Scientific Progress in Mapping the Relational Ecology of Early Child Development: A Systematic Scoping Review

Early child development emerges within a rich tapestry of relationships that sit within the various settings in which children live and grow, including (but not limited to) the family, early education and childcare, and neighbourhood and wider community settings, as well as the connections between them, and the institutions and societal values that support them (Bronfenbrenner, 1977, 2005). The qualities of relationships that support healthy development have been well described over the last century. Warm, empathic and responsive adult care creates the secure base (i.e., felt sense of safety) that children need in order to explore the world and to grow and develop in the process of exploration (Ainsworth et al., 1978). Child–adult carer interactions happen in multiple settings, the centre of which is the family microsystem, including immediate family (e.g., parents and siblings) as well as extended family (e.g., grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins). Related microsystems include the early childcare microsystem (e.g., childcare workers and nannies), family, peer and community microsystems (e.g., family’s friends and neighbours), and broader government and non-government sponsored health systems (e.g., medical and allied health professional). Quality connections between microsystems (e.g., between parents and childcare) further strengthen the overall social ecology of early development forming another layer of the social ecology referred to as the mesosystem (see Fig. 1).

At broader levels sit wider social structures that indirectly influence proximal interactions occurring between children and adult carers. Examples include the quality of adult carer work environments, government financial supports and other social and healthcare services that form a protective exosystem. Broader still sit macrosystem factors that comprise the prevailing culture, attitudes and norms within which expectations about proximal interactions between children and their main adult carers are embedded and develop. At the broadest level sit chronosystem factors that encompass environmental changes that exert influence over the life course. These could include large-scale environmental events such as wars or pandemics.

In more recent years there has been an appreciation that the ecological influences on the developing child are much more complex than the simple nested configuration of social spheres shown in Fig. 1. For example, J. W. Neal and Neal (2013) propose that “the ecological environment is an overlapping arrangement of structures, each directly or indirectly connected to the others by the direct and indirect social interactions of their participants” (p.727). They further argue that these patterns of social interaction can be conceptualised as a social network and can thus be studied using methods developed within the field of social network analysis. Social network analysis is defined as an approach to data collection and analysis that captures information about the connections between entities (i.e. people, organisations, etc.). Egocentric networks (“ego-nets”) are most relevant as they describe the network of “alters” which form around a particular social “actor” (Crossley et al., 2015). This approach acknowledges that these actors are embedded within complex, interconnected social structures and that certain features of the structures themselves such as their density, reciprocity and centrality, can have a significant impact on outcomes. Our purpose in conducting this systematic scoping review was to map scientific progress in understanding the relational ecology of early development of the child-caregiver relationship; specifically, the extent to which studies have been conducted within systems, across systems, at all levels of the relational ecosystem. Given the remarkable similarities between bioecological concepts and concepts within social network analysis (SNA) (Z. P. Neal & Neal, 2017), we examined the use of SNA methods to model the relational ecology of early child development. A systematic scoping review approach was the most appropriate method of synthesis because (1) it accommodated variability in conceptualization of early relational health during early childhood, (2) the method is suitable for high-level mapping of longitudinal research on a broad range of potential influences including identification of research gaps, and (3) our aim was to describe the literature rather than report on the substantive findings of the identified studies (i.e. we do not quantify the nature and magnitude of the association between exposures and outcomes).

The aims of this systematic scoping review were threefold: (1) to determine the extent to which the methods and principles of SNA have been used to investigate the relational ecology of early child development, (2) to extend the scope of the review to studies that have examined any element of the early relational ecosystem using relationship specific measures, and (3) to summarise the types of relationships studied (e.g., mother, father, childcare worker, neighbour), the level of the bioecological model under investigation in these studies (i.e., micro-to-macrosystems), and methodological approaches used to study them (i.e., timing, mode of data collection and construct measured).

The scoping review was guided by the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) approach to scoping reviews (Peters et al., 2020). Reporting utilised the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR; Tricco et al., 2018). The PRISMA-ScR Checklist is provided in the Supplementary Information (see Online Resource 1). This review was not pre-registered. As this review does not involve re-analysing data, ethics approval was not necessary.

The review was conducted in two phases. The first phase sought to identify studies that used applied SNA to measure the relational ecology of early childhood. The second phase was conducted in response to the outcome of the first phase (no identified studies) and extended the scope to studies examining longitudinal associations between any element of the early relational ecology (exposure) and the child-caregiver relationship (outcome). Both phases were restricted to studies of the relational ecology around the child–adult carer that were conducted within population-based longitudinal studies of child development. Both phases followed the JBI recommended PCC framework (Population, Concept, and Context; Pollock et al., 2023).

