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The overall goal of the Baby's First Years study is to assess the causal role played by household income in affecting children's early cognitive, socio-emotional, and brain development. Recent advances in developmental neuroscience suggest that experiences early in life have profound and enduring impacts on the developing brain. Family economic resources shape the nature of many of these experiences, yet the extent to which they affect children's development is unknown. The Baby's First Years project is the first randomized controlled trial to provide estimates of the causal impacts of unconditional cash gifts on the cognitive, socio-emotional, and brain development of infants and young children in low-income U.S. families.

Specifically, 1,000 recruited mothers of infants with incomes below the federal poverty line from four diverse U.S. communities are receiving monthly cash gift payments by debit card. Mothers were initially told the gifts would last for the first 40 months of their child's life, but we have secured funding to continue the payments for three additional years (i.e., for a total of 76 months). Parents in the high cash gift group (n=400 in the study sample) are receiving a cash gift of $333 per month ($4,000 per year), while parents in the low cash gift group (n=600) are receiving a nominal monthly gift payment of $20 ($240 per year), also for 76 months.

In order to measure the impacts of the unconditional cash gift income on children's cognitive and behavioral development, we are assessing high and low cash gift group differences at ages 4, 6, and 8 (and, for a subset of measures, we capture interim development at ages 1, 2, and 3) in measures of cognitive, language, memory, self-regulation, and socio-emotional development. In order to understand the processes by which child impacts emerge, we are measuring a host of family process measures summarized in our pre-registration chart. Our data collection points are referred to as: "baseline", "age 1", "age 2," "age 3", "age 4", "age 6", and "age 8".

Additional information on the project, survey design, sample, variables, and COVID-19 pandemic adjustments are available from:

• The User Guides for Baseline, Age 1, Age 2, Age 3, and Age 4, which are included under the "Data and Documentation" tab
• The project's website: babysfirstyears.com

The researchers request that all peer-reviewed papers using BFY Data:

• be submitted to PubMed https://publicaccess.nih.gov immediately upon acceptance for publication
• include the following citation to the data in their bibliography:

Citation

Magnuson, Katherine A., Kimberly Noble, Greg J. Duncan, Nathan A. Fox, Lisa A. Gennetian, Hirokazu Yoshikawa, and Sarah Halpern-Meekin. Baby's First Years (BFY), New York City, New Orleans, Omaha, and Twin Cities, 2018-2023. ICPSR37871-v8. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], YYYY-MM-DD. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR37871.v8

• and include the following in their acknowledgements:

Acknowledgement

This research uses data from the Baby's First Years study. Research reported in this publication was supported by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number R01HD087384 and 2R01HD087384. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. This research was additionally supported by the US Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation; Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research-Office of the Director, National Institutes of Health; Andrew and Julie Klingenstein Family Fund; Annie E. Casey Foundation; Arnold Ventures; Arrow Impact; BCBS of Louisiana Foundation; Bezos Family Foundation, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; Bill Hammack and Janice Parmelee, Brady Education Fund; Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (Silicon Valley Community Foundation); Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies; Child Welfare Fund; Esther A. and Joseph Klingenstein Fund; Ford Foundation; Greater New Orleans Foundation; Heising-Simons Foundation; Holland Foundation; Jacobs Foundation; JPB Foundation; J-PAL North America; Lozier Foundation; New York City Mayor's Office for Economic Opportunity; Perigee Fund; Robin Hood Foundation; Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; Russell Sage Foundation; Sherwood Foundation; Valhalla Foundation; Weitz Family Foundation; W.K. Kellogg Foundation; and three anonymous donors.

Principal Investigators

Katherine Magnuson, PhD; University of Wisconsin-Madison, lead PI social and behavioral science

Kimberly Noble, MD, PhD; Teachers College, Columbia University, lead PI neuroscience

In alphabetical order:

Greg Duncan, PhD; University of California, Irvine

Nathan A. Fox, PhD; University of Maryland

Lisa A. Gennetian, PhD; Duke University Sanford School of Public Policy

Hirokazu Yoshikawa, PhD; New York University

Principal Investigators of Qualitative Substudy

Sarah Halpern-Meekin, PhD; University of Wisconsin-Madison

Katherine Magnuson, PhD; University of Wisconsin-Madison

Study Management

Lauren Meyer, Teachers College, Columbia University; National Project Director

Andrea Karsh, University of California, Irvine; Administrative Director

Matthew Maury, Duke University, Production and Retention Management

Study Co-Investigators

Sarah Black, PhD; University of New Orleans

William Fifer, PhD; Sackler Institute for Developmental Psychobiology, Columbia University Medical Center

