Policy document
Early childhood development: an imperative for action and measurement at scale
Linda Richter, Maureen M. Black, Pia Rebello Britto, Bernadette M. E. G. Daelmans, Chris Desmond et al. ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This document reviews progress in measuring early childhood development globally, focusing on three measurement approaches: an index for comparing children's development across countries, population-level assessments to identify children at risk, and country profiles of early childhood services and determinants. The authors argue that early experiences shape lifelong health and well-being, and that better measurement frameworks and tools are essential for monitoring progress. While advances have been made, the document calls for more investment in standardising measurement tools and building country capacity to collect and use data.
Key points
- Early childhood experiences shape biological and psychological structures that affect lifelong health, well-being and productivity
- A development index has been created to allow country comparisons of young children's development that can be incorporated into national surveys
- Population-level assessments have been improved to identify young children at risk of poor early development
- Country profiles of determinants, drivers and coverage for early childhood development services were produced using data from 91 countries
- More investment is needed to standardise measurement tools, regularly collect country data, and improve country capacity to collect and use data
Limitations
The document is a review of measurement progress rather than a study of intervention outcomes, so it cannot tell us which early childhood development programmes are most effective or whether specific interventions improve child outcomes. It does not provide detailed evidence on the effectiveness of particular early childhood services or policies.
Abstract
Experiences during early childhood shape biological and psychological structures and functions in ways that affect health, well-being and productivity throughout the life course. The science of early childhood and its long-term consequences have generated political momentum to improve early childhood development and elevated action to country, regional and global levels. These advances have made it urgent that a framework, measurement tools and indicators to monitor progress globally and in countries are developed and sustained. We review progress in three areas of measurement contributing to these goals: the development of an index to allow country comparisons of young children's development that can easily be incorporated into ongoing national surveys; improvements in population-level assessments of young children at risk of poor early development; and the production of country profiles of determinants, drivers and coverage for early childhood development and services using currently available data in 91 countries. While advances in these three areas are encouraging, more investment is needed to standardise measurement tools, regularly collect country data at the population level, and improve country capacity to collect, interpret and use data relevant to monitoring progress in early childhood development.