Cognition in Context Lab

Procrastinating on holiday shopping? Here are some tips based on research with kids and adults:

Two Ways to Avoid the Procrastination Loop and Get Started on Anything New research in psychology describes some of the factors that contribute to procrastination in both children and adults. Learn some tips on how we can build the motivation to get started on that last-minute holiday shopping and any other tasks that need to get done.

If a child gets a low score on an executive function measure, what does that mean? CICLab Director Yuko Munakata, lab alum Sabine Doebel, and colleagues around the world are providing a new answer, as captured in this story featured in the Washington Post:

The Marshmallow Test and other predictors of success have bias built in, researchers say Executive function is a collection of cognitive skills essential to human life, but psychologists now say our tests contain cultural biases.

Thanks for the shout-out Nature Reviews!

Mutual implications of procrastination research in adults and children for theory and intervention Nature Reviews Psychology

Don't procrastinate on reading this new paper!

Mutual implications of procrastination research in adults and children for theory and intervention - Nature Reviews Psychology Procrastination is often viewed as innocuous as long as deadlines are met but it is associated with negative life outcomes. In this Review, Mahy et al. bring together procrastination research in adults and children and explore their mutual implications for measurement, theory and interventions.

Congratulations to CiC Lab alum Antoinette Banks for her incredible achievement in winning the Black Ambition Prize for her Expert IEP app!

PhD Student Antoinette Banks Wins $1 Million Black Ambition Prize - UC Davis School of Education Award is for parent-facing app that uses predictive AI to optimize IEP plans

Do you know what will happen in the future? Children's answers may impact their development:

What’s Next? Advances and Challenges in Understanding How Environmental Predictability Shapes the Development of Cognitive Control - Yuko Munakata, Diego Placido, Winnie Zhuang, 2023 Forming predictions about what will happen next in the world happens early in development, without instruction, and across species. Some environments support mo...

Congratulations to Diego Placido for passing his qualifying exam last Friday!

How much influence do parents really have on their children? Listen to find out more in this new episode of TED Radio Hour featuring CiCLab Professor Yuko Munakata.

Cuts Both Ways There are two sides to every coin — and sometimes our strengths become weaknesses. This hour, TED speakers explore the mixed blessings and volatile flip sides of mental health, parenting and AI.

To wait or not to wait? The answer to that question might be up to culture.

How Culture Affects the ‘Marshmallow Test’ A classic test of self-control can carry complex cultural biases

The CiCLab enjoyed celebrating and sending off Jade Yonehiro (left) and Winnie Zhuang (right), who moved as graduate students with Professor Yuko Munakata from CU Boulder to UC Davis in 2019.

Jade shared her fascinating work as an Open Access Data Analyst for the California Digital Library of the University of California, Office of the President. Winnie presented on the journey that led to her impressive dissertation: “Children’s cognitive control: Measurement, development, and associations with inhibition and mindfulness."

We celebrated Jade and Winnie’s insights and accomplishments, their care and connection with the community, and their recent collaborative publication evaluating a peer-led parenting program: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10826-023-02580-6

We look forward to following Jade’s continuing open-access work, and to hearing about Winnie’s new projects as a mentor-researcher at the Crown Institute! https://www.colorado.edu/crowninstitute/ Congratulations, Winnie and Jade!

Talking to yourself: what does children's self-directed speech tell us about their goals and development?

Unraveling the Nature of Children’s Self-directed Speech: Correlates of Five- and Six-year-olds’ Overt and Partially Covert Speech on Three Tasks Young children’s self-directed speech during activities has long fascinated developmental psychologists. Why do children talk to themselves and does it support development? On Vygotsky’s sociocultural account, children use self-directed speech to regulate thought and behavior while performing ch...

Congratulations to CiCLab RA, Joyan Cyrus, on receiving the Crankstart Reentry Scholarship, and on his acceptance to the McNair scholars program!