Both of these edited collections engage readers in a critical discussion of middle childhood not only as a transitional period leading to adolescence, but also as a developmental stage that predicts success in adolescence and adulthood. 2003 whereas Huston and Ripke 2006 includes middle childhood research programs on a variety of other issues, such as education, poverty, and media influences. Behavior-genetic influences on middle childhood from an important longitudinal study of adoption are reported in Petrill, et al. This edited volume examines children’s individual differences from the time children enter school until the early years of adolescence, as well as the diversity of contexts important to children, such as family, community, and culture. 2005 provides an overview of interdisciplinary projects conducted over ten years by a US research network established in 1997 to study the middle childhood transition. 1990 and Greenspan and Pollock 1991 are two of the first edited collections to critically examine middle childhood as a transitional period between childhood and adolescence. Research on middle childhood has been increasingly published since Collins 1984 reported on the seminal work of the Panel to Review the Status of Basic Research on School-Age Children convened by the National Research Council of the United States. Compared to early childhood and adolescence, middle childhood has been relatively neglected by child development and childhood studies researchers however, there has been increasing interest since the 1980s in the positive contributions of the middle childhood population to their families, schools, and communities. By the end of middle childhood, greater self-regulation and the consolidation of problem-solving skills allow children to extend their abilities to tasks requiring flexible, abstract thinking, and the maintenance of close relationships. At the beginning of this stage, emergent cognitive abilities enable children to handle more complex intellectual problem-solving and to better understand reciprocal social relationships than they could in early childhood. ![]() Although there is considerable debate about the age parameters of this period, most social scientists and practitioners agree that children in the middle childhood period are qualitatively different from children who are either younger or older. Many educators believe that middle childhood begins when children enter primary school at age six others focus exclusively on the middle grades of secondary schooling starting at ages nine or ten. Clinical psychologists characterize middle childhood as a latency period that precedes the intense sexual interest of adolescence. Health care providers describe the period after early childhood growth and development but before the onset of puberty as preadolescence. ![]() ![]() The study of middle childhood has been the focus of research and practice in many different fields, including psychology, education, nursing and medicine, sociology and criminal justice, public health, social work, family studies, and recreation. Middle childhood is the developmental period between early childhood and adolescence, sometimes referred to as late childhood or early adolescence.
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