This revised proposal describes a longitudinal study that addresses both basic and applied questions regarding early child development by examining basic emotion and cognitive processes. We propose to examine the trajectories of emotional and cognitive control and understanding at three time points across the preschool to kindergarten period and assess their relation to early social and academic functioning in kindergarten. The theoretical framework guiding this work hypothesizes that emotional control will affect the trajectories of cognitive development, but that both sets of processes will predict successful adjustment to kindergarten. This framework also specifies a moderating effect of parenting processes in differentially affecting these emotional and cognitive developments. Three hundred children will be assessed at ages 3.5, 4.5, and during the child's transition to kindergarten. At each age, a battery of emotion and cognition tasks will be administered and parent-child interaction will be observed. In addition, during the kindergarten assessment, measures of social and academic competence will be collected. The proposal is a significant and necessary first step toward (1) specifying the core emotion and cognition processes that are implicated in early social and academic success;(2) understanding the developmental trajectories of these processes and the connections between these process;and (3) identifying the parenting factors that affect these emotion and cognition trajectories.
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