Michael Georgieff, MD; University of Minnesota

Joseph Isler, PhD; Columbia University Medical Center

Debra Karhson, PhD; University of New Orleans

Alicia Kunin-Batson, PhD, University of Minnesota

Connie Lamm, PhD; University of Arkansas

Dennis Molfese, PhD; University of Nebraska, Lincoln

Victoria Molfese, PhD; University of Nebraska, Lincoln

Jennifer Mize Nelson, PhD; University of Nebraska, Lincoln

Timothy Nelson, PhD; University of Nebraska, Lincoln

Sonya Troller-Renfree, PhD; Teachers College, Columbia University

Study Data Collectors

The Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, is responsible for recruitment and baseline, age-1, age-2, and age-3 data collection waves. Starting at age-4 through age-8, SRC is responsible for tracking families and assisting site-based staff in locating families. SRC data collection operations are overseen by: Stephanie Chardoul, Director of Survey Research Operations and Piotr Dworak, Senior Survey Specialist, Survey Research Operations.

Contact

To contact the study investigators, email them at [email protected]

Website: babysfirstyears.com

The Youth Development Study (YDS) was initiated as a school-based study of adolescent children and their parents to examine the consequences of formative experiences in adolescence for mental health, value formation, educational achievement, and multiple facets of behavioral adjustment. Particular attention was directed to the impacts of early work experience. Data were also obtained about parent-child and peer relationships and experiences in school. As the study continued, the focus shifted to adult development and attainment and, most recently, mid-life adjustment and health. This comprehensive longitudinal study now encompasses three generations: the initial cohort studied from adolescence to mid-life (G2), their parents (G1), and their adolescent children (G3). Data from three generations in the same families enable study of intergenerational relationships and differences in the experience of adolescence and transition to adulthood across parent and child cohorts. The YDS covers a wide range of topics of interest to sociologists, social psychologists, developmental psychologists, and life course scholars, including the development and impacts of agentic resources, socioeconomic attainment, processes of inter- and intra-generational mobility, objective and subjective work conditions, family relationships, intergenerational relationships, mental and physical health, and well-being.

In-school administration of paper surveys during the first four years of the study was supplemented by mailed surveys. Subsequent data collection took place entirely by mail, with 19 surveys conducted between 1988 and 2011. A final survey was conducted on-line in 2019. Survey data was obtained from the parents (G1) of this cohort during the first and fourth waves of the study (1988 and 1991). Surveys of the children (G3) began in 2009, continued in 2010 and 2011 (by mail) and in 2019-2020 (online).

The Youth Development Study measures a wide range of formative experiences and both psychological and behavioral variables, using survey methodology.

The G1 surveys obtained information about socioeconomic background as well as attitudes toward teenage employment, the parents' own employment as teenagers, their current work experiences, and educational expectations for their children.

The G2 surveys during the high school years included detailed questions about students' work and volunteer experiences, as well as experiences in their family, school, and peer groups, with an emphasis on the ways that working affected other life domains, mental health, and well-being. Shorter surveys containing many of the same topics were administered to students in 1992, 1993, and 1994, and included questions about current family and living arrangements. In 1995, a full survey was administered covering the wide range of topics included in previous surveys as well as information about career plans and life events that had occurred in the past five years. G2 Waves 9 through 19 (1997-2011) included many of the same questions contained in earlier surveys and additional sections that focused on the respondents' educational experiences, family relationships, sources of living expenses, and health and well-being. The most recent G2 survey (2019), administered on-line, included questions about support of aging parents. The YDS is unique in its coverage of both objective and subjective work experiences from adolescence to mid-life.

The topics covered by the G3 surveys are very similar to the G2 variables described above. Variables in each G2 and G3 wave are included in cross-wave codebooks, available at the Data Archive Codebook website.

For an overview of the Youth Development Study, see Mortimer, Jeylan T. (2012) "The Evolution, Contributions, and Prospects of the Youth Development Study: An Investigation in Life Course Social Psychology." Social Psychology Quarterly 75(1, March):5-27.