#cognitivedevelopment — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #cognitivedevelopment, aggregated by home.social.
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DATE: August 16, 2026 at 06:00PM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
-------------------------------------------------TITLE: Children can understand falsification through evidence as early as age 4
URL: https://www.psypost.org/children-can-understand-falsification-through-evidence-as-early-as-age-4/
A study in Germany found that, at 4 years of age, approximately half of children demonstrated the ability to provide valid verbal counterarguments. This percentage increased to 70% at 5.5 years old. At 4 years of age, 90% of children were able to select evidence that clearly refutes a false causal claim and proves the correct one. The paper was published in Developmental Psychology.
Scientific argumentation is the process of using evidence and reasoning to support, challenge, or revise explanations about how the world works. Rather than simply stating an opinion, a scientific argument connects a claim to observations or other evidence that can show why the claim should be accepted or rejected.
An important part of this process is being able to distinguish strong evidence from weak or misleading evidence, especially when several possible explanations exist. Scientific argumentation also involves considering alternative explanations and identifying evidence that could disconfirm a favored hypothesis.
These skills are central not only to scientific research but also to everyday decisions in which people must evaluate competing claims. They have become increasingly important in a world where people encounter large amounts of conflicting information through the internet and social media.
Study author Özgün Köksal and colleagues studied early scientific argumentation abilities and their development in preschool children. They focused on the development of these abilities from 4 to 5.5 years of age.
Study participants were 222 children from an urban area in Germany. The study authors note that participants predominantly came from White middle-class families. After some children dropped out or were excluded for various reasons, the final sample consisted of 191 4-year-olds. 85 of them were girls.
When the children reached 5.5 years of age, 25 more children dropped out and 1 was excluded, resulting in a total of 179 5.5-year-old participants. The children did not have any diagnosed developmental delays or disorders.
At both time points (when the children were 4 and when they were 5.5 years old) the children participated in two research sessions 2 weeks apart. The sessions were video and audio recorded. This study was a part of a larger project in which children completed many different tasks. The authors of this study focused on the children’s performance in the argumentation task.
The argumentation task consisted of two main phases: a learning phase and a test phase. The whole task lasted approximately 15 minutes. The learning phase was focused on children discovering what causes an LED light on a lightbox to switch on. There were 13 paper boxes varying in size and shape, some having a black dot and some not. The study authors set the light to activate when a paper box with that black dot was set on the lightbox, while the size and shape of the paper box were irrelevant.
At the start, the experimenter introduced a child to a puppet by having the child play simple games with the puppet and learning that the puppet can make mistakes. In the next part of this phase, children interacted with the lightbox and paper boxes and explored which boxes activate the light and which do not. They learned that it is the paper boxes with the black dot that activate the light.
In the test phase, the puppet made an incorrect claim about which features activate the light, such as claiming that size is important. The study authors then observed how children provided counterarguments and asked questions to get them to elaborate on their arguments.
In the last part of this phase, children were tasked to refute the puppet’s false claim by choosing an object. They chose between one object that could clearly be used to refute the puppet’s claim and another that was not good evidence. More specifically, the puppet claimed that big objects cause light. The clear evidence object had the black dot, but was small (meaning it was not big). The other object had the black dot, but was also big, and thus did not constitute clear evidence that the size of an object does not matter.
This setup was used when the children were 4 years old. When the children were 5.5 years old, the materials differed. The study authors used thirteen cubes differing in material (wood versus Styrofoam) and color, and having a silver stripe or not, but the principles were the same. The games used during the warm-up were also somewhat different.
The study authors also used the results of assessments of children’s general cognitive abilities and knowledge, executive functions (mental skills that include memory, flexible thinking, and self-control), theory of mind abilities (the ability to recognize mental states of others, and understand what they are thinking, believing, or feeling), and metacognition (the awareness of one’s own psychological processes).
Results showed that, in the learning phase of the argumentation task, 97% of 4-year-olds and 99% of 5.5-year-olds correctly predicted whether the objects they interacted with would trigger the light or not. In the testing phase, when the puppet made a false hypothesis about what triggers the light, 62% of 4-year-olds and 74% of 5.5-year-olds disagreed with it.
Importantly, at 4 years of age, around half of the children demonstrated the ability to provide valid verbal counterarguments. This increased to 70% at 5.5 years of age. At 4 years of age, 90% of children (who all knew the cause of the light) were able to deliberately choose clear disconfirming evidence in response to the puppet’s false claims about what causes light (the object that had a black dot, but was not big). The ability to provide valid arguments was found to be correlated with some aspects of children’s cognitive abilities, but these associations were generally weak.
The study authors concluded that as early as 4 years old, children exhibit a genuine understanding of proving a claim false through evidence. They can distinguish clear, isolated evidence from ambiguous, mixed evidence when confronted with a claim they know to be false. The associations with cognitive abilities suggest that the development in argumentation from 4 to 5.5 years of age primarily revolves around the capacity to use diverse evidence. This is related to children’s ability to understand multiple complex rules and perspectives.
