Infant and Preschool Learning News

December 24, 2024

Top Headlines

Heart Rate Activity Influences When Infants Speak

Dec. 17, 2024 — A psychologist found that a baby's first sweet sounds and early attempts at forming words are directly linked to the baby's heart ...

Naughty or Nice? Many Parents Rely on Threats to Manage Misbehavior -- From No Dessert to No Santa

Dec. 16, 2024 — When young children's behavior becomes challenging, many parents resort to threats -- from taking away toys to threatening that Santa will skip their house, a national poll ...

Mothers' Language Choices Have Double the Impact in Bilingual Families

Dec. 10, 2024 — New research shows that mothers have twice the impact on language exposure, challenging traditional parenting advice. In a new study, researchers found that there wasn't a single strategy that could be singled out as 'best' to raise a child ...

Beyond Screen Time: Complex Factors Shaping Child Development

Nov. 25, 2024 — New research challenges views on screen time, revealing factors such as parental mental health and the type of screen being used may have some impact on child ...

Latest Headlines

updated 7:59pm EST

Language Used by Mothers Affects Oxytocin Levels of Infants

Nov. 25, 2024 — Infants whose mothers regularly use language to describe what their child is thinking or feeling, have higher levels of the hormone oxytocin, finds a new ...

Consistent Bedtime Linked With Better Child Emotion and Behavior Regulation

Nov. 11, 2024 — A consistent bedtime may be more important to a child's ability to control their emotions and behavior than the duration or quality of their sleep, according to a new ...

Toddlers Understand Concept of Possibility

Nov. 4, 2024 — Children too young to know words like 'impossible' and 'improbable' nonetheless understand how possibility works, finds new work with two- and three-year-olds. The findings demonstrate that young ...

A Common Steroid Therapy May Influence Brain Development in Preterm Infants

Oct. 31, 2024 — Antenatal corticosteroids (ACS) are an established therapy for pregnant women at risk of preterm birth. Researchers have found that babies given ACS had notably smaller volumes of two key brain ...

Screen-Free Bedtimes Boost Toddler Sleep, New Research Shows

Oct. 22, 2024 — A world-first randomised controlled trial (RCT) of toddler screen time shows that removing screen time in the hour before bed improves the quality of toddler ...

Feet First: AI Reveals How Infants Connect With Their World

Oct. 1, 2024 — Researchers explored how infants act purposefully by attaching a colorful mobile to their foot and tracking movements with a Vicon 3D motion capture system. The study tested AI's ability to detect ...

Wearable Brain Imaging Device Shines a Light on How Babies Respond in Real-World Situations

Sep. 11, 2024 — A technology which uses harmless light waves to measure activity in babies' brains has provided the most complete picture to date of brain functions ...

Babies Born to Women Consuming a High Fat, Sugary Diet at Greater Risk of Cardiovascular Disease and Diabetes in Later Life

Sep. 13, 2024 — Babies born to pregnant women with obesity are more likely to develop heart problems and diabetes as adults due to fetal damage caused by the ...

Researcher Finds Sound Progress in Babies' Speech Development

Aug. 23, 2024 — The sounds babies make in their first year of life may be less random and more self-driven than previously believed, according to new ...

Mother's Gut Microbiome During Pregnancy Shapes Baby's Brain Development

Aug. 20, 2024 — A study in mice has found that the bacteria Bifidobacterium breve in the mother's gut during pregnancy supports healthy brain development in the ...

Preschool Education: A Key to Supporting Allophone Children

Nov. 28, 2024 — A Canadian study reveals that allophone children often face learning and communication difficulties in kindergarten, which can negatively impact their educational ...

Need a Landing Pad for Helicopter Parenting? Frame Tasks as Learning

Nov. 22, 2024 — Parents are much less likely to intervene when their young children are getting dressed or performing other simple chores if those tasks are framed as learning opportunities, according to a new ...

Parenting Programs Help Kids, but Provide Insufficient Support for Parents

Oct. 9, 2024 — Parenting programs that address both mental health and parenting skills can improve children's development, but often fall short when it comes to offering effective mental-health support for ...

