We are so excited to share that our Early Childhood Research Quarterly Special Issue, “Infant-Toddler Care and Services,” is now available.
The Early Childhood Research Quarterly is one of the leading journals in the early childhood field, so it is especially meaningful to have a Special Issue dedicated to infants, toddlers, and the families and systems that support them. The first three years of life are a foundational period for children’s development and well-being, yet infants and toddlers remain underrepresented in research on care, services, workforce, and systems.
The strong interest in this Special Issue also speaks to the importance of this area: we received 88 initial proposals, from which 31 manuscripts were invited and 14 outstanding studies were ultimately accepted following rigorous peer review. Together, these studies provide new evidence across multiple levels—from children, families, and relationships to the workforce, programs, policies, and systems. Importantly, this collection reinforces the critical importance of access to high-quality care and services for infants and toddlers, including programs such as Early Head Start, and the need for continued investment in the workforce and systems that make this care possible.
The studies are organized around four overarching themes: (1) promoting infant–toddler development and family well-being through responsive and stable relationships, (2) advancing equitable access to infant–toddler care and services, (3) building and sustaining a strong infant–toddler workforce, and (4) strengthening systems through collaboration, integration, innovation, and policy.
We are deeply grateful to the Network of Infant Toddler Researchers (NitR), all of our contributing authors and reviewers, Gary Resnick, Elsevier, and everyone who has supported this effort along the way. This truly has been a collective effort, and I am so grateful for everyone’s scholarship, time, thoughtful feedback, and support.
We hope this collection not only helps address critical gaps in the literature but also help move the field forward and spark continued research, collaboration, investment, and action to better support infants, toddlers, their families, and the professionals who serve them.
We are distributing this email to multiple organizations, so we hope you understand you may receive the duplicates.
- Kyong-Ah Kwon, Carlomagno del Carmen Panlilio, Rachel Chazan-Cohen, & Laura Wallace