The study contributes to scientific knowledge about human cognitive development. However, the study was conducted on a group of children from predominantly middle-class families in an urban area of Germany, a highly developed country. The study authors report that 74% of mothers of participating children had a university education. Results on children from different socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds might differ.
The paper, “Let Me Show Why You Are Wrong”: The Origins of Scientific Argumentation, Its Development, and Cognitive Predictors, was authored by Özgün Köksal, Andrea Saffran, and Beate Sodian.
URL: https://www.psypost.org/children-can-understand-falsification-through-evidence-as-early-as-age-4/
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#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #ScientificArgumentation #ChildDevelopment #EarlyLearning #EvidenceBasedReasoning #CognitiveDevelopment #CriticalThinkingSkills #PreschoolEducation #EducationalResearch #DevelopmentalPsychology #Counterarguments
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DATE: August 13, 2026 at 09:00AM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
-------------------------------------------------TITLE: Parental mental illness is linked to lower cognitive scores in young men
Young men who grew up with a parent diagnosed with a mental disorder tend to score slightly lower on cognitive tests in late adolescence. But this link vanishes for children who experienced multiple other hardships, lived with a single parent, or were placed in foster care. The findings were published in the European Journal of Pediatrics.
Mental health conditions are common and can represent a major source of stress in a young child’s environment. The first six years of life are a time of rapid brain development. During this period, children rely heavily on their parents for care and stability. Disruptions in the home can sometimes affect how a child’s cognitive abilities develop over time.
Often, a parent’s mental illness does not happen in isolation. It frequently co-occurs with other stressful situations, such as poverty, physical illness in the family, or parents separating. Scientists refer to the tendency of childhood hardships to cluster together within families as a compounding burden.
Some researchers propose a theory of cumulative disadvantage. This idea suggests that early hardships pile up over time, resulting in worse outcomes for the child’s development. But few studies have looked at how other family hardships might change the specific relationship between a parent’s mental health and a child’s later intelligence.
Tanja Gram Petersen, a researcher at the University of Southern Denmark, led a team to investigate these specific patterns. The researchers wanted to see if having a parent with a mental illness before age six was linked to cognitive performance at age 18. They also wanted to know if this association changed when a child faced other types of adversity during those same early years.
To find answers, the researchers conducted a large study using data from the Danish nationwide registry system. In Denmark, all residents receive a unique personal identification number. This allows scientists to link individual health records, family relationships, and education data securely and anonymously.
The team identified 125,791 male adolescents born in Denmark between 1996 and 2001. They focused on young men because all 18-year-old male citizens in Denmark are required by law to undergo a military conscription examination. As part of this evaluation, the young men take a standardized cognitive test.
The military test assesses logical, verbal, numerical, and spatial reasoning skills. The researchers standardized the resulting scores to a scale with an average of 100. This made the scores resemble a typical intelligence quotient scale, making it easier to compare the results with other studies.
Using the national registers, the team looked for records of parental mental disorders. They specifically checked if a mother or father had received an inpatient or outpatient psychiatric diagnosis at a hospital before the child’s sixth birthday. About 5.3 percent of the boys in the study had a parent who met this criteria.
The researchers also tracked other hardships the children might have faced before age six. They grouped these events into three categories. The first category involved family health issues, such as the death of a parent or sibling, or a family member with a severe physical illness.
The second category captured socioeconomic disadvantages. This included prolonged family poverty or a parent experiencing long-term unemployment. The third category covered family instability, which included parents living apart, the family moving across municipality lines frequently, or the child being placed in out-of-home care.
Overall, the study found a modest link between parental mental illness and lower offspring test scores. Young men whose parents were diagnosed with a mental disorder scored, on average, 0.91 points lower on the cognitive test at age 18. This was compared to peers whose parents did not have a recorded psychiatric diagnosis.
But when the researchers divided the data based on other hardships, the patterns shifted. For teenagers who lived with both parents up to age six, a parent’s mental illness was linked to a 1.6-point drop in test scores. For boys who lived with only one parent, there was no association between the affected parent’s diagnosis and the child’s test scores.
The results were even more different for children who had been placed in out-of-home care before age six. In that group, having a parent with a mental illness was actually associated with a 3.2-point increase in cognitive scores at age 18. The researchers note that children in the foster system often face severe situations, and these estimates were based on a smaller number of boys, meaning the numbers should be read with caution.
The total number of hardships also mattered. The team counted how many additional stressful events each child experienced. For boys who faced up to two other hardships, a parent’s mental illness was still linked to lower cognitive scores.
But for young men who experienced three or more additional early hardships, the association vanished. These boys already had lower cognitive scores overall, regardless of their parent’s mental health. Having a parent with a psychiatric diagnosis did not reduce their test scores any further.
The researchers note that these results do not prove that a parent’s diagnosis directly causes a drop in intelligence. Both psychiatric conditions and cognitive abilities are heavily influenced by genetics. Families share genes, and they also share home environments. The overlap of inherited traits and stressful surroundings makes it hard to separate exactly what is driving the lower test scores.
