Continuity and change in the home environment: Associations with school readiness

The quality of the home environment is linked to children's development and learning. In early childhood, the ways that parents construct the home environment has been linked to school readiness outcomes, yet limited research has investigated the extent to which the quality of the home environment is stable or changes across the transition to school or whether this stability or change is related to children's outcomes. The current study examined the continuity and change in the level of the quality of the home environment across ages 3-and 5 and its association with school readiness outcomes (i.e., attention regulation, language skills, social-emotional skills) at age 5. Data for this study came from four waves (baseline, age 3, 5 and 9) of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing study, which includes 4898 children (52.4% male) and their primary caregivers. Twenty one percent of the mothers for the total sample were White, 47% were Black, 27% were Hispanic, and 4% identified as other. Sixty five percent of mothers had an education level of high school or less, 24% completed some college, 11% had a college degree or higher. Results indicated that there was not stability in the quality of the home environment between the ages of 3 and 5. In addition, higher quality home environments at age 3 and change in the quality of the home environment predicted greater gains in children's attention regulation, language, and social emotional competence. The importance of early environments for children's school readiness and potential implications for future research, policy, and interventions designed to promote healthy development in early childhood are discussed. (C) 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.