There is a dearth of research spanning multiple developmental stages to delineate the far-reaching implications of early tobacco smoke exposure for later behavior adaptation and also elucidate the underlying psychological mechanisms. Using NICHD SECCYD data, we conducted process model analyses to address this gap. Results indicated that early tobacco smoke exposure was not only negatively associated with preschool cool and hot inhibitory control, but also positively related to externalizing and internalizing problems in early adolescence. Further, early exposure was also positively associated with externalizing problems in early adolescence via a negative link with preschool cool inhibitory control. Behavior problems in toddlerhood also served as one mechanism underlying the implications of early exposure for behavior problems in early adolescence. As compared to nonexposed children, children with both prenatal and postnatal exposure tended to have lower cool and hot inhibitory control, whereas children with only prenatal exposure displayed lower hot inhibitory control. Regardless of whether exposure was across prenatal and postnatal periods, or restricted to prenatal phase alone, exposed children displayed more behavior problems in toddlerhood, which in turn predicted more behavior problems in early adolescence. All associations emerged after considering extensive potential confounding factors and did not vary across child sex. Taken together, early tobacco smoke exposure may induce self-regulation deficits and also early onset of behavior problems and thus elevate the risk of later psychopathology. Building a smoke free environment in pregnancy and infancy likely yields long-term benefits by facilitating adaptation in early adolescence.

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Implications of family economic conditions (FECs) for child development have been extensively examined. What remains sparse is research spanning multiple life stages to delineate the far-reaching influences of early FECs for child subsequent development in different domains and how various family stress and investment processes jointly account for such association. To address these gaps, using data from 929 families in the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development (NICHD Early Child Care Research Network, 2001, 2005), this study examined how family income-to-needs ratio (FITNR) when children were 1–36 months old was associated with child language skills, social competence, externalizing, and internalizing problems at 6th grade. Parental investment and maternal/paternal depressive symptoms and sensitivity when children were 54 months old and in 3rd grade were tested as potential mediators. Results indicated that early FITNR shaped child cognitive, social, and behavioral adaptation in early adolescence indirectly through parental investment, depressive symptoms, and sensitive parenting in the preschool period and middle childhood. Parental investment, depressive symptoms, and sensitive parenting played such mediating roles above and beyond each other. Parental investment primarily accounted for the association between early FITNR and child later language skills, whereas parental depressive symptoms and sensitive parenting uniquely explained the associations between early FITNR and child subsequent internalizing symptoms, externalizing problems, social competence, and language skills. Theoretical/practical implications of such findings were discussed.