Introduction: Cognition and emotion as codeveloping processes.

Abstract

T he topic of cognition and emotion in early development is not only critical to the field of child psychology but also an integral part of my own program of research. From my earliest publication on the topic with Christy Wolfe (a commentary in a special issue of Child Development; Bell & Wolfe, 2004) to a journal special issue (Infant Behavior and Development; Wolfe & Bell, 2023), my research collaborators and I have been enmeshed in this general topic for over 2 decades. We have published multiple empirical articles on the interplay between cognition and emotion (e.g., Meza-Cervera et al., 2023;Wolfe & Bell, 2007) and have been invited to write commentaries and chapters in other volumes (e.g., Bell & Deater-Deckard, 2007;Bell et al., 2019).Emotion-cognition in early development was a burgeoning topic in the field when Susan Calkins and I proposed our original volume to American Psychological Association in 2006. At that point, there had been a great deal of conceptual work suggesting the integration of emotion and cognition (e.g., Blair, 2002;Posner & Rothbart, 2000) but little empirical data. We lamented the lack of longitudinal information on this integration. Much has changed since the publication of the Susan Calkins and I coedited the first edition of Child Development at the Intersection of Emotion and Cognition. Collaborating on that volume was part of a 15-year research relationship that produced many empirical reports on cognition, emotion, and cognitionemotion integration from infancy through middle childhood. The writing of this introduction to the second edition was partially supported by Grant R01 MH125800