Prior work has found links between consistency in toddler handedness for the fine motor skill role-differentiated bimanual manipulation (RDBM), and language development at 2 and 3 years of age. The current study investigated whether consistency in handedness from 18 to 24 months (N = 90) for RDBM predicts receptive and expressive language…

Why do many preterm children show delays in development? An integrated model of biological risk, children's capacities, and maternal stimulation was investigated in relation to cognitive functioning at toddler age. Participants were 200 Dutch children (gestational age = 32-41 weeks); 51% boys, 96% Dutch nationality, 71.5% highly educated mothers.…

One particular developmental task during adolescence is to regulate fluctuating moods to successfully transition through this period. The aim of this person-centered study was to identify distinct developmental trajectories of adolescent mood variability and to compare adolescents in different trajectories on changes in depressive symptoms,…

The current study tested a set of interrelated theoretical propositions based on self-control theory (M. R. Gottfredson & T. Hirschi 1990). Data were collected on 1,155 children at 4.5 years, at 8.5 years (3rd grade), and at 10.5 years (5th grade) as part of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development longitudinal study over a…

We used a matching-to-sample task and manipulated facial pose and feature composition to examine the other-race effect (ORE) in face identity recognition between 5 and 10 years of age. Overall, the present findings provide a genuine measure of own- and other-race face identity recognition in children that is independent of photographic and image…

During social interaction, the behavior of interacting partners becomes coordinated. Although interpersonal coordination is well-studied in adults, relatively little is known about its development. In this project we explored how 2-, 3-, and 4-year-old children spontaneously coordinated their drumming with a peer. Results showed that all children…

The present study was conducted to examine the development of attentional and oculomotor control. More specifically, the authors were interested in the development of the ability to inhibit an incorrect but prepotent response to a salient distractor. Participants, who ranged in age from 8 to 25 years, performed 3 different eye movement tasks: a…

Examined changes from age 7 to 82 years in processes responsible for preparation and interference control underlying alternation between two tasks. Found a U-shaped function for switch costs, with larger costs for young children and older adults. Age-related variance in task-switching performance was partially independent from age-related variance…

Childhood depressive conditions have been explored from multiple theoretical approaches but with few empirical attempts to address the interrelationships among these different domains and their combined effects. In the present study, the authors examined different pathways through which social, cognitive, and genetic risk factors may be expressed…

This article examines Gene x Environment (G x E) interactions in two comorbid developmental disorders--reading disability (RD) and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)--as a window on broader issues on G x E interactions in developmental psychology. The authors first briefly review types of G x E interactions, methods for detecting…

Presents a conjoint recognition paradigm and a model that quantifies conscious and unconscious memory for learned materials and for the types of unlearned materials found to induce false memories in children. Validation study showed that model accounted for 7- and 10-year-olds' performance on recognition memory task. Conscious and unconscious…

Investigated ways in which indicators of parental autonomy granting (decision-making input and parental knowledge of adolescents' daily experiences) differed as a function of context and personal qualities. Found that firstborns were granted more autonomy than second borns, especially in families with firstborn girls and second-born boys. Girls in…

Examined connections between parents' work pressure and adolescent adjustment in 190 dual-earner families. Found that effects of work pressure on adolescent well-being were mediated by parental role overload and parent-adolescent conflict. Fathers' work pressure predicted both parents' feelings of role overload. Mothers' work pressure predicted…

Research on bullying and victimization largely rests on univariate analyses and on reports from a single informant. Researchers may thus know too little about the simultaneous effects of various independent and dependent variables, and their research may be biased by shared method variance. The database for this Dutch study was large (N=1,065) and…

This study examined predictions from preschool parenting measures to middle childhood cognitive and socioemotional child outcomes to explore whether parenting assessment methodologies that require more time, training, and expense yield better predictions of child outcomes than less intensive methodologies. Mother-child dyads (N=278) in low-income…