Baby's First Years (BFY), New York City, New Orleans, Omaha, and Twin Cities, 2018-2022

The overall goal of the Baby's First Years study is to assess the causal role played by household income in affecting children's early cognitive, socio-emotional, and brain development. Recent advances in developmental neuroscience suggest that experiences early in life have profound and enduring impacts on the developing brain. Family economic resources shape the nature of many of these experiences, yet the extent to which they affect children's development is unknown. The Baby's First Years project is the first randomized controlled trial to provide estimates of the causal impacts of unconditional cash gifts on the cognitive, socio-emotional, and brain development of infants and young children in low-income U.S. families.
Specifically, 1,000 recruited mothers of infants with incomes below the federal poverty line from four diverse U.S. communities are receiving monthly cash gift payments by debit card. Mothers were initially told the gifts would last for the first 40 months of their child's life, but we have secured funding to continue the payments for three additional years (i.e., for a total of 76 months). Parents in the high cash gift group (n=400 in the study sample) are receiving a cash gift of $333 per month ($4,000 per year), while parents in the low cash gift group (n=600) are receiving a nominal monthly gift payment of $20 ($240 per year), also for 76 months.
In order to measure the impacts of the unconditional cash gift income on children's cognitive and behavioral development, we are assessing high and low cash gift group differences at ages 4, 6, and 8 (and, for a subset of measures, we capture interim development at ages 1, 2, and 3) in measures of cognitive, language, memory, self-regulation, and socio-emotional development. In order to understand the processes by which child impacts emerge, we are measuring a host of family process measures summarized in our pre-registration chart. Our data collection points are referred to as: "baseline", "age 1", "age 2," "age 3", "age 4", "age 6", and "age 8".
Additional information on the project, survey design, sample, variables, and COVID-19 pandemic adjustments are available from:

The User Guides for Baseline, Age 1, Age 2, and Age 3 which are included under the "Data and Documentation" tab
The project's website: babysfirstyears.com

<strong>The researchers request that all peer-reviewed papers using BFY Data:</strong>

be submitted to PubMed https://publicaccess.nih.gov immediately upon acceptance for publication
include the following citation to the data in their bibliography:

<strong>Citation</strong>
Magnuson, Katherine A., Noble, Kimberly, Duncan, Greg J., Fox, Nathan A., Gennetian, Lisa A., Yoshikawa, Hirokazu, and Halpern-Meekin, Sarah. Baby's First Years (BFY), New York City, New Orleans, Omaha, and Twin Cities, 2018-2022. Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2024-01-15. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR37871.v5

and include the following in their acknowledgements:

<strong>Acknowledgement</strong>
This research uses data from the Baby's First Years study. Research reported in this publication was supported by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number R01HD087384 and 2R01HD087384. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. This research was additionally supported by the US Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation; National Institute of Mental Health; Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research-Office of the Director, National Institutes of Health; Andrew and Julie Klingenstein Family Fund; Annie E. Casey Foundation; Arnold Ventures; Arrow Impact; BCBS of Louisiana Foundation; Bezos Family Foundation, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; Bill Hammack and Janice Parmelee, Brady Education Fund; Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (Silicon Valley Community Foundation); Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies; Child Welfare Fund; Esther A. and Joseph Klingenstein Fund; Ford Foundation; Greater New Orleans Foundation; Heising-Simons Foundation; Holland Foundation; Jacobs Foundation; JPB Foundation; J-PAL North America; Lozier Foundation; New York City Mayor's Office for Economic Opportunity; Perigee Fund; Robin Hood Foundation; Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; Russell Sage Foundation; Sherwood Foundation; Valhalla Foundation; Weitz Family Foundation; W.K. Kellogg Foundation; and three anonymous donors.

<strong>Principal Investigators</strong>
Katherine Magnuson, PhD; University of Wisconsin-Madison, lead PI social and behavioral science
Kimberly Noble, MD, PhD; Teachers College, Columbia University, lead PI neuroscience

In alphabetical order:
Greg Duncan, PhD; University of California, Irvine
Nathan A. Fox, PhD; University of Maryland
Lisa A. Gennetian, PhD; Duke University Sanford School of Public Policy
Hirokazu Yoshikawa, PhD; New York University

<strong>Principal Investigators of Qualitative Substudy</strong>
Sarah Halpern-Meekin, PhD; University of Wisconsin-Madison
Katherine Magnuson, PhD; University of Wisconsin-Madison
<strong>Study Management</strong>
Lauren Meyer, Teachers College, Columbia University; National Project Director
Andrea Karsh, University of California, Irvine; Administrative Director
Matthew Maury, Duke University, Production and Retention Management
<strong>Study Co-Investigators</strong>
Sarah Black, PhD; University of New Orleans
William Fifer, PhD; Sackler Institute for Developmental Psychobiology, Columbia University Medical Center
Michael Georgieff, MD; University of Minnesota
Joseph Isler, PhD; Columbia University Medical Center
Debra Karhson, PhD; University of New Orleans
Alicia Kunin-Batson, PhD, University of Minnesota
Connie Lamm, PhD; University of Arkansas
Dennis Molfese, PhD; University of Nebraska, Lincoln
Victoria Molfese, PhD; University of Nebraska, Lincoln
Jennifer Mize Nelson, PhD; University of Nebraska, Lincoln
Timothy Nelson, PhD; University of Nebraska, Lincoln
Sonya Troller-Renfree, PhD; Teachers College, Columbia University
<strong>Study Data Collectors</strong>
The Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, is responsible for recruitment and baseline, age-1, age-2, and age-3 data collection waves. Starting at age-4 through age-8, SRC is responsible for tracking families and assisting site-based staff in locating families. SRC data collection operations are overseen by: Stephanie Chardoul, Director of Survey Research Operations and Piotr Dworak, Senior Survey Specialist, Survey Research Operations.
<strong>Contact</strong>
To contact the study investigators, email them at [e-mail]
Website: babysfirstyears.com