A scale of prejudice against transgender individuals was developed, validated, and contrasted with a homophobia measure in 153 female and 157 male US college undergraduates. For both sexes, transphobia and homophobia were highly correlated with each other and with right-wing authoritarianism, religious fundamentalism, and hostile sexism, but aggression proneness was predictive of transphobia and homophobia only in men. Benevolent sexism and rape myth acceptance were more predictive of transphobia and homophobia in women than men. With homophobia partialled out, authoritarianism, fundamentalism, and aggression proneness no longer predicted transphobia for men, but authoritarianism, fundamentalism, benevolent sexism, and rape myth acceptance continued to predict transphobia in women. Discussion focused on gender differences in issues that drive prejudice against transgender and homosexual individuals.

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As rates of prematurity continue to rise, identifying which preterm children are at increased risk for learning disabilities is a public-health imperative. Identifying continuities between early and later skills in this vulnerable population can also illuminate fundamental neuropsychological processes that support learning in all children. At 18 months adjusted age, we used socioeconomic status, medical variables, parent-reported vocabulary, scores on the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development language composite, and children’s lexical processing speed in the looking-while-listening task as predictor variables in a sample of 30 preterm children. Receptive vocabulary as measured by the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (4th Edition) at 36 months was the outcome. Receptive vocabulary was correlated with SES, but uncorrelated with degree of prematurity or a composite of medical risk. Importantly, lexical processing speed was the strongest predictor of receptive vocabulary (r = −.81), accounting for 30% unique variance. Individual differences in lexical processing efficiency may be able to serve as a marker of information processing skills that are critical for language learning.

Children with severe physical disabilities can control a Lego robot to perform un-structured play tasks. In some cases, they were able to display more sophisticated cognitive skills through manipulating the robot than in traditional standardised tests. Success with the robot could be a proxy measure for children who have cognitive abilities but cannot demonstrate them in standard testing.

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This study examined associations between caregiver talk and language skills in full term (FT) and preterm (PT) children (n=97). All-day recordings of caregiver-child interactions revealed striking similarities in amount of caregiver talk heard by FT and PT children. Children who heard more caregiver talk at 16 months demonstrated better knowledge- and processing-based language skills at 18 months. The unique contributions of caregiver talk were tempered by medical risk in PT children, especially for processing speed. However, there was no evidence that birth status or medical risk moderated the effects of caregiver talk. These findings highlight the role of caregiver talk in shaping language outcomes in FT and PT children and offer insights into links between neurodevelopmental risk and caregiver-child engagement.

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