Comparing Face-to-Face and Online Data Collection Methods in Preterm and Full-Term Children: An Exploratory Study.

The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the landscape for children's daily lives and the landscape for developmental psychology research. Pandemic-related restrictions have also significantly disrupted the traditional face-to-face methods with which developmental scientists produce research. Over the past year, developmental scientists have published on the best practices for online data collection methods; however, existing studies do not provide empirical evidence comparing online methods to face-to-face methods. In this study, we tested feasibility of online methods by examining performance on a battery of standardized and experimental cognitive assessments in a combined sample of 4- to 5-year-old preterm and full-term children, some of whom completed the battery face-to-face, and some of whom completed the battery online. First, we asked how children's performance differs between face-to-face and online format on tasks related to verbal comprehension, fluid reasoning, visual spatial, working memory, attention and executive functioning, social perception, and numerical skills. Out of eight tasks, we did not find reliable differences on five of them. Second, we explored the role of parent involvement in children's performance in the online format. We did not find a significant effect of parent involvement on children's performance. Exploratory analyses showed that the role of format did not vary for children at risk, specifically children born preterm. Our findings contribute to the growing body of literature examining differences and similarities across various data collection methods, as well as literature surrounding online data collection for continuing developmental psychology research.

Twitches emerge postnatally during quiet sleep in human infants and are synchronized with sleep spindles.

In humans and other mammals, the stillness of sleep is punctuated by bursts of rapid eye movements (REMs) and myoclonic twitches of the limbs.1 Like the spontaneous activity that arises from the sensory periphery in other modalities (e.g., retinal waves),2 sensory feedback arising from twitches is well suited to drive activity-dependent development of the sensorimotor system.3 It is partly because of the behavioral activation of REM sleep that this state is also called active sleep (AS), in contrast with the behavioral quiescence that gives quiet sleep (QS)-the second major stage of sleep-its name. In human infants, for which AS occupies 8 h of each day,4 twitching helps to identify the state;5-8 nonetheless, we know little about the structure and functions of twitching across development. Recently, in sleeping infants,9 we documented a shift in the temporal expression of twitching beginning around 3 months of age that suggested a qualitative change in how twitches are produced. Here, we combine behavioral analysis with high-density electroencephalography (EEG) to demonstrate that this shift reflects the emergence of limb twitches during QS. Twitches during QS are not only unaccompanied by REMs, but they also occur synchronously with sleep spindles, a hallmark of QS. As QS-related twitching increases with age, sleep spindle rate also increases along the sensorimotor strip. The emerging synchrony between subcortically generated twitches and cortical oscillations suggests the development of functional connectivity among distant sensorimotor structures, with potential implications for detecting and explaining atypical developmental trajectories.