"A 'Cool' Kid Wears a Brand, and Everyone's following Him" Hierarchal Social Status in Preadolescence: A New Developmental Perspective.

Inequality in hierarchical social status, especially among socially excluded children, profoundly affects preadolescents. Historically viewed through a lens of psychopathology and moral deficiencies, it challenges the education system's approaches and interventions. This article introduces a developmental perspective, highlighting the hierarchical social status' role in shaping classroom cohesion, strength, and distinctiveness. This study's phenomenological, qualitative methodology aimed to gain preliminary insight into the children's perspectives. Drawing from 12 focus group discussions involving 140 latency-age (grade 5) children in Israel, it uniquely reveals the dynamic nature of hierarchical social status influenced by children's connections with the group. This dynamism promotes group unity, strengthens bonds, and prioritizes collective concerns, contributing to the development of a "social self" in the latency phase. Beyond theory, this study proposes innovative interventions to address social status disparities.

Social-emotional and behavioural problems in young children of healthcare worker mothers during the COVID-19 outbreak: a case-control study.

BACKGROUND: The pandemic has had a significant impact on the daily lives of children and their families, particularly the children of health care workers, due to changes in family routines as a result of their parents' work schedules. We aimed to explore the socioemotional and behavioural (SEB) problems of children of healthcare worker mothers (HCWM) during the COVID-19 pandemic and compare them with age-matched children and their mothers from other occupations. METHOD: A case-control study design was applied, and a snowball approach was used to enrol volunteered participants aged between 6 and 36 months of age, through a Google survey. We used the Brief Infant-Toddler Social and Emotional Assessment (BITSEA) questionnaire to assess children's SEB problems and a Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI) to evaluate the psychological distress of mothers. Differences in BITSEA, BSI and MSPSS scores were examined using chi-square and Mann-Whitney U tests, as appropriate. A logistic regression model was used to identify independent predictors of children's behavioural and emotional problems. RESULTS: In total, 600 questionnaires were analysed. It was observed that children in the HCWM group were separated from their mothers more often and for longer periods of time than their counterparts (p < 0.010, p = 0.002). Changes in the child's structured outdoor activities during the pandemic period were more likely to be observed in the HCWM group (p < 0.05). The percentage of children with the BITSEA problem subscale above the subclinical cut-off, externalizing and dysregulation scores were significantly higher in the HCWM group (p = 0.044, p = 0.031, and p = 0.016). Moreover, each point increase in BSI global index scores (p < 0.001, RR:3.34, 95%CI:1.91-5.82) was found as a risk factor for clinically significant SEB problems. CONCLUSION: Overall, the current study suggests HCWM's have experienced occupational inequality, and young children of HCWM's were at increased risk for externalizing and dysregulation problems during the pandemic. Maternal psychological stress had a significant impact on their children's socio-emotional well-being.

Trajectories of maternal depressive and anxiety symptoms and child's socio-emotional outcome during early childhood.

Maternal symptoms of depression and anxiety during pregnancy and early postnatal years are suggested to impose differential negative effects on child's socio-emotional development depending on the characteristics of the symptoms, such as timing, intensity, and persistence. The aim of this study was to identify trajectories of maternal depressive and anxiety symptoms from pregnancy until 2 years postpartum and to examine their relationship with child socio-emotional problems and competence at 2 and 5 years of age. The sample included 1208 mother-infant dyads from FinnBrain Birth Cohort study. Latent growth mixture modelling (LGMM) was utilized to model the trajectories of maternal depressive symptoms, measured using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS), and general anxiety, measured with Symptom Checklist-90 (SCL-90) at 14, 24, and 34 weeks' gestation (gw) and at 3, 6 and 24 months postpartum. Maternal depression was also assessed at 12 months. Child socio-emotional problems and competence were evaluated using the Brief Infant Toddler Social Emotional Assessment (BITSEA) at 2 years and Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) at 5 years. Relevant background factors and maternal concurrent symptomatology were controlled for. The trajectories of maternal depressive and anxiety symptoms were associated negatively with differential aspects of child long term socio-emotional outcomes from early toddlerhood to preschool years. The trajectories of depressive symptoms and high-level persistent symptoms that continued from pregnancy to two years of child age had the strongest negative association with child outcomes. This highlights the importance of identifying and treating maternal symptomatology, especially that of depression, as early as possible.

