A longitudinal study of self-regulation development: Effects of early life stress and impact on school-readiness

项目总结/摘要 童年的一项主要任务是学习控制冲动，情绪和注意力。这种自我调节在 幼儿期预示着学习能力、社会情感能力和较少的行为问题。 经历过早期生活压力（如贫困、父母精神疾病）的儿童往往表现出更贫穷的生活。 自我调节，这可能是这些儿童经常观察到的更大的适应问题的原因。 此外，并非所有面临逆境的孩子在以后的生活中都会挣扎，自我调节可能是一个关键因素。 他们的韧性。因此，自我调节被认为是一种理想的干预机制， 向其他职能领域倾斜。然而，我们并不完全了解自我的发展， 监管本身，这是必要的，以确定预防性干预措施的目标， 在高风险环境中的儿童积极适应。本研究项目的总体目标是 了解有助于自我发展的背景，养育和生理因素， 随着时间的推移，在经历逆境的家庭中，儿童早期的监管。目的1：测试直接 情境因素、父母教养因素、生理因素与儿童自我调节的关系。目的 2：检验预测自我调节和社会情绪结果的路径模型，包括 通过父母养育，儿童睡眠和压力反应系统的调解途径。目标3：审查 保护性因素，促进弹性，尽管上下文风险。这些假设将在一个 对100名儿童及其家庭进行了抽样调查。父母和他们的3岁孩子将完成一个 一系列任务来衡量自我调节和养育行为的各个方面。家长也会 报告背景因素，如社会经济地位，他们自己的心理健康和家庭 环境将收集儿童的唾液，以测量皮质醇对应激源的反应。睡眠将是 使用活动记录仪和睡眠日记进行测量。社会情感和学校准备结果将是 通过客观评估、家长和教师报告来衡量。这项纵向研究将总共有四个 时间点，有两个亲自评估波和两个在线随访，使我们能够检查 纵向中介过程。从拟议的研究结果将阐明行为和 早期逆境和环境风险因素影响自我调节的生理机制，以及 自我调节如何影响社会情绪和学校准备结果。这将允许 制定有针对性的干预措施，帮助促进高风险儿童的自我调节和入学准备; 孩子

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT A major task of childhood is learning to control impulses, emotions, and attention. This self-regulation in early childhood predicts academic readiness, social-emotional competence, and fewer behavior problems. Children experiencing early life stress (e.g. poverty, parental mental illness) tend to demonstrate poorer self-regulation, which might account for greater adjustment problems often observed in these children. Additionally, not all children facing adversity struggle later in life and self-regulation may be a key factor in their resilience. Thus, self-regulation has been cited as an ideal mechanism for interventions likely to cascade to other areas of functioning. However, we don’t fully understand the development of self- regulation itself, which is needed in order to identify targets for preventive interventions aimed at promoting positive adjustment in children in high-risk settings. The overarching goal of this research project is to understand the contextual, parenting, and physiological factors that contribute to the development of self- regulation over time in early childhood in families experiencing adversity. Aim 1: To test the direct associations between the contextual, parenting, and physiological factors and children’s self-regulation. Aim 2: To examine the path model predicting self-regulation and socioemotional outcomes, including mediational pathways through parenting, child sleep, and the stress response system. Aim 3: To examine the protective factors that promote resilience despite contextual risk. These hypotheses will be tested in a sample of 100 young children and their families. Parents and their 3-year-old children will complete a battery of tasks to measure various aspects of self-regulation and parenting behavior. Parents will also report on contextual factors such as socioeconomic status, their own mental health, and the home environment. Saliva will be collected from the child to measure cortisol reactivity to a stressor. Sleep will be measured using actigraphy and sleep diaries. Socioemotional and school-readiness outcomes will be measured by objective assessments, parent- and teacher-report. This longitudinal study will have four total time points, with two in-person assessment waves and two online follow-ups, allowing us to examine longitudinal mediational processes. Results from the proposed study will elucidate the behavioral and physiological mechanisms by which early adversity and contextual risk factors impact self-regulation, and how self-regulation impacts socioemotional and school-readiness outcomes. This will allow for the development of targeted interventions to help promote self-regulation and school-readiness in high-risk children.