Developmental Review最新文献

The question of how young infants learn to imitate others’ facial expressions has been central in developmental psychology for decades. Facial imitation has been argued to constitute a particularly challenging learning task for infants because facial expressions are perceptually opaque: infants cannot see changes in their own facial configuration when they execute a motor program, so how do they learn to match these gestures with those of their interacting partners? Here we argue that this apparent paradox mainly appears if one focuses only on the visual modality, as most existing work in this field has done so far. When considering other modalities, in particular the auditory modality, many facial expressions are not actually perceptually opaque. In fact, every orolabial expression that is accompanied by vocalisations has specific acoustic consequences, which means that it is relatively transparent in the auditory modality. Here, we describe how this relative perceptual transparency can allow infants to accrue experience relevant for orolabial, facial imitation every time they vocalise. We then detail two specific mechanisms that could support facial imitation learning through the auditory modality. First, we review evidence showing that experiencing correlated proprioceptive and auditory feedback when they vocalise – even when they are alone – enables infants to build audio-motor maps that could later support facial imitation of orolabial actions. Second, we show how these maps could also be used by infants to support imitation even for silent, orolabial facial expressions at a later stage. By considering non-visual perceptual domains, this paper expands our understanding of the ontogeny of facial imitation and offers new directions for future investigations.

Early environmental experiences influence children’s cognitive and neural development. In particular, cognitive stimulation, defined as environmental inputs that engage the senses and provide learning opportunities for children, fosters acquisition of knowledge across various cognitive domains. Low levels of cognitive stimulation in early life may restrict learning opportunities, contributing to lasting consequences for neural development and later academic and occupational achievement. This review delves into the role of cognitive stimulation in neural development and related cognitive performance, available tools for measuring cognitive stimulation in various settings, and offers insights into future research directions. In addition, variability in cognitive stimulation, often linked to differences in socioeconomic status, may create disparities in children’s access to enriching experiences that provide the foundation for learning. We therefore briefly review the role of socioeconomic status in cognitive stimulation and cognitive development. We also leverage evidence from intervention studies to illustrate the importance of cognitive stimulation for children’s outcomes. Investigating the influence of cognitive stimulation on children’s brain and behavior development is crucial for developing effective intervention strategies to foster the healthy development of all children and unlocking their full potential.

The quality of parent-infant interaction is crucial for infant development, and the postpartum period is considered particularly important for subsequent developmental pathways. Parental mentalizing has been identified as a key component influencing parental behavior. Yet, no meta-analysis has specifically focused on the link between parental mentalizing and observed parental behavior during parent-infant interaction in the first year postpartum. The present study addresses this gap by conducting a meta-analysis of 20 studies involving mothers and their 0–12 months old infants. A three-level random effects analysis, encompassing 133 individual effect sizes and 1990 participants, revealed a small, positive overall effect size (r = 0.20). Moderator analyses investigated the influence of study methodology (e.g., offline versus online assessment of mentalizing, free-play interaction versus non-free play), sample and study characteristics on effect size. Using meta-regression, significant moderators were maternal SES risk-status and study publication year, while study methodology and other sample and study characteristics did not moderate the association. The study advances our understanding of parental mentalizing and parenting behavior in the postpartum period, providing methodological considerations for mentalizing assessment. Results are discussed in terms of implications and recommendations for future research.

We review existing research on intertemporal choice in children that has used delay choice tasks, a type of delay gratification task that typically involves choosing between a smaller reward now and a larger reward later. We align developmental research with some of the large body of empirical and theoretical work in this area that has been conducted with adults, with a focus on methodological appropriateness, the effectiveness of experimental manipulations, and role of future thinking processes in intertemporal choice. We conclude that, with care, it is possible to use delay discounting tasks with children from around 8 years that are similar to those that have been used with adults; simpler delay choice tasks are likely to yield robust data from around 3 years. Experimental manipulations to enhance performance have generally been less successful with child populations than adults, but there is some evidence that learning-based and framing approaches can increase the likelihood that children delay gratification. We outline a detailed theoretical framework, based on existing research with adults, that describes the various ways in which future thinking processes may contribute to intertemporal choice, and argue that some of these processes may develop relatively late. This means that the nature of the relation between future thinking and intertemporal choice may change substantially with development.

