Department of Psychology.
Dev Psychol. 2019 Mar;55(3):623-636. doi: 10.1037/dev0000651. Epub 2018 Dec 27.
Publicly funded center-based preschool programs were designed to enhance low-income children's early cognitive and social-emotional skills in preparation for kindergarten. In the U.S., the federal Head Start program and state-funded public school-based pre-kindergarten (pre-k) programs are the two primary center-based settings in which low-income children experience publicly funded preschool. Although evidence suggests that these programs generally promote cognitive and social-emotional skills for low-income children overall, whether the benefits of program participation vary for low-income children with difficult temperaments is unexplored. Difficult temperament status is a source of vulnerability that connotes increased risk for poor early school outcomes-risks that may be ameliorated by public preschool programs known to promote kindergarten readiness among other vulnerable populations. Using a nationally representative sample of low-income children ( ≈ 3,000) drawn from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort (ECLS-B), this study tests whether associations between public preschool participation and children's cognitive and social-emotional skills in kindergarten are moderated by difficult temperament status. We focus on Head Start and public school-based pre-k, comparing both with parental care and with each other. Results provide weak evidence that public preschool's benefits on children's cognitive and social-emotional skills in kindergarten are moderated by child temperament. School-based pre-k is significantly associated with better reading skills relative to parental care only for children with difficult temperaments. Additionally, for children with difficult temperaments, Head Start is significantly associated with better approaches to learning relative to parental care, and with reduced externalizing behavior problems relative to school-based pre-k. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
政府资助的以中心为基础的学前教育计划旨在提高低收入儿童的早期认知和社会情感技能，为他们进入幼儿园做准备。在美国，联邦政府的“先行计划”（Head Start program）和州政府资助的公立学校学前教育（pre-k）计划是低收入儿童接受政府资助学前教育的两个主要中心设置。尽管有证据表明，这些计划总体上促进了低收入儿童的认知和社会情感技能发展，但计划参与对气质困难的低收入儿童的益处是否不同，这一点尚未得到探索。气质困难状况是一个脆弱性的来源，意味着这些儿童在早期学校成绩方面存在较差的风险增加-这种风险可能通过众所周知的促进幼儿园准备的公共学前教育计划得到缓解，这些计划也能为其他弱势群体带来益处。本研究利用来自早期儿童纵向研究-出生队列（ECLS-B）的约 3000 名低收入儿童的全国代表性样本，测试了公共学前教育参与度与儿童在幼儿园的认知和社会情感技能之间的关系是否受到气质困难状况的调节。我们关注的是“先行计划”和公立学校的学前教育，将两者与父母照顾以及彼此进行比较。结果提供了一些微弱的证据表明，公共学前教育对儿童在幼儿园的认知和社会情感技能的益处受到儿童气质的调节。与父母照顾相比，只有在儿童气质困难的情况下，学校为基础的学前教育才与更好的阅读技能显著相关。此外，对于气质困难的儿童，与父母照顾相比，“先行计划”与更好的学习方法显著相关，与学校为基础的学前教育相比，外化行为问题也有所减少。（PsycINFO 数据库记录（c）2019 APA，保留所有权利）。
