Foreword Robert C. Granger; Acknowledgments; 1. Middle childhood: contexts of development Aletha C. Huston and Marika N. Ripke; 2. The significance of middle childhood peer competence for work and relationships in early adulthood W. Andrew Collins and Manfred van Dulmen; 3. Aggression and insecurity in late adolescent romantic relationships: antecedents and developmental pathways Gregory S. Pettit, John E. Bates, Amy Holtzworth-Munroe, Amy D. Marshall, Lori D. Harach, David J. Cleary and Kenneth A. Dodge; 4. Middle childhood family-contextual and personal factors as predictors of adult outcomes L. Rowell Huesmann, Eric F. Dubow, Leonard D. Eron and Paul Boxer; 5. Genetic and environmental influences on continuity and change in reading achievement in the Colorado Adoption Project Sally J. Wadsworth, Robin Corley, Robert Plomin, John K. Hewitt and John C. DeFries; 6. Reciprocal effects of mothers' depression and children's problem behaviors from middle childhood to early adolescence Sara R. Jaffee and Richie Poulton; 7. Middle childhood life course trajectories: links between family dysfunction and children's behavioral development Linda S. Pagani, Christa Japel, Alain Girard, Abdeljelil Farhat, Sylvana Cote and Richard E. Tremblay; 8. The contribution of middle childhood contexts to adolescent achievement and behavior Katherine Magnuson, Greg J. Duncan and Ariel Kalil; 9. Educational tracking within and between schools: from first grade through middle school and beyond Doris R. Entwisle, Karl L. Alexander and Linda Steffel Olson; 10. School environments and the diverging pathways of students living in poverty Penny Hauser-Cram, Marji Erickson Warfield, Jennifer Stadler and Selcuk R. Sirin; 11. The relations of classroom contexts in the early elementary years to children's classroom and social behavior NICHD Early Child Care Research Network; 12. Out-of-school time use during middle childhood in a low-income sample: do combinations of activities affect achievement and behavior? Pamela Morris and Ariel Kalil; 13. Low-income children's activity participation as a predictor of psychosocial and academic outcomes in middle childhood and adolescence Marika N. Ripke, Aletha C. Huston and David M. Casey; 14. Healthy mind, healthy habits: the influence of activity involvement in middle childhood Sandra D. Simpkins, Jennifer A. Fredricks, Pamela E. Davis-Kean and Jacquelynne S. Eccles; 15. Media effects in middle childhood L. Rowell Huesmann and Laramie D. Taylor; 16. Continuity and discontinuity in middle childhood: implications for adult outcomes in the UK 1970 birth cohort Leon Feinstein and John Bynner; 17. Mandatory welfare-to-work programs and preschool-age children: do impacts persist into middle childhood? Sharon M. McGroder, Martha J. Zaslow, Kristin A. Moore and Jennifer L. Brooks; 18. Effects of welfare and employment policies on middle-childhood school performance: do they vary by race/ethnicity, and if so, why? Hirokazu Yoshikawa, Pamela Morris, Lisa Gennetian, Amanda L. Roy, Anna Gassman-Pines and Erin B. Godfrey; 19. Effects of a family poverty intervention program lasting from middle childhood to adolescence Aletha C. Huston, Sylvia R. Epps, Mi Suk Shim, Greg J. Duncan, Danielle A. Crosby and Marika N. Ripke; 20. Experiences in middle childhood and children's development: a summary and integration of research Aletha C. Huston and Marika N. Ripke.