If a child already faces multiple hardships, those events might share the same underlying genetic or environmental roots as the parent’s mental illness. Because of this, adding a parental diagnosis to an already stressful environment might not result in any additional measurable impact on the child’s brain development.
The study included a few limitations that readers should keep in mind. The research focused entirely on males, and it is possible that young women might respond differently to childhood adversity. The data also lacked details on the quality of parenting or the presence of abuse and neglect in the home.
Additionally, Denmark provides a robust universal welfare system. Citizens have free access to most health and social services. The ways in which early hardships affect long-term development might look different in countries with less supportive social safety nets.
The researchers believe that reducing early childhood hardships could still yield broad benefits for society. Cognitive ability is linked to many important life outcomes, including physical health, socioeconomic status, and overall mortality. Understanding how different family situations shape cognitive development will help scientists better support children facing multiple hurdles.
The study, “Cognitive ability following exposure to parental mental disorders and other childhood adversities: a population-based cohort study of Danish males in late adolescence,” was authored by Tanja Gram Petersen, Gunhild Tidemann Okholm, Kirstine Davidsen, Rikke Wesselhoeft, Merete Osler, Trine Munk-Olsen, and Mette Bliddal.
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#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #ParentalMentalIllness #CognitiveDevelopment #AdolescentCognition #DanishStudy #MaleAdolescents #EarlyLifeAdversity #ChildhoodStress #FosterCareEffects #SocioeconomicImpact #GeneticsVsEnvironment
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DATE: August 12, 2026 at 12:00PM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
-------------------------------------------------TITLE: Mentally engaging parenting linked to better working memory development
URL: https://www.psypost.org/mentally-engaging-parenting-linked-to-better-working-memory-development/
Children from wealthier families tend to start school with a better ability to hold and use information in their minds, but engaging kids in activities like reading or puzzles is associated with bridging this gap. A large study tracking students from kindergarten through fifth grade found that mentally engaging parenting practices are linked to protected cognitive development in children from disadvantaged backgrounds. The research was published in Learning and Individual Differences.
Working memory is the mental capacity to temporarily hold and manipulate information. It acts as a mental workspace for tasks like reasoning, planning, and understanding language. In a classroom, a child uses working memory to remember multi-step instructions or to solve mental math problems. This cognitive skill is strongly linked to how well children learn when they enter formal schooling.
During early childhood, this mental capacity grows rapidly. A family’s socioeconomic status, which encompasses household income, parental education, and job prestige, is closely tied to this early cognitive development. Children raised in families with fewer resources often face chronic stress and have less access to educational materials. These factors are frequently associated with slower cognitive growth compared to peers from wealthier backgrounds.
Past research has shown mixed results about whether these early cognitive gaps widen, remain the same, or shrink as children progress through school. Researchers Li Zhao, Stephanie W.Y. Chan, and Shuyang Dong wanted to map exactly how working memory changes across childhood. They also examined whether specific parenting behaviors could alter the statistical relationship between a family’s socioeconomic background and a child’s cognitive growth.
The team analyzed data from a large study of 15,437 children in the United States. The information came from a national education database that followed a representative group of students from their kindergarten year in 2010 through the fifth grade. To measure working memory, the original survey administrators used a backward digit span task. Children listened to a sequence of numbers and had to repeat them back in reverse order.
The number sequences grew longer as the children succeeded, testing the limits of their mental capacity. This test was given to the students multiple times between kindergarten and the fifth grade. During the kindergarten year, parents answered survey questions about their household income, education levels, and occupations.
Parents also reported on three dimensions of their parenting behavior. They answered questions about cognitive stimulation, which included how often they read, sang, or did arts and crafts with their children. The survey also asked about parental warmth, such as how often parents expressed affection or felt close to their child. Finally, parents reported on negative discipline, specifically whether they spanked their child and how many times they had done so in the past week.
Using all these data points, the researchers built statistical models to track cognitive growth over time. Overall, working memory increased steadily for most children as they progressed through elementary school. The growth happened fastest in the early years and began to level off as the children approached the fifth grade.
A family’s socioeconomic status was linked to exactly how this growth happened. Children from higher socioeconomic backgrounds started kindergarten with better working memory scores than their less wealthy peers. However, children from lower socioeconomic backgrounds actually showed a faster initial rate of cognitive growth during the early school years.
This early burst of growth allowed disadvantaged children to narrow the cognitive gap slightly. The researchers suspect that entering a structured school environment provides an initial boost to children who lacked resources at home. Yet, their working memory growth started to plateau much earlier than that of their wealthier peers. Children from higher socioeconomic backgrounds experienced a steadier, more prolonged period of working memory development.
Because of this longer growth period, the cognitive gap remained evident by the end of fifth grade. Over time, cumulative disadvantages like limited access to enriching extracurricular activities can continue to restrict cognitive development. Wealthier children keep benefiting from sustained access to enriched resources, allowing their mental capacities to grow for a longer period.
