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Background
The period of birth to three is a time of extraordinary growth and development for children in all domains-cognitive, language, physical, social, emotional, and adaptive. Promoting healthy development and providing stimulation during these first years lays the foundation for future growth and learning. However, for many infants and toddlers living in poverty, healthy development is compromised through inadequate nutrition, health care, and stimulation, as well as by the numerous stressors on their families. Because of these risk factors, programs have been created to help ameliorate the effects of poverty on children and families and to provide them with the tools for later school and life success.
Since the 1960's War on Poverty, many early intervention programs have been created to help at-risk infants and toddlers and their families. Efforts to serve infants and toddlers include the Parent and Child Centers (1967-1997), Migrant Head Start programs (1969-present), Parent and Child Development Centers (1970-1980), the Child and Family Resource Program (1973-1983), and the Comprehensive Child Development Program (1990-1995). In 1994, Head Start initiated the Early Head Start Program. Many other infant/toddler and family intervention programs outside of Head Start have been created and evaluated to determine which strategies are most effective in improving child and family outcomes.
Inclusion Criteria
This bibliography was created through a review of the literature regarding the effects of infant and toddler intervention efforts with at-risk populations. While early intervention research abounds, specific screening criteria have been selected in order to create a bibliography that is both cohesive, as well as relevant to current efforts being undertaken by the Administration for Children and Families.
The screening criteria were reevaluated and broadened for the 2002 edition. Specifically, changes to the screening criteria included: a) eliminating the longitudinal criterion and expanding the bibliography to include research studies that collected data at two or more assessment points, b) expanding the criterion for age of population when intervention began from 12 to 24 months, and c) broadening the population criteria to include additional at-risk populations.
The screening criteria utilized in the development of this edition of the bibliography are as follows:
- Two assessment points: data collected at more than one time period, such as baseline and follow-up or pre-test and post-test.
- Prenatal period to 24 months: age of population when the intervention began. May include older children if some of the children fall within this age range.
- At-risk populations: includes infants and families who are at-risk due to poverty, maternal depression, substance abuse, mental health issues, foster care, low birthweight, or premature birth.
- Evaluation of an intervention or interventions: intervention targets children either through child-focused, family-focused, or two-generational models and includes study child outcome data.
In addition to expanding the screening criteria, a decision was made not to include dissertations or unpublished literature such as conference papers and presentations.
Staff are currently in the process of updating the database with research to reflect these new criteria.
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