The first phase of the review identified 67 population-based cohort studies that applied the principles and methods of social network analysis to study the relational ecology of child development. On double screening, none of these studies examined associations between the relational ecology and the quality of the early child–adult carer relationship between conception and three years of age. The extended second phase of the search returned 11,226 articles after removal of duplicates. At title and abstract screening in LitQuest, 3725 articles (33.2%) were manually screened, with 3181 excluded. The remaining 7501 articles were excluded by LitQuest. Full text screening was carried out on 543 articles and 122 articles were deemed eligible for inclusion. Screening and eligibility are reflected in the PRISMA flowchart (Fig. 2). Study details of the 122 included articles are provided in Online Resource 3.

In this scoping review we aimed to map scientific progress in understanding the relational ecology of early child development, from families to community settings, connections between them, and structures that support them. We found that most studies focused on the family microsystem, with a particular focus on the mother–child relationship, and an occasional focus on the father-child relationship. Relatively few studies focused on other aspects of the microsystem, or higher levels of the relational ecosystem (meso-, exo- or macrosystems). Overall, it is evident that the complete relational ecosystem is poorly studied and that most studies are concentrated within the family microsystem. Moreover, the nature of the way these relationships were measured had substantial heterogeneity. The neglect of the broader relational ecology of early child development may put practitioner and social policy makers at risk of placing too much responsibility on adult carers themselves, within family settings in particular, and not enough on the wider social structures that support adult carers to care for children. These gaps in our collective knowledge of the early relational ecosystem requires urgent attention in future observational research.

The dearth of research in these areas may be because of the inherent challenges in measuring and analysing more diffuse and complex social environments. Indeed, the complexity and dynamism of these interactions necessitates innovative research designs and methodologies that are able to account for the interrelated nature of the social systems effecting early relational health and how these associations develop and change over the life course. As briefly outlined in the introduction, one possible way to capture these associations is using social network data collection and analysis methods.

Our initial searches did not identify any empirical research using social network methodologies to study relational health outcomes. However, we did encounter a conceptual approach to integrating social network analysis within a bioecological framework (e.g., Neal & Neal, 2017). Recognising that the ecological influences impacting an individual (or, in the current case, an infant-adult carer dyad) can be more complex than a simple nested configuration of social systems, this conceptual approach proposes that ecological influences are networked in complex and intersecting ways. The complexity of these networked ecological systems can be studied using well formulated social network data collection and analysis methodologies (Crossley et al., 2015; Kadushin, 2012). These models offer promising avenues for future research, particularly in understanding how different social systems interact to influence the infant-adult carer bond.

Additionally, future research could focus on examining how the microsystem of the family interacts with broader macrosystem influences, such as cultural norms and societal values. For instance, comparative studies exploring family dynamics within different cultural contexts (e.g., Italian versus Jewish cultures within the same geographical location) could provide insights into how macrosystem influences like cultural values shape child-caregiver relationships and the broader social ecology. Ensuring that future studies use population-representative samples will be critical for enabling generalization of findings across diverse populations. This will also ensure that interventions designed based on findings from such studies can effectively address the needs of different demographic and cultural groups, particularly those that might currently be underrepresented in the literature.

Bronfenbrenner’s model conceptualises the microsystem as the immediate environment in which the child directly interacts. Traditionally, this includes aspects of the family, school and peer environments. However, there has been increasing integration of technology in daily life through digital spaces (e.g., social media, virtual communication platforms and online education). These digital environments are becoming commonplace as part of the child and their caregiver’s immediate environment and may act as another aspect of the microsystem that influences a child’s social and emotional development (Navarro & Tudge, 2023). For instance, the nature and quality of child-caregiver interactions within digital platforms, the ways in which carers use technology in the home, and the cultural attitudes toward digital device use could each shape child development. As such, the introduction of a digital microsystem raises new questions about how the use of technology can strengthen or weaken relational bonds and health between children and their adult carers.

Our review has some limitations worth noting. First, this review focussed on general population samples and excluded clinically indicated samples (e.g., studies with sampling based on domestic violence or foster care), which may provide important insights into how extreme relational disruptions affect the child-caregiver relationship. By focusing only on general populations, the review may overlook critical dynamics present in high-risk groups, limiting the broader applicability of the findings. Moreover, the exclusion of qualitative studies may limit nuance in our understanding of the dynamics of child-caregiver relationships, that may be difficult to capture through quantitative methods alone. Similarly, many of the exposures identified in this review were based on subjective measurement, as opposed to objective contextual measures of exposures. However, it is important to note that perceptions of ecological factors may indeed be a more powerful influence on child-caregiver relational health than objective factors (Bronfenbrenner, 2005). Finally, our review included only published literature, which may introduce publication bias, skewing our understanding of the full scope of research in this area.