The researchers then looked at how parenting behaviors altered these trends. They found that cognitive stimulation was associated with a buffering effect against the negative impacts of a lower socioeconomic background. Children whose parents frequently engaged them in reading, puzzles, and nature activities tended to start kindergarten with higher working memory scores.
These engaging activities were also linked to changes in the trajectory of the children’s cognitive growth. Children receiving high levels of cognitive stimulation experienced a delayed plateau in their working memory development. This means their cognitive skills continued growing for a longer time, following a pattern more similar to the growth of children from wealthier families.
Other parenting behaviors did not alter the relationship between family wealth and cognitive growth. The results were not statistically significant for parental warmth modifying the socioeconomic disparities in working memory. The researchers noted that most parents in the survey reported very high levels of warmth, which might have made it difficult to detect any subtle statistical variations.
Spanking also failed to change the trajectory of socioeconomic disparities. While spanking was generally linked to poorer working memory across all groups, it did not uniquely associate with a change in the cognitive gap tied to socioeconomic status. Physical discipline appeared to be negatively linked to cognitive development regardless of a family’s income or education level.
There are a few limitations to the study design. All data on parenting behaviors were reported by the parents themselves. People often answer surveys in ways that make them look better, which can introduce bias into the results. Future projects could use direct observations of parent-child interactions to get more objective measurements.
Additionally, the researchers only used data on family income and parenting behaviors from the children’s kindergarten year. Families experience financial changes, and parenting styles evolve as children grow. By only looking at a single point in time, the study cannot account for how shifting family dynamics over the next five years might have shaped the students’ development.
The measurement of physical discipline was also quite narrow. The survey asked parents if they spanked their child and how many times they had done so in the past week. This short timeframe makes it hard to capture chronic patterns of harsh discipline. A longer assessment period would be needed to see how consistent physical discipline associates with cognitive growth over years.
The backward digit span task only assesses one specific type of cognitive processing. Working memory has multiple components, including the ability to remember spatial information. Using a wider variety of cognitive tests would provide a more complete picture of a child’s mental capabilities.
Finally, the data came exclusively from a sample of children in the United States. Educational systems and cultural parenting norms vary widely around the world. The ways that wealth and parenting interact to shape cognitive growth might look different in other countries.
The study, “Development of working memory through childhood: The interplay of family socioeconomic status and parenting behaviors,” was authored by Li Zhao, Stephanie W.Y. Chan, and Shuyang Dong.
URL: https://www.psypost.org/mentally-engaging-parenting-linked-to-better-working-memory-development/
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#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #WorkingMemory #CognitiveDevelopment #EarlyChildhoodEducation #ParentingTips #SocioeconomicStatus #CognitiveStimulation #ReadingWithKids #MentalEngagement #ChildDevelopment #LearningDifferences
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DATE: August 12, 2026 at 09:00AM
SOURCE: PSYPOST.ORG** Research quality varies widely from fantastic to small exploratory studies. Please check research methods when conclusions are very important to you. **
-------------------------------------------------TITLE: Early giftedness rarely lasts into adulthood, large developmental study finds
Children identified as highly intelligent at an early age rarely maintain their high cognitive scores by the time they reach adulthood. A large study of child development suggests that early gifted programs may be relying on unstable measures, as cognitive ability shifts dramatically before stabilizing in adolescence. The research was published in the journal Intelligence & Cognitive Abilities.
General cognitive ability represents a broad measure of how well a person acquires knowledge, solves problems, and processes information. This trait is typically assessed using standardized intelligence tests that yield a cumulative score spanning verbal and non-verbal skills. Psychologists have debated how early in life this trait becomes a permanent fixture of an individual’s psychological profile.
High scores on early childhood intelligence tests frequently lead to placements in specialized gifted programs. Educational systems often assume that a child who demonstrates advanced reasoning skills at age four or seven will maintain that same intellectual advantage into adulthood. Researchers wanted to test the reality of this assumption by mapping out the actual cognitive trajectories of thousands of developing children.
The study was led by Angel Blanch, a psychologist at the Universitat de Lleida in Spain. Blanch collaborated with Sergio Escorial at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and Roberto Colom at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. The research team sought to identify what specific personal and situational factors predict whether a child will keep or lose a high cognitive score over time.
To answer this, the researchers analyzed data from the Twins Early Development Study. This cohort includes detailed longitudinal data on child development spanning thousands of families in the United Kingdom. The researchers focused on a large sample of 11,119 participants who had their cognitive abilities tested repeatedly at ages four, seven, twelve, sixteen, and twenty-one.
The cognitive assessments changed as the participants matured to capture age-appropriate skills. Early testing involved parent-administered vocabulary and grammar scales alongside non-verbal puzzles. By age twenty-one, the participants were completing complex web-based gamified tests measuring advanced verbal reasoning and matrix-based problem-solving.
The participants were divided into two main groups based on their test scores at age seven. The normative group consisted of 3,958 individuals who scored in the average range, between 99 and 115 points. The high-ability group included 1,580 individuals who scored above 115 points on the standardized assessments.
