ASSOCIATIONS BETWEEN EARLY MATERIAL HARDSHIP AND BEHAVIORAL SELF-REGULATION DEVELOPMENT ACROSS CHILDHOOD: A PERSON-CENTERED APPROACH

We identified early material hardship profiles in infancy and their associations with the heterogeneity of behavioral self-regulation from early to middle childhood, using the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N=4,614). Four material hardship classes and three behavioral self-regulation trajectories were identified. Children experiencing diverse material hardship (e.g. food, bill, utility hardship) in year 1 demonstrated a higher probability of membership in the low-increasing and medium-stable behavioral self-regulation trajectories and a lower probability in the high-increasing trajectory from ages 3 to 9. Implications for addressing families’ financial material difficulties and supporting self-regulation for children at greater risk are discussed.