Over- and under-eating in response to subjective emotional states (emotional eating) are well described behaviours that are thought to emerge early in life. Research and theory have proposed that individual characteristics and environmental factors (e.g. parental feeding practices) both contribute to the development of emotional eating. However, the mechanisms underlying this development are poorly understood. Here, we review relevant literature that pertains to factors and processes involved in the development of emotional eating and propose a comprehensive model suggesting how emotional eating develops throughout infancy and childhood. Within the model, we describe the biological and environmental factors that could impact a child’s probability for emotional eating. We identify key mechanisms that may influence how these factors lead to emotional eating, such as interoceptive processing, emotion regulation and appetite self-regulation. We put forward the idea that emotional eating is a context dependent behaviour, with the extent of emotional eating likely influenced by contextual factors operating in conjunction with key mechanisms. Lastly, we offer potential pathways through which emotional eating develops as a learnt behaviour. The proposed model provides a comprehensive explanation that considers the complexity of emotional eating behaviours and generates novel ideas for future research.

The Nurture Assumption by Judith Rich Harris was a revolutionary book that called into question the family socialization literature and the conventional ways in which parenting is typically studied by social scientists. In the 25 years since it was first published, the key arguments set forth in The Nurture Assumption still remain on the margins of most fields of study and not fully integrated into individual research agendas. In this paper, I focus on how Judith Rich Harris has impacted my scholarly thinking and my academic career as a criminologist. In doing so, I discuss the ways in which Judith Rich Harris’ views can guide criminological thinking and the reasons why the field of criminology has been and continues to be resistant to her and The Nurture Assumption.

If children are socialized less by their parents than their peer group, psychology may fruitfully adapt social psychology’s exploration of group processes for understanding how children develop. Concerns with self-presentation, reputation, and learning subtle norms may emerge earlier and more strongly than would be the case if children were primarily interacting with their parents. The peer group culture of childhood may be a self-perpetuating culture that is somewhat independent of and possibly in opposition to the adult culture and parents’ attempts to prepare children for adulthood. Modern trends such as increasing age segregation and play-dates with adult supervision may hamper the transmission of children’s and adolescents’ peer culture.

Increased lifespan in the population was historically driven by reductions in infant mortality but is now driven by reduced mortality in older adults. Research is beginning to show reduced incidence of many age-related diseases, but there have been some mixed trends observed in assessment of cognitive ability in healthy ageing research. Across three studies, time-based trends in older adults’ cognition were assessed. In a meta-analysis of literature largely studying different waves of longitudinal data, Study 1 showed cognitive improvement in later-recruited waves of older adults compared to earlier-recruited waves. In a second meta-analysis of studies comparing young and older adults’ cognition, Study 2 showed that age-related cognitive deficits were becoming smaller over time. Finally, in an analysis of historic data from a single laboratory, Study 3 confirmed the findings of Study 2 and demonstrated that time-based reductions in age-related cognitive deficits were largely driven by improvement in cognition over time in older groups, whilst young adults’ cognition remained relatively flat across time. It is argued that later tested groups of older adults are benefiting from environmental advantages to cognition (e.g., education, healthcare, nutrition) that might previously have mainly applied to young adult groups in research. These results have implications for cognitive ageing research which will likely yield smaller age differences than historic work. It is also argued that definitions of cognitive impairment related to dementia diagnosis may need to be periodically revised.

The approximate number system (ANS) is a hypothesized mechanism responsible for the representation and processing of numerical information in an imprecise fashion. According to the predominant theory, the ANS is essential in solving simple numerical tasks such as comparing which of two quantities is numerically larger, and some research has indicated that individual differences in its acuity influence higher-level mathematical performance. Because of this far-reaching role of the ANS, it is essential to assess its acuity with measures that are reliable, and valid. The present work reviews and synthesizes many of the methodological problems that are relevant for measuring ANS acuity in young children. We discuss issues related to task comprehension, the role of non-numerical perceptual properties of the stimuli, the role of inhibition, and the appropriateness and reliability of the ANS acuity indices. Recommendations and open questions are summarized.

Cumulative science hinges on consolidating empirical evidence. However, both narrative reviews and meta-analyses often restrict integration by using construct labels in searches, which vary greatly across traditions and eras in psychology. A complementary approach is the mapping review, more common in other disciplines, which focuses on operational definitions and experimental design. Here, we pioneered using this approach in experimental psychology, applying it to memory development. We classified 506 publications in the last 5 decades using 16 design features and identified methodologically convergent work that originated from different theoretical frameworks. New insights emerge from this approach. First, characterizing the relative data density along each dimension of experimental design identifies where future research is most necessary. Second, we linked relevant evidence previously separated by nonoverlapping construct labels. Third, we illustrated the potential application of this technique as a precursor to subsequent research syntheses with an analysis of the development of pattern separation (also called mnemonic discrimination). To facilitate the process of literature integration and identification of methodological overlap, we have created a freely available interactive web application using the current database.