The research team used statistical tools called latent curve models to track how each participant’s scores changed as they aged. This method allowed the scientists to map average starting points and the rate of change over a period of fourteen years. They then introduced several predictive variables into the models to see what related to these cognitive shifts.
These predictive variables included a mix of biological and environmental factors. On the biological side, the team looked at polygenic scores, which estimate an individual’s genetic likelihood for a certain trait based on variations across their entire genome. Environmental factors included the socioeconomic status of the parents, home chaos, behavioral problems, school engagement, and stressful life events.
The data revealed a high degree of cognitive mobility among the children. Only 16 percent of the participants who scored in the high-ability tier at age seven maintained that high status by age sixteen. The vast majority of early high-scorers saw their cognitive scores drift downward toward the average range as they matured.
Cognitive stability increased as the children reached early adolescence. Of the participants who showed high cognitive ability at age twelve, about 23 percent kept their high scores into their late teens. A similar stability rate was observed for those scoring high at age sixteen, indicating that age twelve might be a more reliable time for identifying sustained intellectual advancement.
Upward mobility was also relatively rare for the children who started with average scores. Among the normative group at age seven, only 8 percent experienced enough cognitive growth to cross into the high-ability tier by age sixteen. It was statistically three times more likely for a high-ability child to maintain their rank than it was for an average-ability child to climb into the top tier.
When examining predictors of these shifts, the researchers found that genetic and personal factors showed stronger associations than situational metrics. Higher polygenic scores and parental socioeconomic status were robustly associated with maintaining higher cognitive scores and experiencing positive developmental trajectories. In contrast, environmental variables like a chaotic home life or early behavioral problems had very little association with the rate of cognitive change.
This insulation from environmental factors was particularly pronounced in the high-ability group. These individuals were largely unaffected by negative life events or a disorganized home environment when it came to their long-term intellectual growth. For the average-scoring group, stressful life events did show a mild negative association with cognitive scores at older ages, though the impact was secondary to genetic predictors.
School engagement was one of the few situational variables that positively predicted cognitive growth across both groups. Adolescents who reported higher engagement with their schoolwork and teachers tended to experience greater upward shifts in their cognitive scores. Even so, the biological markers remained the strongest overall predictors of intellectual development.
These findings align with a developmental concept known as the Wilson effect, which describes how the heritability of intelligence increases as people age. Children’s brains dynamically mature according to intrinsic genetic programs that express themselves differently across various developmental stages. As individuals grow older, they naturally gravitate toward the intellectual levels predicted by their genomes, overriding many early environmental advantages or disadvantages.
The strong association between socioeconomic status and cognitive maintenance comes with a biological caveat. Socioeconomic status in this study was based on the educational and occupational credentials of the parents. Because parents pass down both their genes and their social standing, separating the purely environmental impact of wealth from inherited cognitive traits remains a persistent challenge in developmental psychology.
The study relied entirely on behavioral tests and questionnaires rather than direct physical measurements. The researchers did not collect brain imaging data, preventing them from observing the physical cortical changes that accompany these cognitive shifts. Identifying specific neural markers could help explain why some children lose their early cognitive advantages while others retain them.
The statistical models required participants to have consistent data points across multiple ages, which limited the types of variables the team could include. Certain developmental milestones might have been missed between the specific testing ages of seven, twelve, sixteen, and twenty-one. Future studies tracking these cognitive transitions on a year-by-year basis could provide a more detailed map of intellectual maturation.
The results suggest that educational systems should exercise caution when relying on cognitive assessments administered in early childhood. Placing young children into rigid educational tracks based on preschool or early elementary testing often results in misclassification. Regular re-evaluation throughout adolescence presents a much more accurate picture of a student’s long-term intellectual potential.
The study, “Developmental changes in high cognitive ability children: The role of nature and nurture,” was authored by Angel Blanch, Sergio Escorial, and Roberto Colom.
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#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #EarlyGiftedness #CognitiveDevelopment #IntelligenceTrajectories #WilsonEffect #GeneticsAndIQ #SocioeconomicStatusIQ #EducationalTracking #AdolescentCognition #CognitiveMobility #TwinStudyInsights
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DATE: August 7, 2026 at 09:25PM
SOURCE: SCIENCE DAILY MIND-BRAIN FEEDTITLE: Teen cannabis use linked to slower memory and thinking growth
URL: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2026/08/260806050726.htm
Teens who start using cannabis may experience slower growth in memory, attention, language, and processing speed. Their abilities often developed normally at first, then began leveling off while nonusers continued improving. THC appeared to be the most likely driver, especially for worsening memory.
URL: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2026/08/260806050726.htm
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#psychology #counseling #socialwork #psychotherapy @psychotherapist @psychotherapists @psychology @socialpsych @socialwork @psychiatry #mentalhealth #psychiatry #healthcare #depression #psychotherapist #TeenCannabis #MemoryScience #CognitiveDevelopment #THCImpact #YouthHealth #AttentionSpan #MemoryDecline #ProcessingSpeed #CannabisResearch #AdolescentHealth
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Book lovers will be happy to learn that reading is the greatest ‘cognitive enhancer’ known to man.
