Yun Shen

All Publications

• Participation rates in a group-based early childhood development program: Evidence from rural China CHINA ECONOMIC REVIEW Zhang, Z., Wang, L., Shen, Y., Lin, J., Meng, P., Zheng, I., Zhao, N., You, K., Song, T., Wu, A., Zhang, H., Zhu, B., Rozelle, S. 2026; 98

  View details for DOI 10.1016/j.chieco.2026.102725

  View details for Web of Science ID 001780152100001

• Revisiting Home Environment in the Digital Age: Empirical Comparison of FCI Subscales With Screen Use in Rural China. Child: care, health and development Shen, Y., Wang, L., Zhang, H., Meng, P., Tang, V., Rozelle, S., Zheng, S., Zhu, B., Shao, J. 2026; 52 (2): e70262

  Abstract

  Early childhood development (ECD) is critical for lifelong outcomes, especially in low- and middle-income countries. The home environment plays a vital role, with high-quality caregiving practices such as reading, storytelling and interactive play strongly linked to developmental outcomes. The family care indicator (FCI) scale, although widely used to assess caregiving quality, may be outdated due to shifts from traditional print materials to digital media in recent years. This study explores how home environment components, especially reading materials and screen usage, affect ECD in rural China and why the FCI may need to be revised in the near future.Data were collected from 581 children aged 6-24 months in rural Zhejiang Province in 2024. Child development outcomes were measured using the Bayley Scales of Infant Development, Third Edition, and the home environment was assessed via the FCI, supplemented by questions on caregiver and child screen use and caregivers' self-efficacy in accessing online parenting resources.Results show that 40% of children exhibited cognitive delays and 42% language delays, whereas 74% of households lacked magazines or newspapers, and nearly half of caregivers never read books at home. Children were exposed to screens for an average of 22 min per day (SD = 45). The FCI reading material subscale was not significantly associated with developmental outcomes, but when caregivers used educational screen content together with their children, it was positively associated with language development (p < 0.05) and cognitive development (p < 0.10). Caregivers' own screen use for parenting knowledge showed no significant association, likely due to low self-efficacy in navigating online resources.Traditional FCI items on books and newspapers have limited predictive value, whereas educationally oriented screen use appears beneficial, suggesting the FCI should be updated to reflect evolving caregiving practices in the digital age.

  View details for DOI 10.1111/cch.70262

  View details for PubMedID 41866786

• Supporting cognitive catch-up: The effects of cluster-randomized psychosocial stimulation interventions on preterm low birthweight children in rural China. Child development Emmers, D., Yu, W., Shen, Y., Feng, C., Misra, M., Peng, A., Wang, J., Wu, F., Ye, S., Rozelle, S. 2024

  Abstract

  Improved survival of preterm low birthweight (LBW) infants due to advances in neonatal care has brought issues such as postnatal development trajectories to the foreground. This study pools evidence from three cluster-randomized experiments evaluating community-based psychosocial stimulation programs conducted from 2014 to 2017 that included 3571 rural Chinese children aged 6-24months (51.1% male, 96.2% Han Chinese). The risk of severe cognitive delay was found to be 26.5 percentage points higher for preterm LBW children than for their peers at age 2.5, with a prevalence rate of 48.3%. Results show that psychosocial stimulation interventions can improve child cognitive development at scale, with beneficial impacts on child cognition disproportionately larger for preterm LBW children, helping them to catch up developmentally.

  View details for DOI 10.1111/cdev.14068

  View details for PubMedID 38353466