3-151 - Developmental Science and Pathways to Sustainable Early Childhood Development: Implications for UN Sustainable Development Goals

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Investing in young children is at the core of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), based on recent advances in neuroscience, child development, and economics. Significant brain development, socio-emotional development, and nutritional status have their foundations established during this period. Early interventions can overcome threats to children’s development, are cost-effective and lead to lifespan economic productivity. This symposium highlights the role of developmental science in contributing to the interdisciplinary scientific knowledge base and to effective implementation of SDGs in Low-and Middle-Income Countries.
All four presentations endorse that the success of the SDGs depends on ensuring that young children reach their developmental potential, thereby building the capacity for future generations to have the health, intelligence, creativity, and humanitarianism to advance the global agenda. The first presentation demonstrates how Nurturing Care can enhance the development of undernourished children in India. The second presentation examines some of the challenges and potentialities for Target 4.2 (by 2030 all girls and boys have access to quality early childhood development) with reference to South Asia. The third presentation presents evidence on how programs that infuse local culture into ECE programming successfully meet SDG Goal 4 on inclusive education. Using evidence from biodevelopmental, social, and macroeconomic perspectives, the fourth presentation links ECD programs to issues of social transformation, conflict and peace in the global context of the SDGs and make the case for multisectoral and interdisciplinary partnerships to achieving multiple SDG targets. All presentations emphasize that the success of the SDGs depends on effective childhood policies and programs.

Sub Unit

• Social Policy

Chairs

• Suman Verma, Panjab University, Chandigarh, India

• Anne C. Petersen, University of Michigan, CHGD

Individual Presentations

• Nurturing Care: Strategies to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals - Presenting Author: Maureen M. Black, RTI International & University of Maryland School of Medicine; Non-Presenting Author: Katherine A. Merseth, RTI International

• Positioning Early Childhood Development as a Sustainable Development Goal Target in the South Asian Context - Presenting Author: Meenakshi Dogra, Ambedkar University Delhi; Non-Presenting Author: Venita Kaul, Ambedkar University Delhi

• Progress Towards SDG 4 in a Culturally Diverse World: Experience of Modalidad Propia in Colombia - Presenting Author: Andrés Motta, UNICEF Colombia consultant; Non-Presenting Author: Hirokazu Yoshikawa, New York University

• ECD Programs, Peacebuilding, and the SDGs: Opportunities for Interdisciplinary Research and Multisectoral Partnerships - Presenting Author: Liliana Angelica Ponguta, The Yale Child Study Center; Non-Presenting Author: Chelsea Donaldson, Empatico, The KIND Foundation; Non-Presenting Author: Friedrich Affolter, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund; Non-Presenting Author: Paul Connolly, Centre for Evidence and Social Innovation, Queen’s University Belfast; Non-Presenting Author: Laura Dunne, Centre for Evidence and Social Innovation, Queen’s University Belfast; Non-Presenting Author: Sarah Miller, Centre for Evidence and Social Innovation, Queen’s University Belfast; Non-Presenting Author: Pia R Britto, UNICEF; Non-Presenting Author: Rima Salah, Yale Child Study Center; Non-Presenting Author: James Leckman, The Yale Child Study Center