As children get older, they acquire new facts, memories and skills, build and revise intuitive theories about people, objects, and space, and develop and foster social relationships with others. How does the brain support these remarkable achievements? My research uses a variety of methods, including child-friendly neuroimaging experiments, to address this question. In particular, I investigate the relationship between social cognitive development (i.e., how we think about people) and brain development in childhood. I ask: (1) when do we develop specialized brain regions for thinking about other people? (2) what computations do these brain regions carry out? (3) what kinds of neural changes support social cognitive development? (4) what environmental & genetic factors promote & hinder this development? My research aims to inform theories of cognitive development and address basic science questions about the human brain.