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1. A matter of time: Developmental cascades for developmental science

   https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2025.102078  

   Schneider, Joshua L; West, Kelsey L (July 2025, Infant Behavior and Development)

   Rankin, Lela (Ed.)

   The pace and breadth of infant development is remarkable—by their third birthday, infants acquire an impressive range of skills across multiple domains. Studying the complexities of cross-domain development, however, poses a challenge for a field of researchers with traditionally siloed expertise. The developmental cascades framework—the conceptual view that disparate domains are interconnected and reciprocally influential—offers researchers a flexible approach to identify and describe infant development. Over the past quarter century, cascades have surged in popularity among infancy researchers. In this review, we provide a history of developmental cascades research and highlight its contributions to the science of infant behavior and development. We discuss contemporary themes and challenges cascades researchers face (e.g., how to clear the high bar needed to establish causality among links in a cascading chain of events) and make recommendations for future research. Specifically, we propose that adopting a cascades approach encourages researchers to: (1) consider the ‘whole child’ by charting connections across different domains; (2) examine multiple timescales by linking moment-to-moment interactions to broader changes across development; (3) embrace complexity and foster interdisciplinary collaboration; and (4) gather evidence for causal pathways by combining the rigor of lab experiments with the richness of natural observations. Finally, we consider future directions for the next quarter century of cascades research—for developmental science, applied psychology, and clinical intervention. 

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2. APA handbook of pediatric psychology, developmental-behavioral pediatrics, and developmental science: Developmental science and developmental origins of risk and resilience in childhood and adolescence (Vol. 1).

   https://doi.org/10.1037/0000413-000  

   Glidden, J; Yee, K; Killen, M (January 2025, American Psychological Association)

   Bornstein, Marc H; Shah, Prachi E (Ed.)
3. Examining developmental plasticity in the skeletal system through a sensitive developmental windows framework

   https://doi.org/10.1002/ajpa.24338  

   McPherson, Cait B. (June 2021, American Journal of Physical Anthropology)

   null (Ed.)

   Developmental plasticity facilitates energetically costly but potentially fitness-enhancing adjustments to phenotypic trajectories in response to environmental stressors, and thus may significantly impact patterns of growth, morbidity, and mortality over the life course. Ongoing research into epigenetics and developmental biology indicate that the timing of stress exposures is a key factor when assessing their impact on developmental processes. Specifically, stress experienced within sensitive developmental windows (SDWs), discrete developmental periods characterized by heightened energy requirements and rapid growth, may alter the pace and tempo of growth in ways that significantly influence phenotypic development over both the short and long term. In human skeletal biology, efforts to assess how developmental environments shape health outcomes over the life course could be enhanced by incorporating the SDW concept into existing methodological approaches. The goal of this article is to outline an interpretive framework for identifying and interpreting evidence of developmental stress in the skeletal system using the SDW concept. This framework provides guidance for the identification of elements most likely to capture evidence of stress most relevant to a study's core research questions, the interpretation of developmental stress exhibited by those elements, and the relationship of skeletal indicators of stress to the demographic patterning of morbidity and mortality. Use of the SDW concept in skeletal biology has the potential to enrich traditional approaches to addressing developmental origins of health and disease hypotheses, by targeting periods in which individuals are most susceptible to stress and thus most likely to exhibit plasticity in response. 

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4. Thyroid hormone coordinates developmental trajectories but does not underlie developmental truncation in danionins

   https://doi.org/10.1002/dvdy.76  

   Hu, Yinan; Mauri, Angela; Donahue, Joan; Singh, Rajendra; Acosta, Benjamin; McMenamin, Sarah (July 2019, Developmental Dynamics)

   Abstract BackgroundDifferences in postembryonic developmental trajectories can profoundly alter adult phenotypes and life histories. Thyroid hormone (TH) regulates metamorphosis in many vertebrate taxa with multiphasic ecologies, and alterations to TH metabolism underlie notable cases of paedomorphosis in amphibians. We tested the requirement for TH in multiple postembryonic developmental processes in zebrafish, which has a monophasic ecology, and asked if TH production was compromised in paedomorphicDanionella. ResultsWe showed that TH regulates allometric growth in juvenile zebrafish, and inhibits relative head growth. The lateral line system showed differential requirements for TH: the hormone promotes canal neuromast formation and inhibits neuromast proliferation in the head, but causes expansion of the neuromast population in the trunk. WhileDanionellamorphology resembled that of larval zebrafish, the twoDanionellaspecies analyzed were not similar to hypothyroid zebrafish in their shape or neuromast distribution, and both possessed functional thyroid follicles. ConclusionsAlthough zebrafish do not undergo a discrete ecological transformation, we found that multiple tissues undergo transitions in developmental trajectories that are dependent on TH, suggesting the TH axis and its downstream pathways as likely targets for adaptation. Nonetheless, we found no evidence that evolutionary paedomorphosis inDanionellais the result of compromised TH production. 

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5. Evolutionary Developmental Psychology: 2017 Redux

   https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.13018  

   Legare, Cristine H.; Clegg, Jennifer M.; Wen, Nicole J. (January 2018, Child Development)