Complex posttraumatic stress disorder in intergenerational trauma transmission among Eritrean asylum-seeking mother-child dyads.

Background: Traumatic stress among forcibly displaced people has a variety of adverse consequences beyond individual mental health, including implications for poor socioemotional developmental outcomes for their children post-displacement.Objective: This study explored the intergenerational transmission of maternal ICD-11 Complex Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD) and depression among asylum-seeking mothers for their children's internalizing and externalizing difficulties.Method: Participants were 127 trauma-affected Eritrean mothers of preschool-aged children in Israel. The severity of child difficulties was compared between mothers with probable ICD-11 CPTSD (94.5% comorbid depression), ICD-11 PTSD (48.5% comorbid depression), unimorbid depression, and healthy mothers, using multivariate analyses of variance, while controlling for children's direct exposure to adverse life experiences.Results: Probable ICD-11 CPTSD and PTSD were present in 23.6% and 26.0% of mothers, respectively. Relative to maternal PTSD, CPTSD was significantly and strongly associated with elevated child internalizing symptoms (d = 2.44) and marginally significantly, although strongly, associated with child externalizing symptoms (d = 1.30). Post-hoc exploratory analyses documented that, relative to maternal PTSD and depression, CPTSD and depression comorbidity was marginally significantly but strongly associated with child internalizing (SMD = .67), but not externalizing symptoms (SMD = .35).Conclusions: Findings implicate maternal CPTSD and comorbid depression in child socio-emotional development and inform clinical assessment, prevention, and intervention to attenuate poor development among children in unstable post-displacement settings.

Trauma among forcibly displaced people has a variety of aversive multisystemic consequences, compromising the socioemotional development of non-exposed children.ICD-11 complex posttraumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) and comorbid depression may be functionally important to elevated risk for maternal intergenerational trauma transmission, even relative to ICD-11 posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).To effectively attenuate intergenerational transmission of trauma post-displacement, efforts and resources should be invested in maternal mental health care as well as socio-culturally adapted, trauma-sensitive parenting training.

Caring approaches to young, gifted music learners' education: a PRISMA scoping review.

This study reviews empirical research literature that deals with existing caring approaches to nurture and educate gifted children in music. The focus on the ethics of care stems from the need to expand notions of talent development in music from a purely behaviorist focus often associated with traumatic experiences, toward a perspective that addresses socio-emotional and cultural aspects of human development across the lifespan. We employed the Preferred Reporting Systems for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses for Scoping Reviews method to review literature concerning caring approaches to the upbringing and education of children gifted for music. A total of 652 records dating from the 1930s and searched via both digital databases and manually in 41 relevant journals were retrieved from which 506 were examined using our inclusion criteria. A detailed analysis process allowed the authors to include 14 studies that were organized according to sampling location, methodologies, quality appraisal, and criteria-related topics. Eleven of the studies were qualitative with a majority of these employing semi-structured interviews for data collection, while the remaining meta strategy and quantitative studies typically employed questionnaires. Salient topics covered by the selected studies included: addressing inequalities in opportunity to access gifted programs; identifying socio-emotional needs of gifted (and twice-exceptional) students; offering a nurturing environment; focusing on intrinsic motivation; developing coping strategies for overall wellbeing; and cultivating healthy attitudes toward competitions through a spirit of peer collaboration and humility. These aspects were clustered into Francoy Gagné's Differentiated Model of Giftedness and Talent regarding natural abilities, environmental, intrapersonal, and developmental catalysts that are involved in nurturing talents in gifted children. Results suggest that the existing research on caring approaches to musically gifted children's learning and development are scarce and that current knowledge is based mostly on single one-off studies rather than systematic research, and on studies that examine a selection of aspects but not adopting a larger-scale theoretical framework. This review highlights the need for more systematic, multidisciplinary, and empirically robust studies on caring approaches to musically gifted children's learning and development, and for policy developments in educational settings where acceleration programs are offered for young, gifted music learners.

