited shared environmental effects; and impulsivity showed strong genetic stability and unique shared environmental influences. Findings identify tailored genetic and environmental targets for intervention.

Iconic words are more frequent in infant-directed speech, but it is not known why. We examine whether caregivers use iconic words to engage infants in interaction. In two studies (Study 2 preregistered), involving five White American English-speaking 18-month-olds (three female; data collected between 2002 and 2005) and 45 American English-speaking 13- to 23-month-olds (23 female; 32 White, 10 Mixed Race, 1 Black/African American, and 2 Other; data collected between 2017 and 2020), we used iconicity ratings to identify the 10 most and least iconic 10-s windows (bouts) in caregiver speech. In high compared to low-iconicity bouts, infants gazed more at caregivers, gazed more at the subject of conversation, and more often smiled, laughed, gestured, and verbalized. Mothers' utterances within high-iconicity bouts were also higher in pitch and slower in speech rate than those in low-iconicity bouts.

Some argue that autism in gender-diverse people may reflect the effects of gender-related distress and minority stress producing autism-like features, rather than biologically based neurodiversity. We tested key predictions stemming from this "phenocopy" account by examining whether autism-related cognitive characteristics would track gender identity (cisgender/gender diverse) rather than autism diagnosis. Specifically, the phenocopy account predicts that the behavioral features of autism in gender-diverse people are superficial and therefore will not be accompanied by an autism-typical cognitive profile. We tested this in a 2 (diagnostic status: autistic vs. non-autistic) × 2 (gender identity status: cisgender vs. gender diverse) design, for which data collection ran from March 2023 to March 2025 and took part exclusively in the United Kingdom. In Study 1, 181 matched youth (aged 7-16 years; 89% White) completed theory of mind (ToM) measures, and alexithymia was assessed via parental report. In Study 2, 202 caregivers (aged 28-62 years; 96% White) completed similar measures. Autistic youth showed lower ToM (ηp2 = .07) and higher alexithymia (ηp2 ≥ .09), irrespective of gender identity. Caregivers of autistic youth exhibited higher alexithymia (ηp2 = .04), but no ToM differences (ηp2 ≤ .01). The findings provide no evidence for the phenocopy account but can inform clinical support.

Cultural beliefs that success in certain fields depends on brilliance undermine women's participation in those fields, as demonstrated in adults. Understanding the development and consequences of these field-specific brilliance beliefs in early childhood is crucial for addressing gender gaps at their roots. The present research (N = 352; 5- to 10-year olds; 50% girls; 45.4% White) showed that children around age six began to attribute brilliance to computer science but not biology, suggesting that distinct associations between brilliance and fields emerge early. Brilliance beliefs shaped children's academic interests: girls were less interested than boys in pursuing a science field requiring brilliance. These findings highlight that gender disparities take hold early, and disrupting brilliance-field associations may promote greater gender equity.

The current study evaluated a developmental cascade model in which PROSPER-delivered substance use preventive interventions impact next-generation children's psychosocial outcomes. This study evaluated a sample of 395 participants (Mage = 28.29, 94% White) from the original PROSPER community-randomized trial following two cohorts of adolescents starting in 2002 and 2003 (measured across Grades 6-10), who now have young children (measured in two waves of parenthood between 2019 and 2022). Analysis of the developmental cascade model revealed that PROSPER interventions promoted adolescents' social problem-solving skills, which in turn was associated with a more positive childrearing environment (cohesion, conflict, routines) 16 years later. In turn, the childrearing environment predicted next-generation children's social-emotional competence. Findings indicate that evidence-based universal programs may have intergenerational public health implications.

This pre-registered study investigated how adolescents in a context of long-standing ethno-political polarization-Northern Ireland-transmit contested narratives. Much like the children's game of telephone, adolescents (N = 395, Mage = 14.56, SD = 2.16; range 10-18 years; 55.7% female, 42.0% male; 57.1% White-Irish, 32.5% White-British, 6.3% White-Other) read and recalled narratives for other participants; a process repeated sequentially across chains of four people. Narratives were either conflict-related or non-conflict control. Across homogeneous (same ethno-political group) and mixed (alternating group) chains, we found that information was rapidly lost or changed. This occurred to a greater extent in conflict compared to non-conflict conditions. We found no evidence for preferential transmission of ingroup-enhancing information, though nonpartisan recall slightly decreased with age. Adolescent information transmission may interrupt cycles of division in conflict-affected settings.

This study assessed whether associations between very preterm birth (<32 weeks' gestation) or very low birth weight (<1,500 g; VPT/VLBW) and adult outcomes of physical and mental health, wealth, and social relationships are mediated by childhood experiences of neurodevelopmental impairment, academic achievement, mental health, and parent-child and peer relationships. A Bavarian population-based cohort (N = 489; VPT/VLBW = 260; term-controls (TC) = 229; 49.9% females, White) were assessed at birth, 6, 8, 13, and 26 years (1985-2014). VPT/VLBW was associated with adverse childhood experiences and adulthood outcomes. Disparities in academic achievement, parent-child relationship and impairment explained lower wealth and social relationships, lower mental health and adult-parent relationship, and lower physical health for VPT/VLBW versus TC adults. Targeting schooling and parenting may improve long-term outcomes for VPT/VLBW individuals.

This study investigates the evolving relationship between oral language comprehension (phonology, vocabulary, syntax) and verbal and nonverbal executive functions -EF- (inhibition, working memory, updating) in 395 typically developing French children aged 5 to 8 years (M = 7 years; SD = 11.91 months; 52% girls). Behavioral performances were analyzed using a graph-theory approach, allowing for the modeling of cognitive networks. Results showed a shift from early integration between language and EF in Kindergarten to increasing segregation and specialization by 3rd grade, associated with improvements in task performance and reduced interindividual variability along development. These findings highlight the dynamic between language comprehension and EF in children from the general population with further implications for developmental and clinical perspectives on language-related disorders.

Children often deny the possibility of unusual and improbable events and immoral actions. Three preregistered experiments on 5- and 6-year-old children (N = 154, 47% female, 53% male, tested across three sites in Canada with varied ethnic compositions between March and September 2025) find that children better recognize that improbable events are possible when the events include agents who could plausibly be involved in them and who might want to produce them. In Experiments 1 and 2, children affirmed possibility more when unusual events were described as involving thematically related agents rather than unrelated or indefinite ones. Children also affirmed possibility more for actions that could be voluntarily chosen than for incidents that might happen involuntarily. In Experiment 3, children affirmed possibility more when improbable events involved agents with relevant motives and locations, but this did not affect children's judgments about the possibility of acting immorally. These findings suggest that children often deny the possibility of improbable events because they fail to recall relevant knowledge useful for envisaging the circumstances behind the events.