Early Exposure to Diverse Faces Helps Babies Overcome Prejudices Later in Life

Sep. 10, 2024 — Babies who have more diverse social contacts in the first years of their life can get over their prejudices more easily by the age of 17, according to new ...

Babbling Babies Need Timely Responses to Learn Language, Social Norms

Aug. 12, 2024 — New research shows the timing of others' reactions to their babbling is key to how babies begin learning language and social norms -- a process evident in infants' interactions with a ...

Parents Who Use Humor Have Better Relationships With Their Children, Study Finds

Aug. 12, 2024 — In a pilot study, most people viewed humor as an effective parenting tool and that a parent or caregiver's use of humor affected the quality of their relationship with their children, according ...

Skin-to-Skin 'Kangaroo Care' Found to Boost Neurodevelopment in Preemies

Aug. 7, 2024 — Babies born very early had stronger neurodevelopmental performance at 1 year if they received more skin-to-skin care as newborns, a study ...

'Baby Talk:' Decoding How Children's Vocal and Cognitive Cues Sway Adults

Aug. 6, 2024 — In infancy, caregivers rely on facial expressions and vocal cues to understand a baby's needs and emotions, as babies do not use language. Research shows that while facial expressions are ...

Preventing Brain Damage in Preterm Babies

July 24, 2024 — An interdisciplinary team of physicians and scientists show for the first time that a blood protein called fibrin blocks an essential biological process that drives brain development in early life. ...

Large Study Confirms: Siblings of Autistic Children Have 20% Chance of Autism

July 16, 2024 — A new, large study confirms earlier findings that children with an autistic sibling have a 20% chance of being autistic ...

Toddlers' Brains Show Significant Growth in Cognitive Skills by 16 Months

July 11, 2024 — Toddlers engage more regions of their brains around 16-months to help them develop important cognitive skills enabling them to follow simple instructions and control impulses. Findings from the study ...

Creativity Starts in the Cradle, New Research Shows

July 10, 2024 — New research indicates that babies can begin grasping complex language and ...

Emotional Overeating Fed by Temperament, Caregivers' Reactions to Children's Emotions

June 27, 2024 — A research team tracked children from infancy through age 3 to explore the roots of emotional overeating. Parents/caregivers were surveyed about the children's temperaments and whether they ...

Neighborhood Opportunities Influence Infant Development and Cognition

June 27, 2024 — Researchers find that growing up in neighborhoods with more educational and socioeconomic opportunities has a positive impact on infants' brain ...

How Much Oxygen Do Very Premature Babies Need After Birth?

June 24, 2024 — A study suggests giving oxygen at a concentration of 90 to 100 percent soon after birth could halve the risk of death for very premature babies that need help ...

Babies Use 'Helpless' Infant Period to Learn Powerful Foundation Models, Just Like ChatGPT

June 5, 2024 — Babies' brains are not as immature as previously thought, rather they are using the period of postnatal 'helplessness' to learn powerful foundation models similar to those underpinning ...

Great News, Parents: You Do Have Power Over Your Tweens' Screen Use

June 5, 2024 — For many parents, it can feel like curbing kids' screen use is a losing battle. But new research has found the parenting practices that work best to curb screen time and addictive screen ...

Infants Hear Significantly More Speech Than Music at Home

May 30, 2024 — A new study has compared the amount of music and speech that children hear in infancy. Results showed that infants hear more spoken language than music, with the gap widening as the babies get ...

Babies Babble Squeals and Growls in Clustering Patterns Observable from Birth Through the First Year

May 29, 2024 — In the first large-scale observation with human coding of infant vocalizations using all-day home recordings, babies of all ages from birth up to a year old squealed and growled in significant ...

Brain Connectivity Patterns Differ in Infants at Familial Risk for Autism

May 22, 2024 — A study has found distinct brain connectivity patterns in six-week-old infants at risk for developing autism spectrum disorder ...