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Childhood Beliefs: When the Moon Follows You
Di masa kanak-kanak, penulis percaya bahwa bulan mengikutinya, menciptakan rasa kedekatan dengan alam semesta. Seiring bertambah dewasa, penulis menyadari absurditas keyakinan tersebut, namun tetap merindukan perasaan keindahan dan makna. Dalam perjalanan hidup, penulis berusaha mencari kembali pengalaman itu, menyadari bahwa kebenaran bisa kehilangan rasa personal.https://legawa.com/2026/06/27/childhood-beliefs-when-the-moon-follows-you/
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The First Universe We Ever Knew
There is something humbling about studying human development — as if each chapter is less a lesson and more a reminder that we are all, in some way, still forming. The science offers its clean definitions and tidy theories, but beneath them runs a deeper current, one that feels almost mythic: the story of how a person becomes. Somewhere in the background, a quiet truth hums:we are always mid‑sentence in our own becoming. We like to imagine development as a straight ascent, a staircase […]https://thereflectivemind9.wordpress.com/2026/06/16/the-first-universe-we-ever-knew/
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How to Foster Problem-Solving Skills in Your Baby: A Science-Backed Guide for Parents
Science-backed guide for parents: Discover how to nurture your baby's problem-solving skills from infancy. Learn practical strategies, from responsive parenting to creative play, that build a foundation for lifelong learning and resilience. Start fostering critical thinking today. -
Bloom’s Taxonomy Revised guides the Education for Life Program, integrating cognitive, affective, and psychomotor learning for a holistic approach. It supports open-source, adaptable education through curriculum, teaching strategies, learning tools, and classroom design for lifelong learning.
https://onecommunityglobal.org/blooms-taxonomy/
#BloomsTaxonomy #EducationForLife #HolisticLearning #OpenSource #LifelongLearning #TeachingStrategies #CognitiveDevelopment #LearningTools #InnovativeEducation
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Childhood neglect linked to slower working memory development, study finds https://www.psypost.org/childhood-neglect-linked-to-slower-working-memory-development-study-finds/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon #ChildhoodNeglect #CognitiveDevelopment #WorkingMemory #ExecutiveFunction #PsychologyResearch
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🧠 Neuroscience, Game Design, and Design Thinking:
Games influence not just how we entertain ourselves but also how we think, feel, and interact with the world.
As game design continues to evolve, neuroscience
offers insights into how games can influence socio-cognitive development—from executive functions to social cognition and emotional regulation. When paired with design thinking, the potential for innovation in game design education becomes truly exciting.Games are not just immersive worlds—they are powerful tools for influencing the brain's learning circuits. Research shows that well-designed games can:
- Enhance working memory and cognitive flexibility by creating environments that challenge players to think on their feet.
- Improve decision-making and problem-solving skills through adaptive feedback loops.
- Promote social learning by simulating complex social scenarios that engage mirror neurons, helping players develop empathy and social awareness.This is where design thinking plays a pivotal role in game design. By embedding a neuroscience and cognitive science-informed approach into the design thinking process, we can empower future designers to create games that not only entertain but also foster cognitive development. Using techniques such as rapid prototyping, empathy mapping, and iterative feedback, designers can craft games that target key neural circuits involved in attention, memory, and empathy.
Using design thinking principles to create games that address real-world challenges, from mental health (rehabilitation as well) to social interaction, based on neural and cognitive mechanisms is really fascinating!
#NeuroscienceInGames #CognitiveDevelopment #GameDesignEducation #DesignThinking #Neuroplasticity #GameDesign #CognitiveScience
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1) An older article but one I enjoy every time it resurfaces: Mister Rogers’ Nine Rules for Speaking to Children, or how his careful phrasing (“Freddish”) spoke to young audiences
"Rogers understood and acknowledged the unique power and privilege of his role ... Rogers wanted us to know, says Greenwald, “that the inner life of children was deadly serious to them,” and thus deserving of care and recognition."
https://www.openculture.com/2019/05/mr-rogers-nine-rules-for-speaking-to-children-1977.html
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New paper from the #DevelopmentalPsychology side of the Kuhlmeier lab
The widespread adoption of new methods for testing children does not typically occur over a matter of months. Yet, the pandemic created a sudden need among many research groups to use online testing. We report results from a survey of researchers on experiences with online testing and discuss challenges, limitations, and opportunities.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1160203
#CognitiveDevelopment #Cognition
#OpenScience
#ResearchMethods -
Are you ready for an agilists’ crash course in neuroscience and neurobiology?🧠 Watch this video: https://youtu.be/VgT3AqKhI6U
You’ll learn how to adapt the concepts and tools from neuroscience and psychotherapy in a manner appropriate for our roles as agile coaches and scrum masters, in order to help your team.
