California Preschool Learning Foundations - ECEZero2Three ...

competence, emotion regulation,
conscience development, and psychological
adjustment. Higher effortful
control is, in short, a benefit for young
children’s deliberate and socialized
conduct.
The research on executive function
seeks to explain young children’s problem-solving
behavior in regard to their
ability to regulate their attentional and
cognitive processes, another aspect
of self-regulation (see Zelazo and others
2003). This research identifies the
period of three to five years of age as
an especially important developmental
period for executive function, which
may be associated with concurrent
changes in brain functioning (Bunge
and Zelazo 2006; Diamond and Taylor
1996; Gerstadt, Hong, and Diamond
1994).
Among the various capacities young
children gradually acquire for selfcontrol,
emotion regulation has been
of particular interest to developmental
scientists because of its relevance to
social competence and psychological
adjustment. Thompson, Meyer, and
Jochem (in press) have written several
reviews of theory and research on this
topic, summarizing an expanding body
of research literature.
Social and Emotional
Understanding
Over the past several decades, there
has been an enormous amount of
research interest in the early development
of social and emotional understanding.
This interest has arisen from
the realization that, contrary to traditional
ideas, toddlers and preschoolers
are not egocentric but are, instead,
very interested in others’ beliefs and
how those beliefs compare with their
California Department of Education • Preschool Learning Foundations, Volume 1
own (see Dunn 1988; Saarni 1999).
Further exploration of this topic has
also been motivated by the realization
that early differences in social and
emotional understanding are associated
with individual differences in
social competence. Preschoolers who
are more socially and emotionally perceptive
are capable of greater success
in their relationships with peers and
adults (see Denham and others 2003;
Denham and others 2002a; Denham
and others 2002b; Denham and others
2001; and see reviews by Denham
1998, 2006; Denham and Weissberg
2004; Halberstadt, Denham, and
Dunsmore 2001), which is relevant to
school readiness. Young children who
are more competent in understanding
others’ feelings have been found, for
example, to become more academically
competent in the primary grades,
which may arise from the more successful
peer relationships to which
they contribute (Izard 2002; Izard and
others 2001; see also Dowsett and
Huston 2005; Raver 2002; Raver and
Knitzer 2002).
Preschoolers who are more socially
and emotionally perceptive are capable
of greater success in their relationships
with peers and adults . . .
23
In recent years, research in this area
has grown under the idea that young
children develop a progressively more
complex “theory of mind,” by which
they explain people’s behavior with
respect to internal mental states. They
gradually come to understand internal
mental states more and more fully.
Research on developing theory of mind
has focused on the ages of three to five
years, the period during which young
SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT