Self-regulation in early childhood encompasses higher-order executive function processes and lower-order emotional responses that enable children to navigate the classroom environment. Although self-regulation and executive functions are overlapping constructs, self-regulation represents a broad assessment of children’s ability to call upon executive function processes in order to meet contextual demands. Prior...
Early learning skills, such as executive function (EF), are a key component of healthy development and predict long-term academic success. Yet many children are entering kindergarten without the necessary skills (including EF) that are needed to set them on a successful learning trajectory. Early prekindergarten classrooms that encourage a high...
School interventions have typically focused on academic and psychological outcomes for children, but can children carry positive effects home from school to influence their parents and home environments? Developmental research typically focuses on how parents influence development in their children, but this study flips this lens to ask whether children...
Self-regulation skills lay the foundation for short- and long-term school success, and strengthening these skills in early childhood can have significant implications for immediate and future life outcomes (e.g., Blair & Diamond, 2008; McClelland, Acock, Piccinin, Rhea, & Stallings, 2013). A large body of literature has investigated how characteristics of...
In the United States, children from underserved racial/ethnic backgrounds encounter greater environmental risk both in terms of the physical environment (e.g., housing quality, access to resources like health services and jobs, and exposure to environmental toxins) and the social environment (e.g., social support, neighborhood crime, racism, and discrimination), due to...
A parent’s criminal justice involvement (CJI) can have a lasting impact on their children. Additionally, if these children are involved in Child Protective Services (CPS) they have often faced a form of abuse or neglect and they may be increasingly vulnerable to additional risks. Although a literature base exists that...
Strong self-regulation skills can predict academic success in early childhood contexts, specifically for math and literacy skills, thus laying the foundation for future success (McClelland & Cameron, 2012; McClelland & Ponitz, 2011). Children’s exposure to increased instructional time in school through programs such as full day kindergarten (FDK) has also...
Decisions about college are significant in the lives of students and their families, especially since these are often the first major life-decisions that adolescents are able to make largely on their own (Galotti, 1995; Galotti & Mark, 1994). It is widely recognized that family history plays a role in whether...
Exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation is a primary cause of melanoma and non-melanoma skin cancer and thus represents a critical public health concern. Skin cancer risk behavior research lacks an instrument designed to assess health beliefs about UV exposure that may increase skin cancer risk by increasing risky UV exposure...
English Language Learners (ELLs) represent a culturally and linguistically diverse population in US schools. ELLs enter kindergarten with a range of academic and self-regulation skills, but can face multiple challenges navigating the school context (Zwiers, 2013). Previous research documents that low-income ELLs lagged behind in academic achievement, self-regulation, and English...