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CW: Long Hashtag List for the Life Sciences
Life Sciences Hashtags
• Animal Behaviour
#AnimalBehavior #AnimalBehaviour #AnimalCognition #AnimalPsychology #AnimalResearch #AnimalSocieties #AnimalStudies #BehavioralEcology #BehaviouralEcology #BehavioralScience #BehaviouralScience #CameraTraps #ComparativeCognition #CriticalAnimalStudies #Learning #Memory #PositiveReinforcement #Sociobiology #TrailCam• Astrobiology
#AlienLife #Astrobiology #Biosignatures #Cryosphere DeepIce #EarthScience #Exoplanets #GeoScience #Habitability #Karst #MicroHabitats #OceanWorlds #OriginOfLife #PlanetaryCaves #PlanetaryScience• Behaviour Science
#AnthroZoology #Behavior #Behaviour #Behaviour2023 #BehavioralScience #BehaviouralScience #Biopsychology #CognitiveDevelopment #ComparativeCognition #DevelopmentalPsychology #Ethology #Learning #Memory #Neuroethology #PhilosophyOfMind #PleasureActivism #Psychology #SelfOrganisation #SelfOrganization #SocialNetwork• Biochemistry | Group: @biochemistry
#Actin #AminoAcids #Biochemical #Biochemistry #Catalyst #Catalysis #DNA #Enzyme #Enzymes #Hormones #IonChannels #Kinetics #Metabolism #Metabolomics #mRNA #Peptides #Polymer #Protein #Proteins #RNA• Bioinformatics | Group: @bioinformatics
#BigData #Bioinformatics #RStats• Biology | Group: [email protected]
#Biochemistry #Biology #Biomes #Botany #Ecology #Ecosystem #Evolution #Genetics #Habitat #LifeCycle #MarineBiology #Microbiology #Zoology• Biomaterial Science
#Biofilm #Biofilms #Biologics #Biomaterials #Biotechnology #MaterialsScience #Nanotechnology #SustainableDesign #SyntheticBiology• Biomedical Science
#Biomedical #BiomedicalEngineering #BiomedicalScience #NetworkMedicine #SystemsBiology• Botany
#Botany #Botanical #Botanist #FloraIncognita #Florespondence IAmABotanist #Phenology #PlantBiology #PlantCells #PlantID #PlantIdentification• Cell Biology | Group: @cellbiology
#CellBiology #CellDivision #CellMigration #Chloroplast #Cilium #Cytoskeleton #EndoplasmicReticulum #Eukaryotes #Golgi #Lipids #Macrophages #Membrane #Membranes #Microtubules #Mitochondria #Nucleus #Organelle #Organoids #Ribosome #SingleCell• Developmental Biology
#ChildDevelopment #Connectome #Connectomics #DevelopmentalBiology #Embryology #Embryos #EvoDevo #GeneRegulation #Pregnancy #Proteomics #ReproSci #SexDet #StemCells #Transcriptomics• Ecology | Group: @ecology
#AgroEcology #BehavioralEcology #BehaviouralEcology #Biodiversity #BiodiversityCrisis #BiodiversityLoss #Biogeography #ConservationBiology #Ecocide #EcoGrief #Ecological #EcologicalMonitoring #EcologicalSurvey #Ecology #Ecosystem #ForestEcology #Habitat #InvasionEcology #InvasiveSpecies #MassExtinction #OldGrowth #Riparian #WildCounts• Entomology | Group: @entomology
#Beetles #Bugs #Coleoptera #Crustaceans #Entomologia #Entomology #Hemiptera #Hymenoptera #iNaturalist #Insect #Insects #InsectPhotography #Invertebrates #Isopods #Lepidoptera #Metamorphosis #Orthoptera #Pupa #Taxonomy• Genetics
#BasePair #CellDivision #Chromosome #Chromosomes #Clone #Epigenetics #DNA #Gene #GeneExpression #GeneRegulation #GeneticallyModified #Genetics #Genome #Genomics #GMO #Meiosis #Mitosis #Mutation #RNAseq #Telomeres #Variants• Immunology
#Antibodies #Antibody #Antigen #AutoImmune #BCells #Immune #ImmuneSystem #Immunity #ImmunoCompromised #Immunology #ImmunoTherapy #Interferon #Macrophages #Monoclonal #MonoclonalAntibodies (#mAbs) #Neutrophils #TCell #Vaccinated #Vaccine #Viralimmunology• Marine Science
#Acidification #Algae #Aquatic #Cetaceans #Coral #CoralBleaching #CoralReefs #DeepSea #Diatoms #Estuary #Eutrophication #Kelp #KelpForest #MarineBiology #MarineLife #MarineMammals #MarineScience #MarineTaxonomy #Oceanography #Oceans #OceanWarming #Phytoplankton #Reefs #SeaBed #SeaFloor #SeaGrass #Seaweed #ScubaDiving #Snorkeling #UnderWaterPhotography #Zooplankton• Microbiology | Group: @microbiology
#Antibiotics #AntiMicrobial #AntiMicrobialResistance (#AMR) #Bacteria #Bacterial #Bacteriophage #Bacteriology #Cilia #Microbes #Microbial #MicrobialEcology #Microbiology #Microbiome #Microbiota #MicroOrganisms #Phage #Protists#EColi #Legionella #Pseudomonas #Salmonella #Streptomyces
• Molecular Biology | Group: @molecularbiology
#Biophysics #CellBiology #MolecularBiology #MolecularEvolution #ProteinEngineering #ProteinStructure #Proteomics #StructuralBiology• Mycology | Group: @mycology
#Fungi #Fungiverse #Mushrooms #Mycelium #Mycologists #Mycology #Mycophile #Spores #Sporespondence• Ornithology | Group: @ornithology
