Abstract Is accurate scientific knowledge of a counterintuitive concept enough to teach it? Coexistence accounts of conceptual change hold that scientific explanations coexist with, rather than replace, intuitive ones, so teaching well may demand not only knowledge but the inhibition of competing intuitions—something reflection can support. We asked three questions: whether parents' accurate knowledge alone is sufficient to teach natural selection, whether the form of reflection shapes how parents teach, and what children take from these conversations. In 2018, we recruited 100 parent–child dyads at a U.S. university laboratory (5- to 9-year-old children, 44 girls; parents 79% women, 94% college-educated, majority White, mixed ethnicities). Parents taught their child either with no preparation (control) or after reflecting on their understanding by answering questions, with or without also hearing an explanatory storybook. Children's understanding improved only when parents not only understood natural selection but had reflected beforehand. Answering questions prompted a more question-asking teaching style and storybook exposure a more expository one; both helped children generate accurate concepts, which predicted mechanistic learning. However, knowledge alone was not enough.
Abstract We evaluate Ahlan Simsim, an emotional development-focused television show produced by Sesame Workshop and Jordan Pioneers, through a cluster-randomized controlled trial in Jordan preprimary classrooms (n = 216 schools, 4,369 children; endline Mage = 66.9 months; 51% female; 97% Jordanian, 3% Syrian; data collected 2021–2022). Treatment classrooms received daily Ahlan Simsim viewing added to the KG2 curriculum for 12 weeks; control classrooms received the curriculum alone. Significant positive impacts were found on expressive emotion recognition, emotion situation knowledge, and one emotion regulation strategy, breathing, but not receptive emotion recognition or other emotion regulation strategies. Effect sizes (d) range from 0.11 to 0.36. Costs of intervention delivery are estimated at $3–7 per child. Implications for children's media and social-emotional learning interventions are discussed.
Abstract While there is a wide range of environments that have been implicated in executive function (EF) development, most are related to the behavior of genetic relatives such as parents, meaning there is significant risk that genetics confound these relationships. Using data from 7,925 ethnically and socio-economically diverse Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development cohort study participants aged 9–10, we examined evidence of genetic confounding in EF's relationship with two socioeconomic status (SES) variables (maternal education and household income), and two parenting measures (family conflict and parental monitoring), using multiple methods. Twin models found that relationships between parenting and EF variables were best explained by genetics, which was replicated by bivariate genome-wide complex trait analysis (GCTA). Bivariate GCTA also found that SES-EF relationships displayed substantial genetic confounding, consistent with univariate twin findings of no shared environment. However, polygenic scores (PGS) provided no significant evidence of genetic confounding, consistent with their lower proportion of genetic variance captured. These results provide strong evidence of genetic confounding in EF in middle childhood, and should encourage researchers to be more aware of the risk of genetic confounding in their designs. They also indicate that PGS are poor controls for genetic confounding in EF, necessitating other methods be employed to address their limitations.
Abstract The present study proposes a framework of critical ethnic-racial socialization. A pilot study with 74 parents (32% Latinx; 27% Black; 19% White; 11% Asian; 8% Multiracial; 3% indigenous) and their 3- to 7-year-old children (57% girls) conducted in 2024–2025 was used to instantiate the framework. Specifically, behavioral observations of parent–child play served to establish proof of concept. Data were consistent with the ethnic-racial socialization literature (i.e., ethnic-racial heritage, ethnic-racial pride, preparation for bias) and the critical consciousness literature (i.e., critical awareness, critical action). Data further suggested messages about ethnic-racial diversity, acceptance and inclusion, and appreciation of diversity. Findings show that even in early childhood, parents engage in strategies to promote children's ethnic-racial identity and critical consciousness.
Abstract Food neophobia, the tendency to reject novel food, has been linked to children's categorization and executive functions in cross-sectional research, but the developmental direction of these relations remains unclear. This longitudinal study examined reciprocal relations between these variables across one school year in French children. Participants were 113 children (50 girls; M age = 48.30 ± 7.20 months at Time 1) recruited from five public preschools in a large metropolitan area. Data were collected between 2023 and 2024 (Time 2). Race and ethnicity data were not collected due to national regulations. Caregivers reported children's food neophobia, and children completed a food categorization task and measures of working memory, inhibition, and cognitive flexibility. Most constructs showed temporal stability across waves. Higher food neophobia at Time 1 predicted lower categorization performance (β = −.263) and lower executive functions (β = −.195), controlling for prior levels. In contrast, categorization performance and executive functions did not predict subsequent changes in food neophobia. These findings suggest that food neophobia prospectively relates to later differences in children's executive functions and their ability to use food-category knowledge under task demands, consistent with the possibility that early avoidance tendencies shape engagement with cognitively informative experiences during development.
