High‐quality early care and education for low‐income families: Toddlers’ cognitive and emotional functioning during the COVID‐19 pandemic

High‐quality early care and education (ECE) programs are associated with positive outcomes, especially for children from low‐income families. During the initial COVID‐19 pandemic lockdown many of these families faced an abrupt halt to ECE. Here, we examined how toddlers from economically disadvantaged backgrounds enrolled in high‐quality ECE programs in the United States during the 2020 pandemic (n = 48) fared on cognitive and socioemotional outcomes compared to a 2019 pre‐pandemic cohort (n = 94) and a pandemic 2021 cohort (n = 132). Toddlers in the 2020 cohort scored significantly lower on executive function compared to toddlers in 2019 and 2021 cohorts. Toddlers in the 2020 cohort had higher ratings self‐regulation compared to the pre‐pandemic cohort, but not 2021 cohort. There were no differences on attachment ratings between cohorts. Findings suggest that the abrupt halt to ECE programs due to the COVID‐19 pandemic impacted US toddlers’ cognitive and socioemotional abilities. This underscores the importance of continued high‐quality ECE for infants and toddlers from low‐income families during disruptive times. Further work is needed to investigate the long‐term impacts of experiencing an abrupt halt to ECE due to COVID‐19.