Exploring Parenting Styles Patterns and Children's Socio-Emotional Skills.

In this study, we adopted parenting styles as a multidimensional and latent construct that includes different aspects of parenting, rather than solely focusing on a single parenting style. In a Web-based survey with 1203 Greek parents, we identified parenting styles and their SDQ reports on their children. According to our results by Latent Profile Analysis, we must use a more complex approach concerning parenting styles. We identified a "Highly Authoritative style" profile with high levels of authoritative, low levels of authoritarian and middle levels of permissive parenting styles. We additionally identified a profile called "Relaxed Authoritative style", with still high but lower levels of authoritative style, low but slightly heightened levels of authoritarian style, and middle levels of permissive style. A further profile, named "Permissive Focused Authoritative style", had a mix of high levels of authoritative, moderate levels of permissive, and elevated levels of authoritarian parenting styles. Finally, in a profile named "Inconsistent Parenting style", we identified parents with a blend of still high, but the lowest of all four levels of authoritative and highest levels of permissive and authoritarian parenting styles. When combining the four identified parenting patterns with the SDQ results, we identified the "highly authoritative parenting style" profile to be the least connected to internalizing or externalizing problems of the respective children.

A Scoping Review on the Use and Potential of School-Based Drama Therapy to Enhance Socio-emotional Skills in Early Childhood.

Drama therapy incorporates play, imaginary engagement, embodiment, and perspective taking to promote interpersonal skills and affective functioning. Existing school-based drama therapy (SBDT) research has demonstrated utility with select populations; however, much of the SBDT literature has featured disparate findings. Absent from the current literature is a thorough synthesis of the benefits of SBDT for socio-emotional development in early childhood, an age cohort that may be well suited for drama therapy due to the method's theoretical and practical focus on action, symbolism, and play. A scoping review was conducted to answer the research question: What is the use and potential of SBDT to enhance socio-emotional skills in early childhood? Following a thorough database and manual search, 406 articles were identified and, after screening, 16 articles met the inclusion criteria. Based on the results, practice recommendations include the use of metaphor, distance, and life-drama connection to enhance socio-emotional skills, using dramatic play as a tool to address adverse experiences, and applying SBDT to support specific clinical populations. Policy recommendations include the use of SBDT within a public health trauma approach and the need for ecological integration of SBDT into schools. Research recommendations include the need for a broad-level articulation of a scaffolded SBDT research agenda in schools focused on socio-emotional skills and recommendations specific to methodological and reporting rigor.

Ethical considerations in child-robot interactions.

Social robots hold promise in augmenting education, rehabilitative care, and leisure activities for children. Despite findings suggesting various benefits of social robot use in schools, clinics, and homes, stakeholders have voiced concerns about the potential social and emotional effects of children engaging in long-term interactions with robots. Given the challenges of conducting large long-term studies of child-robot interaction (CRI), little is known about the impact of CRI on children's socio-emotional development. Here we summarize the literature on predictions and expectations of teachers, parents, therapists, and children regarding the effects of CRI on children's socio-emotional functioning and skill building. We then highlight the limited body of empirical research examining how CRI affects children's social behavior and emotional expression, and we provide a summary of available questionnaires for measuring socio-emotional constructs relevant to CRI. We conclude with design recommendations for research studies aimed at better understanding the effects of CRI, before social robots become ubiquitous. This review is relevant to researchers, educators, roboticists, and clinicians interested in designing and using social robots with developmental populations.

Patterns of parent screen use, child screen time, and child socio-emotional problems at 5 years.

