Authors
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Shannon Stark Guss
Early Childhood Education Institute, University of Oklahoma - Tulsa
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Brenda Jones-Harden
University of Maryland
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Amanda Stein
Ounce of Prevention Fund
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Noreen Yazejian
Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
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Nina Forestieri
Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Keywords:
adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), early education dosage, achievement gap
Abstract
Studies have shown that adversity in childhood has harmful effects on well-being across the lifespan. This study examined the prevalence of children’s cumulative experiences of adversity, based on parent report, in a national sample of low-income children (N=3,208) enrolled in a high quality early childhood education (ece) program. It explored the association between family adversity that occurred within the year prior to the parents’ interview and the child’s well-being measured after the interview. Well-being was based on language, school readiness, and social emotional outcomes. Almost half of all families reported experiencing at least one adversity. Family adversity was associated with worse school readiness and health outcomes. Adversity had mixed associations with socialemotional outcomes and no association with language outcomes. This study also explored time enrolled in ece (dosage) as a protective or promotive factor in relation to adversity. Time in program had a positive relationship to most child outcomes and could be interpreted as a promotive factor within the context of adversity for all outcomes except behavioral concerns.
Author Biographies
Shannon Stark Guss, Early Childhood Education Institute, University of Oklahoma - Tulsa
Shannon Guss is a Project Director at the Early Childhood Education Institute. Her primary project is the local evaluation of the Tulsa Educare Schools. She is also a doctoral student in the Research, Evaluation, Measurement, and Statistics (REMS) track of Education Studies at Oklahoma State University. Her research interests include family risk and resilience and the use of data to support children at risk for school failure
Brenda Jones-Harden, University of Maryland
Dr. Jones-Harden is an Associate Professor in the Human Development and Quantitative Methods department.  Her research interests include development of maltreated foster children, prenatally drug-exposed children, and other children at-risk. Her specialties include prevention science and program evaluation.
Amanda Stein, Ounce of Prevention Fund
Dr. Stein is a Senior Research Associate in Early Childhood Education at the Ounce of Prevention Fuund. She directs the Educare Chicago implementation Study and the Educare Chicago Longitudinal Follow-Up Study and provides research and evaluation leadership on various Ounce of Prevention fund initiatives.
Noreen Yazejian, Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Dr. Yazejian is a Senior Scientist at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute (FPG). She has extensive experience conducting large-scale, multi-site research and evaluation studies and assessing the quality of practices in early education settings and the effects of variation in quality on children. Her research focuses on early childhood program evaluation, including work related to professional development interventions, models of programming birth to five, home visiting, quality rating and improvement systems, and early childhood language and literacy.
Nina Forestieri, Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Nina Forestieri is a Social Research Assistant at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute (FPG). She serves as data specialist, statistician, and methodologists across a variety of research projects.
Section
Research Articles
License
Copyright © 2025 by the authors. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
