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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. Building a developmental science of redemption

   https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dr.2024.101183  

   Yonas, Daniel; Solomon, Larisa Heiphetz (March 2025, Developmental Review)

   Stories about redemption are ubiquitous; people emphasize moral improvement when describing their own lives and, often, others' lives as well. However, psychology does not yet have a well-developed literature concerning redemption, and developmental science has not addressed questions regarding how perceptions of redemption might emerge or change between childhood and adulthood. To the extent that past research has spoken to this issue, it has pointed in contradictory directions. Two different theories—focusing on essentialism and on optimism—make two different developmental predictions about how and why judgments of redemption might change with age. Integrating these perspectives, we propose a novel theory of redemption that puts work on essentialism and optimism in conversation with each other. The theory of redemption further highlights the role of social inputs (e.g., experiences with their own and others' moral change) as mechanisms that can lead children to hold more redemptive views than do adults. The theory of redemption accounts for previous findings in developmental science and makes novel predictions regarding the social inputs and consequences of redemptive views. 

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3. A Developmental-Science Perspective on Social Inequality

   https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721420964147  

   Elenbaas, Laura; Rizzo, Michael_T; Killen, Melanie (November 2020, Current Directions in Psychological Science)

   Many people believe in equality of opportunity but overlook and minimize the structural factors that shape social inequalities in the United States and around the world, such as systematic exclusion (e.g., educational, occupational) based on group membership (e.g., gender, race, socioeconomic status). As a result, social inequalities persist and place marginalized social groups at elevated risk for negative emotional, learning, and health outcomes. Where do the beliefs and behaviors that underlie social inequalities originate? Recent evidence from developmental science indicates that an awareness of social inequalities begins in childhood and that children seek to explain the underlying causes of the disparities that they observe and experience. Moreover, children and adolescents show early capacities for understanding and rectifying inequalities when regulating access to resources in peer contexts. Drawing on a social reasoning developmental framework, we synthesize what is currently known about children’s and adolescents’ awareness, beliefs, and behavior concerning social inequalities and highlight promising avenues by which developmental science can help reduce harmful assumptions and foster a more just society. 

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4. Importance of investing in adolescence from a developmental science perspective

   https://doi.org/10.1038/nature25770  

   Dahl, Ronald E.; Allen, Nicholas B.; Wilbrecht, Linda; Suleiman, Ahna Ballonoff (February 2018, Nature)
5. An open developmental science will be more rigorous, robust, and impactful

   https://doi.org/10.1002/icd.2254  

   Gilmore, Rick O.; Qian, Yiming (June 2021, Infant and Child Development)

   Abstract Developmental science poses some of the most profound problems in all of science and some of the most difficult ones. Because the answers are so important to human health and well‐being, it's essential that researchers do everything possible to accelerate discovery and promote reproducibility and rigour. In this essay, we argue that fully embracing open practices—especially data and materials sharing—will achieve the goals of making developmental science more rigorous, robust, and impactful while simultaneously accelerating discovery. 

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