Digital media screens have become an essential part of our family life. However, we have insufficient knowledge about parental screen use patterns and how these affect children's socio-emotional development. In total, 867 Canadian parents of 5-year-old children from the TARGet Kids! Cohort (73.1% mothers, mean ± SD age = 38.88 ± 4.45 years) participated in this study from 2014 to the end of 2019. Parents reported parental and child time on television (TV) and handheld devices and completed the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). Latent profile analysis identified six latent profiles of parent screen use: low handheld users (P1, reference; n = 323), more TV than handheld (P2; n = 261), equal TV and handheld (P3; n = 177), more handheld than TV (P4; n = 57), high TV and handheld (P5; n = 38), and extremely high TV and handheld (P6; n = 11). Parents that were more likely to belong to P6 were also more likely to be living in single-parent households compared to P1 (estimate = -1.49 ± 0.70), p = .03). High membership probability for P2 (estimate = -0.67 ± 0.32, p = .04) and P4 (estimate = -1.42 ± 0.40, p < 0.001) was associated with lower household income compared to P1. Children of parents with higher P4 (χ2  = 12.32, p < 0.001) or P5 (χ2  = 9.54, p = .002) membership probability had higher total screen time compared to P1. Finally, a higher likelihood to belong to P6 (χ2  = 6.82, p = .009) was associated with a higher SDQ Total Difficulties Score compared to P1. Thus, patterns of parent screen use were associated with child screen use and child socio-emotional problems. The emerging link between parental screen use profiles and child behaviors suggests the need for more research on parent screen time.

Sex-specific associations among infant food and atopic sensitizations and infant neurodevelopment.

Introduction: Food sensitization is a first and strong indicator of immune deviation in the progression to other allergic conditions. Sensitization to food or other allergens and related inflammation during critical windows of infant development may adversely affect neurodevelopmental milestones. However, additional research is needed to test this association further. Methods: Associations between atopic (any food or aeroallergen) or food sensitization (specific to egg, soybean, peanut, and milk) at age 1 year and neurodevelopment up to 2 years of age were evaluated in the national CHILD Cohort Study, with a secondary aim examining whether these associations were sex-specific. Food and atopic sensitization were assessed by skin prick tests (SPT) in 1-year-old infants, with neurodevelopment assessed using the cognitive, language, motor, and social-emotional subscales of the Bayley Scales of Infant Development (BSID-III) administered at 1 and 2 years of age. Results: Atopic sensitization was present among 16.4% of infants, while 13.4% had food sensitizations. Only socioemotional scores reached statistical significance among the four BSID-III domains. Both atopic and food sensitization at 1 year of age was associated with lower social-emotional scores, independent of the infant's ethnicity. These findings were sex-specific and only observed among boys, among whom social-emotional scores were lowered by 5 points if atopic sensitization was present (-5.22 [95% CI: -9.96, -0.47], p = 0.03) or if food sensitization was present (-4.85 [95% CI: -9.82,0.11], p = 0.06). Similar results were observed using the standard SPT cut-off of ≥3 mm - for atopic sensitization (-5.17 [95% CI: -11.14, -0.80], p = 0.09) and for food sensitization (-4.61 [95% CI: -10.96, 1.74], p = 0.15). Conclusion: In our study of term infants, we found an inverse, cross-sectional association between atopic and food sensitization status and social-emotional development scores in male children but not female children.

Perspectives of Parents and Teachers on the Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children's Socio-Emotional Well-Being.

The negative impacts of COVID 19 on children's holistic development have been reported by researchers around the world. This qualitative study explored teachers' and parents' perspectives on the impact of physical/social distancing and school closure policies on children's socioemotional development. The study was conducted in fall 2020. The sample included four U.S. Preschools teachers (for 4-year-olds), four international preschool teachers (for 4, 5-year-olds), three U.S. Kindergarten teaches (for 5-year-olds), and 4 U.S. parents of 4 and 5-year-olds. Interviews were conducted over Zoom. Participants shared that the social deprivation experienced by children such as lack of friendships, absence of peer learning and peer communication, loss of play time, and lack of socialization impacted their children's socialization skills, higher order thinking development, mental health, and activity levels. Participants also shared that their children exhibited externalizing behaviors such as acting out, throwing tantrums, seeking negative attention, aggressiveness, lying, and showing disrespect. Participants reported children's life skills acquisition issues such as their over reliance on parents and difficulty in performing routine tasks. Participating teachers who taught 5-years-olds reported lower levels of fine motor skills among their students. The findings of the study suggest that although children have experienced severe academic learning loss during the pandemic, the post-pandemic ECE curriculum must keep a strong socio-emotional and practical life skills focus which contributes to children's overall well-being. Future studies may adopt a mixed method design in multi-country contexts to evaluate the impact of interventions implemented by early childhood programs on children's socioemotional health.

