IRADS: The Study of Culture, Social Settings, and Child Development across School Transitions

到2040年，人们被确定为？少数民族？将占美国人口的一半在城市中，绝大多数进入学前/小学和高中的儿童是拉丁美洲人，亚洲人或非洲裔美国人，这些儿童及其家庭如何适应这些高风险的学校过渡将对儿童的发展结果以及美国的未来产生长期影响。迫切需要系统地调查来自不同文化社区的儿童在重大过渡时期的经历和发展道路。作为回应，纽约大学IRADS建立在纽约大学文化，发展和教育研究中心（CRCDE）的5年研究基础上，并寻求推进关于不同种族人群中儿童社会，情感和认知发展的科学理论和知识。计划跟踪一组900个城市家庭，主要是墨西哥、多米尼加、中国、欧洲和非洲裔美国人体面的低收入和工人阶级家庭，这些家庭有幼儿（4-7岁）和青少年（13-17岁），因为他们的孩子进入学前/小学和高中。这些家庭中的大多数在过去几年中参加了儿童权利和教育中心的研究，并提供了关于这些儿童和家庭从儿童出生（幼儿组）到进入中学（青少年组）的背景经历的丰富资料。这五个种族群体被选中进行研究，因为他们构成了纽约市的大多数儿童。此外，它们使具有不同移民身份、种族和肤色歧视历史、公民身份以及语言和文化背景的群体之间形成对比。计划开展的活动包括继续收集关于儿童认知、社会和情感发展以及家庭和学校环境中的经历等方面的原始数据，这些数据对儿童在关键过渡时期的经历最为敏感。在社会发展领域，重点将是社会能力和社会认同。 对于认知发展，重点将放在语言/识字，数学概念和表现，分类技能，注意力能力，以及学术表现和参与。在情绪发展方面，重点将放在儿童的情绪调节上。这些技能共同构成了健康发展成果的基石。在家庭和学校环境中，重点将是父母、教师和儿童的信念和做法;关系的质量（例如，家长-子女、教师-子女）;以及财政资源。这项研究的智力价值包括产生新的，有文化基础的理论和知识的发展和来自不同种族背景的儿童在多个发展领域，社会环境和重大发展转型的经验。《更广泛的影响》是由一套综合计划制定的，旨在通过以下方式促进对不同族裔人口的研究和教育：（1）培训新一代学者（特别是代表性不足的少数群体）参与推进科学使命的研究;（2）分享工具、方法、和研究结果，以加强研究人员的科学能力，从事对儿童发展问题具有文化敏感性的研究;（3）通过出版物、培训、简报和社区外展，向研究人员、教育工作者和决策者传播研究结果;（4）加强地方、国家和国际伙伴关系。

By 2040, people identified as ?ethnic minority? will comprise half the U.S. population. In urban cities, the vast majority of children entering preschool/elementary school and high school are Latino, Asian or African American, and how well these children and their families adjust to these high-stake school transitions will have long term implications for children's developmental outcomes as well as the future of the U.S. In the context of growing diversity among the nation's children, systematic inquiry into the experiences and developmental pathways of children from different cultural communities during periods of major transitions is urgently needed. In response, the NYU IRADS builds on 5 years of research under NYU's Center for Research on Culture, Development and Education (CRCDE), and seeks to advance scientific theory and knowledge on children's social, emotional and cognitive development in ethnically diverse populations. Plans are to follow a group of 900 urban, predominantly low-income and working class families of Mexican, Dominican, Chinese, European and African American decent with young children (4-7 years) and adolescents (13-17 years) as children enter preschool/elementary school and high school. The majority of these families have participated in the research of the CRCDE over the past several years, and have already provided rich information on the background experiences of these children and families beginning at children's birth (in the early childhood group) and entry into middle school (in the adolescent group). The five ethnic groups were selected for study, as they comprise the majority of children in New York City. In addition, they enable contrasts among groups with different immigration statuses, histories of discrimination related to race and skin color, citizenship status, and language and cultural backgrounds. The planned activities involve continued gathering of original data on aspects of children's cognitive, social, and emotional development and experiences in home and school settings that would be most sensitive to children's experiences across critical transitions. Within the area of social development, focus will be on social competence and social identity. For cognitive development, focus will be on language/literacy, math concepts and performance, classification skills, attention abilities, and academic performance and engagement. For emotional development, focus will be on children's emotion regulation. Together, these skills form the building blocks for healthy developmental outcomes. In home and school settings, focus will be on the beliefs and practices of parents, teachers and children; the quality of relationships (e.g., parent-child, teacher child); and financial resources. The Intellectual Merit of this research includes the generation of new, culturally grounded theory and knowledge on the development and experiences of children from diverse ethnic backgrounds across multiple developmental areas, social settings, and significant developmental transitions. The Broader Impacts are framed by a set of integrated plans to advance research and education on ethnically diverse populations through the: (1) training of a new generation of scholars (especially underrepresented minorities) to engage in research that advances the scientific mission; (2) sharing of instruments, methods, and findings so as to strengthen the scientific capacity of researchers to engage in culturally sensitive studies of children's development; (3) dissemination of findings to researchers, educators and policy makers through publications, trainings, briefings and community outreach; and (4) strengthening of local, national, and international partnerships.