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Verbal testimony about reality status is critical but often contradictory. These studies address whom children consider reliable sources of information about reality and how they evaluate conflicting testimony. In Study 1, seventy 4- to 8-year-olds heard an adult or child provide testimony about how to cook food and use toys, and about the reality of unfamiliar entities. Children selected the adult for food and the child for toys. Six- and 8-year-olds also selected the adult regarding reality. In Study 2, ninety 4- to 8-year-olds heard conflicting reality information from children and adults. Six- to 8-year-olds endorsed adult and child claims differentially and stated that adults knew more. By age 6, children favor adult testimony about reality over that of children.

Executive functions (EF) have been identified as important predictors of children's proximal and distal development. Recent research highlights pretend play as a potential mechanism for EF development, and there has been a call to identify for whom pretense in most beneficial. The current study investigated whether an association found between children's propensity towards pretend play in preschool and EF skills 2 years later depended on an aspect of their temperament, specifically their ability to regulate their emotions. Importantly, this was examined in a Head Start population (N=188 children, ages 4-5), where EF skills are often delayed. Results revealed that pretense was only related to EF among children who had poor ER skills; among children who had trouble regulating their emotions in preschool, engaging in high levels of pretend play was associated with better EF outcomes in first grade. These findings suggest the need for future studies to determine if pretense interventions can assist in the development of EF among children with poor ER skills.

Children's ability to understand and infer the thoughts and feelings of others influences how they develop a unique view of the world. Examining developmental factors that impact young children's success in both social and cognitive domains has important implications for advancing our current knowledge of social cognition. The purpose of this study was to examine relations among emotion knowledge, deception detection, and Theory of Mind to shed light on the development of social cognition. Specifically, preschoolers' deception detection skills were found to moderate the relationship between emotion knowledge and Theory of Mind. Thus, children's ability to use their emotion knowledge to understand the points of view of others varies as a function of their ability to detect deception. Implications for child development are discussed.

Maladaptive perfectionism has the potential to put gifted individuals at an increased risk for cardiac events via the reduced heart rate variability that results from chronic negative affect and physiological stress reactions. As a result, implementing affective interventions into gifted programs may play a critical role in teaching gifted children with maladaptive perfectionism stress-management techniques and coping strategies, which could help keep gifted children with maladaptive perfectionism from growing into adults with similar issues who are then at an increased risk of negative health consequences. Through a review of the theoretical and empirical literature, the current article explores the possible ramifications of maladaptive perfectionism on the health of both gifted children and adults, with a specific focus on the relationship of maladaptive perfectionism to stress and cardiovascular disease. Suggestions for the implementation of preventative measures in the form of targeted affective interventions based on the review of the literature are then provided.

Individuals emerge as leaders across the lifespan; however, research investigating early childhood leaders is scant. This study assessed leadership in early childhood (N = 375) by using latent profile analysis of secondary data to examine how skill profiles are related to preschool leader scores. Skill profiles included scores for executive functioning, emotion regulation, imagination, theory of mind, vocabulary, and reception of prosocial behaviors (likeability). Six distinct profiles emerged with variation of high and low skill groupings. Four profiles with higher skill groupings also scored the highest on the leader construct but were not statistically different from each other. These findings support previous research that suggests that leaders may be identifiable in early childhood, and that there may be more than one pathway to early childhood leadership (i.e., differing skill combinations). With further research, these findings may have implications for curriculum development and the selection of peer models in clinical practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the early 1960s through the early 1970s, a new idea drew the interest of local leaders and national networks of educators seeking to further desegregation but concerned about how to do so within the bounds of white resistance. Huge single- or multischool campuses, called education parks, would draw students from broad geographical areas and facilitate desegregation. But in the design and location choices for these imagined (but often not realized) education parks, desegregation advocates revealed a spatial ideology of schooling that reflected both a rejection of racialized black spaces and an antiurban, modernist aesthetic. Beyond recognizing the place of spatial ideology in desegregation advocacy, this article suggests that historians of education listen for ideas about space and their impact in other areas of educational history.

Popular understandings of segregation often emphasize the Jim Crow South before the 1954 "Brown" decision and, in many instances, explain continued segregation in schooling as the result of segregated housing patterns. The case of Flint, Michigan, complicates these views, at once illustrating the depth of governmental commitment to segregation in a northern community and showing how segregated schools and neighborhoods helped construct one another. The Flint case also reveals new modes of segregationist thought. Throughout much of the twentieth century, Flint's city leaders thought of segregation as splitting, and they sought to divide their city along racial lines. But they thought of segregation as joining as well. Drawing on various strands of progressive reform and educational thought, Flint's educational, business, and philanthropic leaders believed community bonds would be stronger in segregated neighborhoods anchored by their schools. Flint's "community schools" program worked toward this end, exemplifying the paired embrace of segregation as joining and splitting, and becoming a model for educators in hundreds of cities nationwide.

Research Findings: Emotion regulation is a strong predictor of both short- and long-term peer relationships and social competence and is often targeted in preschool curricula and interventions. Pretense is a natural activity of childhood that is thought to facilitate the development of socialization, perspective taking, language, and possibly emotion regulation. This study investigated whether fantasy-oriented children, who engage in more pretense, demonstrate higher levels of emotion regulation. Prekindergartners (n = 103) and teachers were given a battery of measures assessing children's emotion regulation, fantasy orientation, theory of mind, and language. Results from hierarchical regression analyses indicated that children's proclivity toward fantastical play (their fantasy orientation) uniquely predicted 24% of the variance in their emotion regulation skills over and above typical predictors: age, theory of mind, and language skills. That is, children who participated in more fantasy pretense demonstrated better emotion regulation skills than their peers. Practice or Policy: The present study suggests that future research, curriculum, and interventions should focus on targeting fantastical pretense to assess causal mechanisms of emotion regulation development. Teachers and parents should encourage children's fantastical pretense, as research suggests it may be an important contributor to the development of critical socialization skills such as emotion regulation.

Background/Context: In the first half of the 20th century, American policy makers at all levels of government, alongside housing and real estate industry figures, crafted mechanisms of racial exclusion that helped to segregate metropolitan residential landscapes. Although educators and historians have recognized the long-term consequences of these policies for the making of educational segregation, they have not yet fully perceived how strongly ideas about public schools mattered in the shaping of these exclusionary practices. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: This historical study examines the "neighborhood unit" concept, its origins, and its influence, to illustrate the centrality of schooling in shaping mechanisms of racial segregation. The "neighborhood unit" concept, advocated during the 1920s by planner Clarence Perry before becoming central to local-level planning as well as federal-level housing policy, imagined self-contained communities within cities. Each of the units featured multi-purpose school-community facilities at their literal spatial as well as conceptual center. Perry and the influential cadre of planners who adopted the concept thought it would make metropolitan areas more livable, vibrant, and socially cohesive. But their neighborhood unit idea also encouraged racial segregation, in both schools and residential areas. Research Design: Sources for this qualitative historical investigation include published and unpublished primary sources from individuals, organizations, and government entities involved in making and using the idea of the neighborhood unit as well as extant historical scholarship. Conclusions/Recommendations: The history of the neighborhood unit shows that ideas about schools were central in the creation of the modern metropolitan landscape and enduring patterns of racial segregation. This evidence furthers the growing historical interpretation that housing segregation and school segregation operate not as separate terrain, but in deep connection with one another. By acknowledging and incorporating this historical perspective, educators and policy makers can reconceptualize segregation's roots, and perhaps its remedies.