Psychosocial health disparities in early childhood: Socioeconomic status and parent migration background.

The association between low socioeconomic status (SES), migration background and psychosocial health could be various in different age stages, rare research has investigated associations in very early childhood. Cross-sectional data of SES, parental migration background, and child's psychosocial problems among 2149 children were collected (M age = 24.6 ± 1.8 months, 49.9% girls) from a community population. Indicators of SES included parental education level, maternal work status, and family composition. Child's psychosocial problems, including social-emotional problems and delay in social-emotional competence, were assessed by the Brief Infant-Toddler Social and Emotional Assessment Problem scale and Competence scale, respectively. Interaction effects between SES and maternal migration background in risk of psychosocial problems were found. Among children of a native-born mother, lower maternal and paternal education levels indicated a higher risk of social-emotional problems and competence delay, respectively. Children of a migrant mother had a higher risk of both social-emotional problems and competence delay if they had a migrant father. The results highlight psychosocial health disparities in 2-year-old children and the need for research into mechanisms underlying these associations.

Emotions, Strategies, and Health: Examining the Impact of an Educational Program on Tanzanian Preschool Children.

Around the world, well-produced television programming can engage vulnerable, hard-to-reach audiences by offering informal education and enrichment. Akili and Me is an animated children's educational program available in Sub-Saharan Africa that provides age and culturally appropriate lessons. In 2018, the producers created socio-emotional and health content. This study examines the relationship between children's exposure to the new Akili and Me content and socio-emotional and health outcomes. Participants included low-income school children (mean age 5.32 years, SD = 0.82) from Arusha, Tanzania. Researchers conducted one-on-one baseline and post-intervention surveys with each participant. Over 12 weeks, the children attended afterschool sessions with screenings of Akili and Me, with distinct content screened on different days. The research team recorded children's attendance and assessed children's receptivity to the program through character identification. Using MLM regression models with data from 411 participants from 10 public schools, the analyses showed that a greater exposure and receptivity to Akili and Me predicted improved outcomes scores on the socio-emotional and health outcomes, controlling for sex, age, baseline scores, and general media receptivity (non-Akili and Me characters). Contributing to the literature on educational media, this study shows that exposure to an animated program can teach vulnerable preschool children socio-emotional and health content.

The effect of perinatal interventions on parent anxiety, infant socio-emotional development and parent-infant relationship outcomes: A systematic review.

Background: Infants of parents with perinatal anxiety are at elevated likelihood of experiencing disruption in the parent-infant relationship, as well as difficulties with socio-emotional functioning in later development. Interventions delivered in the perinatal period have the potential to protect the early dyadic relationship and support infants' ongoing development and socio-emotional outcomes. This review primarily aimed to examine the efficacy of perinatal interventions on parent anxiety, infant socio-emotional development/temperament, and parent-infant relationship outcomes. Secondarily, the review sought to understand how interventions focused principally on one member of the dyad affected the outcomes of the other, and which intervention components were common to successful interventions. Method: Five electronic databases as well as manual search procedures were used to identify randomised controlled trials according to a PICO eligibility criteria framework. Risk of bias assessments were undertaken, and a narrative synthesis was conducted. The review was pre-registered on PROSPERO (CRD42021254799). Results: Twelve studies were analysed in total, including five interventions focused on the adult, and seven interventions focused on the infant, or the infant's relationship with their parent. Interventions incorporating cognitive behavioural strategies for affective disorders showed reductions in parent anxiety (N = 3), and interventions focusing on altering distorted maternal internal representations showed positive change in parent-child dyadic interactions, and infant outcomes (N = 2). Evidence that interventions focused on one partner of the dyad led to improved outcomes for the other partner was limited. However, evidence was of mixed methodological quality. Conclusions: It is important to integrate both parents and infants into treatment programmes for perinatal anxiety. Implications for clinical practice and future intervention trials are discussed.

