Search & Browse
Resources indexed on the Research Connections site cover a broad spectrum of research on child care and early education and related policies. The collection brings together original research, syntheses, fact sheets and briefs, instruments, and other research-related resources from the wide range of social science disciplines and professional fields that study early care and education.
For the best experience, please use Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Edge.
Search Tips
- You can enter a research question:
What are the characteristics of families using family, friend and neighbor care? - Use quotes to find an exact phrase; use the minus sign to remove items from results:
"child development" - "school readiness" - Search is not case-sensitive.
- A Boolean "and" is invoked with multiple search terms.
- Stemming is automatic; do not use an asterisk.
- For the best experience, please use Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Edge.
Scope of the Collection
Resources indexed and housed on the Research Connections site cover a broad spectrum of research on child care and early education and related policies. The collection brings together original research, syntheses, and other research-related resources from the wide range of social science disciplines and professional fields that study early care and education.
Resources in the collection examine the child care and early education experiences of children birth through age 8 and -- when addressing school-age child care -- through age 13. Research on elementary education is beyond the scope of the collection.
Other major subjects of research in the collection include, but are not limited to:
- Parents and families using child care and early education services
- The early childhood and school-age child care work force
- Child care and early education settings, including center care, Head Start, public pre-kindergarten, family child care, family-friend-neighbor care (i.e., kith and kin care), in-home care
- National, state, and local child care and early learning policies
Research on other child and family services -- e.g., child welfare, early intervention, and family support -- is beyond the scope of the collection, except when it focuses on the role of child care and early education in those arenas.
The collection centers on the United States but also includes research on early care and education in other countries.
Research Connections accepts all research and related documents disseminated in the field, without judging the quality of their design, methods, findings, and general content. It is, therefore, essential that visitors evaluate the quality of research they find on the site. Resources to help with evaluation are available at Assessing Research Quality.
Sources of the Collection
To keep the collection up-to-date, Research Connections routinely searches several hundred journals and websites. Research Connections has systematically searched for all new literature since 1995. The collection includes some earlier publications, and plans call for adding more selected earlier resources. To suggest additional journals or websites to search and earlier materials to include, please send e-mail to contact@researchconnections.org