Why do Inequalities Emerge in Children's Early Cognitive Development?

英国的社会不平等问题对幼儿的影响尤为严重。社会不平等与一系列儿童成果有关，包括入学准备、学业成绩和语言技能。入学准备，即从早期学习经验中受益的能力，是改善生活机会的一个重要因素，因此，它正在成为世界各地许多政府日益重视的问题。提高入学准备的关键是促进学习的注意力和自我调节技能。然而，新出现的证据表明，社会不平等对这些注意力和自我调节技能有特定的影响，这些技能被称为“执行功能”。“我最近的研究发现，来自弱势背景的儿童的执行功能发育不太好，这可能解释了为什么他们的入学准备较差。为了制定支持儿童的干预措施，我们迫切需要了解执行功能不平等产生的途径。由于这种联系只是最近才被记录下来，很少有研究来研究为什么这些早期认知技能的不平等首先出现。该项目将重点关注我们认为最有可能解释早期执行功能发展不平等的两种机制：1）亲子互动和2）儿童语言。早期的行为被认为是对儿童如何发展调节行为能力的主要影响。父母帮助孩子解决问题的亲子互动往往为丰富父母的投入提供了机会。在这种互动中，培养了两种重要的技能。首先，孩子们会发展出规则策略，然后内化。第二，孩子们发展语言技能，帮助他们设定和保持目标。这两者都是支持执行功能发展的关键。我们将看看这些类型的亲子互动与儿童的发展，同时也考虑更广泛的背景家庭因素，可能会影响父母是否可以参与这些互动。我们将与社会多元化的家庭合作，并使用新开发的任务来跟踪儿童的执行功能在学前早期的几个时间点的发展，这些技能正在迅速发展。该项目将为地方政府和第三部门专业人员提供急需的证据基础，以限制社会不平等的影响，并制定基于证据的方法，以支持儿童的发展和缩小早期不平等。

The problems of social inequality in the UK disproportionately affect young children. Social inequality is associated with a range of childhood outcomes including school readiness, academic attainment and language skills. School readiness, the ability to benefit from early learning experiences, is a vital factor in improving life opportunities and as such, it is becoming an increasing priority for many governments worldwide. Key to improving school readiness is promoting the attentional and self-regulation skills that underpin learning. However, emerging evidence suggests that social inequality has a specific effect on these attention and self-regulation skills, known as 'executive functions.' My recent research has found that children from disadvantaged backgrounds have less well developed executive functions and this may explain why they have poorer school readiness. In order to develop interventions to support children, we urgently need to understand the pathways through which inequalities in executive functions arise. As this link has only been relatively recently documented, little research has been done to examine why these inequalities in early cognitive skills first emerge. The project will focus on two mechanisms which we believe are most likely to explain inequalities in early executive function development: 1) parent-child interactions and 2) child language. Early caregiving behaviours are thought to be a primary influence on how children develop the ability to regulate their behaviour. Parent child interactions that involve parents helping children to solve problems often provide opportunities for enriched parental input. During these kinds of interactions, two important skills are fostered. First, children develop regulation strategies that then become internalised. Second, children develop language skills that help them to set and maintain goals. Both of these are key to supporting the development of executive functions. We will look at how these kinds of parent-child interaction relate to children's development, whilst also considering broader contextual family factors that may influence whether parents can engage in these interactions. We will work with socially diverse families and use newly developed tasks to track the development of children's executive functions at several time points over the early preschool years when these skills are rapidly developing. The project will provide a much-needed evidence base for local government and third sector professionals working to limit the impact of social inequality and for developing evidence-based ways that can support children's development and narrow early inequalities.