Cumulative Effects of Poverty on Children's Social-Emotional Development: Absolute Poverty and Relative Poverty.

This study examines the cumulative effects of poverty on children's socio-emotional outcomes from ages 5 to 12, using U.S. National Longitudinal Survey of Youth data (N = 6941). Two definitions of poverty were used: absolute poverty as defined by the federal poverty threshold, and relative poverty defined as income less than 50 percent of median household income. (1) Does cumulative poverty, measured in absolute and relative terms, have any impact on children's socio-emotional outcomes? (2) Does this association increase/decrease as children become older? Relative poverty had a stronger adverse effect on children's social-emotional development than absolute poverty, and the adverse effect of relative poverty was bigger when children were older. Child and maternal characteristics affected children's socio-emotional development. The income threshold for absolute poverty is lower than that for relative poverty; using a relative poverty threshold might better identify individuals with limited resources that are at risk of having adverse socio-emotional outcomes.

Examining Heterogeneity in the Impacts of Socio-Emotional Curricula in Preschool: A Quantile Treatment Effect Approach.

We examine treatment effect heterogeneity using data from the Head Start CARES study, in which a sample of preschool centers was randomly assigned to either one of three curricula interventions targeting socio-emotional (SE) skills (i.e., emotional knowledge, problem-solving skills, and executive functions) or to continue using their "business-as-usual" curriculum. Most existing research estimates only mean differences between treatment and control groups, and uses simple subgroup analyses to assess treatment heterogeneity, which may overlook important variation in treatment effects across the ex post outcome distribution. We use quantile treatment effects analyses to understand the impacts of these curricular interventions at various parts of the outcome distribution, from the 1st percentile to the 99th percentile, to understand who benefits most from SE curricula interventions. Results show positive impacts of the curricula interventions on emotional knowledge and problem-solving skills, but not equally across the full skill distribution. Children in the upper half of the emotional knowledge distribution and at the higher end of the problem-solving skills distribution gain more from the curricula. As in the study's original mean-comparison analyses, we find no impacts on children's executive function skills at any point in the skills distribution. Our findings add to the growing literature on the differential effects of curricula interventions for preschool programs operating at scale. Importantly, it provides the first evidence for the effects of SE curricula interventions on SE outcomes across children's outcome skill levels. We discuss implications for early education programs for children with different school readiness skills.

Intervention Programs to Promote the Quality of Caregiver-Child Interactions in Childcare: A Systematic Literature Review.

Sensitive caregiver-child interactions appear fundamental throughout childhood, supporting infants' wellbeing and development not only in a familial context but in professional caregiving as well. The main aim of this review was to examine the existing literature about Early Childhood Education Context (ECEC) intervention studies dedicated to caregiver-child interaction, fostering children's socioemotional developmental pathways. Studies published between January 2007 and July 2021 were identified in four electronic databases following PRIMSA guidelines. The initial search yielded a total of 342 records. Among them, 48 studies were fully reviewed. Finally, 18 of them met all inclusion criteria and formed the basis for this review. Main factors characterizing implemented programs were recorded (e.g., intervention and sample characteristics, dimensions of the teacher-child interaction targeted by the intervention, outcome variables, main results) in order to frame key elements of ECE intervention programs. Our review points to a range of fundamental issues that should consider to enhance ECEC interventions' efficacy, supporting children's socioemotional development and caregiver-child interaction. Reflections and considerations for future research are provided.

Neonatal White Matter Microstructure and Emotional Development during the Preschool Years in Children Who Were Born Very Preterm.

