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Early childhood intervention is particularly cost-beneficial when it reduces justice involvement, but ingredients that contribute to this outcome are unknown. The goal of this study was to estimate the effects of two common early childhood intervention ingredients--home visits and center-based education--on juvenile justice involvement. The Infant Health and Development Program (IHDP) randomized 1090 premature and low-birth-weight babies to intervention or control groups. Intervention group families were offered home visits from birth to age 3 years and high-quality center-based early childhood education from ages 1 to 3 years, but varied in their take-up of each intervention component. We estimated (1) intent-to-treat effects and (2) the effects of families' level of participation in each intervention component, using a novel stratification approach to minimize the impact of self-selection bias on dosage. Outcomes were children's risk of being stopped by police, arrested, or incarcerated, by age 18 years. Intent-to-treat analyses showed no effects of the IHDP for both sexes combined, nor for girls only, on any of the three outcomes, but there was an intent-to-treat effect on boys' risk of being arrested, OR = 0.43 (95% CI 0.24, 0.76). Analyses of dosage effects showed that, for both sexes combined, participation in the center-based educational component decreased the odds of being stopped by the police by 3% for each month of services. For boys only, the odds of being arrested decreased by 4% with each month of home visits and by 4% with each month of center-based educational services. We conclude that high-quality center-based early childhood education and, to some extent, home visits, reduce justice involvement among biologically vulnerable children, especially boys.

We present results of a randomized control trial of a two-generation English as a Second Language (ESL) program in which all families participated in Head Start while treatment parents also enrolled in a high dosage, family-focused ESL curriculum with supportive services. Examining 197 parent-child dyads among Spanish- (89%) and Zomi-speaking (11%) immigrant families, we found improvements in participant parents' English reading skills and engagement with their child's teacher after one year. Parents with low levels of English proficiency (57%) at program start reported more positive parenting skills and lower levels of psychological distress whereas parents with more advanced English proficiency (43%) reported more parenting stress and higher levels of psychological distress. We did not find main effects on children's language and cognitive skills. We conclude by discussing policy implications of a two-generation approach for immigrant families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Childhood adversity is thought to undermine youth socioemotional development via altered neural function within regions that support emotion processing. These effects are hypothesized to be developmentally specific, with adversity in early childhood sculpting subcortical structures (e.g., amygdala) and adversity during adolescence impacting later-developing structures (e.g., prefrontal cortex; PFC). However, little work has tested these theories directly in humans. Using prospectively collected longitudinal data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS) (N = 4,144) and neuroimaging data from a subsample of families recruited in adolescence (N = 162), the current study investigated the trajectory of harsh parenting across childhood (i.e., ages 3 to 9) and how initial levels versus changes in harsh parenting across childhood were associated with corticolimbic activation and connectivity during socioemotional processing. Harsh parenting in early childhood (indexed by the intercept term from a linear growth curve model) was associated with less amygdala, but not PFC, reactivity to angry facial expressions. In contrast, change in harsh parenting across childhood (indexed by the slope term) was associated with less PFC, but not amygdala, activation to angry faces. Increases in, but not initial levels of, harsh parenting were also associated with stronger positive amygdala–PFC connectivity during angry face processing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Psychosocial stress in childhood and adolescence is linked to stress system dysregulation, although few studies have examined the relative impacts of parental harshness and parental disengagement. This study prospectively tested whether parental harshness and disengagement show differential associations with overall cortisol output in adolescence. Associations between overall cortisol output and adolescent mental health problems were tested concurrently. Adolescents from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS) provided hair samples for cortisol assay at 15 years (N = 171). Caregivers reported on parental harshness and disengagement experiences at 1, 3, 5, 9, and 15 years, and adolescents reported at 15 years. Both parent and adolescent reported depressive and anxiety symptoms and antisocial behaviors at 15. Greater parental harshness from 1–15 years, and harshness reported at 15 years in particular, was associated with higher overall cortisol output at 15. Greater parental disengagement from 1–15 years, and disengagement at 1 year specifically, was associated with lower cortisol output. There were no significant associations between cortisol output and depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, or antisocial behaviors. These results suggest that the unique variances of parental harshness and disengagement may have opposing associations with cortisol output at 15 years, with unclear implications for adolescent mental health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A lack of affordable housing is a pressing issue for many low‐income American families and can lead to eviction from their homes. Housing assistance programs to address this problem include public housing and other assistance, including vouchers, through which a government agency offsets the cost of private market housing. This paper assesses whether the receipt of either category of assistance reduces the probability that a family will be evicted from their home in the subsequent six years. Because no randomized trial has assessed these effects, we use observational data and formalize the conditions under which a causal interpretation is warranted. Families living in public housing experience less eviction conditional on pre‐treatment variables. We argue that this evidence points toward a causal conclusion that assistance, particularly public housing, protects families from eviction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the effects of the two‐generation program CareerAdvance—which combines education and training for parents in healthcare with Head Start for children—on children's academic, language, mathematics, and inhibitory control followed for 3 years. The sample (collected in Tulsa, Oklahoma from 2011 to 2018) includes 147 children in the CareerAdvance group and 139 children in a matched comparison group (n = 286; 40% Black, 17%, White, 10% Hispanic, 33% Mixed Race, or Other Race; M = 3.6 years old; 47% female). Overall, the effect of CareerAdvance on child outcomes is neither greater nor less than Head Start alone. These findings suggest that children's developmental outcomes do not worsen or improve in the short term when their parents return to school. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Associations between adversity and youth psychopathology likely vary based on the types and timing of experiences. Major theories suggest that the impact of childhood adversity may either be cumulative in type (the more types of adversity, the worse outcomes) or in timing (the longer exposure, the worse outcomes) or, alternatively, specific concerning the type (e.g., parenting, home, neighborhood) or the timing of adversity (e.g., specific developmental periods). In a longitudinal sample from the Future of Families and Wellbeing Study ( N = 4,210), we evaluated these competing hypotheses using a data-driven structured life-course modeling approach using risk factors examined at child age 1 (infancy), 3 (toddlerhood), 5 (early childhood), and 9 (middle childhood). Results showed that exposures to more types of adversity for longer durations (i.e., cumulative in both type and timing) best predicted youth psychopathology. Adversities that occurred at age 9 were better predictors of youth psychopathology as compared to those experienced earlier, except for neglect, which was predictive of internalizing symptoms when experienced at age 3. Throughout childhood (across ages 1-9), aside from the accumulation of all adversities, parental stress and low collective efficacy were the strongest predictors of internalizing symptoms, whereas psychological aggression was predictive of externalizing symptoms.