#BirdID #Birding #BirdMigration #BirdPhotography #BirdResearch #BirdsOfMastodon #Corvid #eBird #Migration #Nesting #Oology #Ornithology #Raptor #SeaBirds #ShoreBirds• Virology | Group: @virology
#AntiViral #AvianFlu #Bacteriophage #BirdFlu #CoronaVirus #COVID #COVID19 #GiantViruses #HIV #InfectiousDisease #Ebola #Measles #Phage #SARS #SARSCoV2 #Vaccine #Vaccines #ViralLoad #Viralimmunology #ViralPersistence #Variants #Virology #Virome #Virus #Viruses• Zoology
#Animals #Biology #Zoologist #Zoology(Click to access Scientists in the Formal, Natural & Social Sciences)
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ManyDogs (@ManyDogs) is an international consortium of researchers interested in #canine science.
We are soliciting proposals for our next project. Do you have ideas?
Check out the info below and see: bit.ly/416TXN6
#AnimalCognition #AnimalBehaviour #AnimalBehavior #ComparativeCognition #CognitiveDevelopment #Cognition #DevelopmentalPsychology
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#MastodonTips: #Hashtags to follow if you are interested in:
Climate: #ClimateChange #Sustainability #ClimateCrisis
Gardening: #GardeningMastodon #UrbanGardening #Herbs
Geology: #Volcano #GeologyRocks #Fossils
Humour: #Comedy #Funny #Joke #Memes
Literature: #SciFi #Fiction #Nonfiction #Novels
Music: #MusicNews #NowPlaying #Records
Psychology: #SocialPsychology #Neuroscience #CognitiveDevelopment
Television: #TV #ClassicTelevision #Series
Videogames: #Gaming #VideoJuegos #RetroGaming
@edutooters -
Over the last decade, #scientists have explored the association between #GutMicrobiota & the #brain & affected #neurologic manifestations. These #studies have indicated that #gut #microbiota #influences #neurogenesis , #behavior , #emotions , #CognitiveDevelopment & progression of #neuropsychiatric diseases. A #NewStudy published in the journal #FrontiersInMedicine reviewed recent literature on the link between gut microbiota, the brain & #NeurologicalDisorders.
https://www.news-medical.net/amp/news/20230319/Gut-microbiomes-and-mental-health-how-do-they-interact.aspx -
ICYMI: Two new bee social learning papers have come out.
Social signal learning of the waggle dance in honey bees
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.ade1702Bumblebees acquire alternative puzzle-box solutions via social learning
https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3002019#AnimalCognition #ComparativeCognition #AnimalBehavior #AnimalBehaviour #Cognition #CognitiveDevelopment
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New paper from the #DevelopmentalPsychology side of the Kuhlmeier lab on shyness & prosocial behavior: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1128588/full
We presented 3.5- to 4.5-year-olds with problems that varied, in a 2 x 2 within-subjects design, by the type of intervention required (helping or comforting) and the source of the problem (within the experimenter’s personal space or distanced from her). Shyer children were not less likely to intervene, but they were slower to do so.
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There‘s a job opening for a #PhD student / doctoral researcher (fully funded, salary & research costs, 4 years) in my @snsf_ch #Ambizione project on the neuro-cognitive development of language processing at the University of Zurich @uzh. The PhD student will be advised by me and @moritzdaum. Please share widely! https://t.uzh.ch/1qP #psycholinguistics #cognitivedevelopment #cogsci #psychology #linguistics
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New, extremely careful research suggests:
Fully 1/3 of effect of growing up in a poor #neighborhood on children's #CognitiveDevelopment is due to #AirPollution
"Although most prior research about the effects of concentrated poverty focuses on older children and posits mechanisms involving differences in socialization or institutional resources, we provide evidence that the etiology of neighborhood effects lies earlier [...] and is rooted in environmental
inequalities" -
Are you new to Mastodon? When I started here last month I found this #Tootorial by @djnavarro very helpful for understanding not only the interface but the culture of hashtags (that have CapitalLetters), alt-text, and content warnings.
https://blog.djnavarro.net/posts/2022-11-03_what-i-know-about-mastodon/
#AnimalBehavior #AnimalBehaviour #AnimalCognition #ComparativeCognition #DevelopmentalPsychology #CognitiveDevelopment
#Psychology #Biology