Children born very preterm (<33 weeks of gestation) are at a higher risk of developing socio-emotional difficulties compared with those born at term. In this longitudinal study, we tested the hypothesis that diffusion characteristics of white matter (WM) tracts implicated in socio-emotional processing assessed in the neonatal period are associated with socio-emotional development in 151 very preterm children previously enrolled into the Evaluation of Preterm Imaging study (EudraCT 2009-011602-42). All children underwent diffusion tensor imaging at term-equivalent age and fractional anisotropy (FA) was quantified in the uncinate fasciculus (UF), inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF), inferior longitudinal fasciculus (ILF), and superior longitudinal fasciculus (SLF). Children's socio-emotional development was evaluated at preschool age (median = 4.63 years). Exploratory factor analysis conducted on the outcome variables revealed a three-factor structure, with latent constructs summarized as: "emotion moderation," "social function," and "empathy." Results of linear regression analyses, adjusting for full-scale IQ and clinical and socio-demographic variables, showed an association between lower FA in the right UF and higher "emotion moderation" scores (ß = -0.280; p < 0.001), which was mainly driven by negative affectivity scores (ß = -0.281; p = 0.001). Results further showed an association between higher full-scale IQ and better social functioning (ß = -0.334, p < 0.001). Girls had higher empathy scores than boys (ß = -0.341, p = 0.006). These findings suggest that early alterations of diffusion characteristics of the UF could represent a biological substrate underlying the link between very preterm birth and emotional dysregulation in childhood and beyond.

Signaled night awakening and its association with social information processing and socio-emotional development across the first two years.

STUDY OBJECTIVES: Night awakening is common in infancy, and some infants continue to have signaled night awakenings throughout early childhood. However, the influence of signaled night awakening on children's social development is less explored. In the present study, longitudinal associations between signaled night awakening, social information processing, and socio-emotional development were measured within the CHILD-SLEEP birth cohort in two groups formed based on parent-reported night awakenings. METHODS: At 8 months, there were 77 infants in the waking group (≥3 awakenings) and 69 infants in the nonwaking group (≤1 awakening). At 8 and 24 months, social information processing was measured as children's attention to neutral and emotional faces, and at 24 months, parent-reported socio-emotional behavior was measured with the Brief Infant-Toddler Social and Emotional Assessment (BITSEA) questionnaire. RESULTS: The two groups showed different patterns of attention to emotional faces. The waking group had a more pronounced attentional bias to fearful versus happy faces, whereas in the nonwaking group, attention to fearful and happy faces did not differ. In addition, at 24 months, the waking group had more dysregulation problems and lower social competence than the nonwaking group, but no clear differences in internalizing or externalizing problems were found. CONCLUSIONS: Our results contribute to the literature by showing that during the first 2 years of life, signaled night awakening is associated with social information processing and socio-emotional behavior.

A comparative study of cognitive and socio-emotional development in children with Rubinstein-Taybi syndrome and children with Autism Spectrum Disorder associated with a severe intellectual disability, and in young typically developing children with matched developmental ages.

BACKGROUND: Cognitive and socio-emotional profiles of children with CREBBP-related Rubinstein-Taybi syndrome (RSTS 1), children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) with severe intellectual disability and developmental ages (DA) under 24 months, and typically developing (TD) children with similar DA were compared. PARTICIPANTS: Thirty-one children with RSTS 1 (mean chronological age, CA = 59,8 months; 33-87) and thirty children with ASD, matched on CA and DA and developmental quotients (DQ), were compared to thirty TD children (CA ranged from 12 to 24 months). METHODS: Cognitive and socio-emotional developmental levels, DA and DQ were assessed with appropriated tests. RESULTS: More socio-emotional developmental similarities were observed between TD and RSTS 1 than between TD and ASD children. Clinical groups displayed similar developmental delays in cognitive (self-image, symbolic play, means-ends, and object permanence) and socio-emotional domains (language and imitation). Children with RSTS 1 exhibited higher developmental levels in behavior regulation, joint attention, affective relations, emotional expression domains, and a lower developmental level in spatial relations domain. CONCLUSIONS: Common interventions centered on symbolic play, self-image, language, and imitation for both clinical groups, and differentiated interventions centered on spatial abilities for RSTS 1 children and on social abilities for ASD could be used by caregivers were suggested.