There is reassuring news for parents this morning.

Detailed research has found very little difference in the benefits of caring for toddlers at home or sending them to daycare.

The ‘Growing Up In Ireland’ study found ‘socio-emotional’ development was largely unaffected by daycare.

Associate Research Professor with the ESRI, Helen Russell, says they identified a greater impact in households experiencing financial difficulty.

Ms Russell said: “We looked also at the hours of care, care of more than 30 hours per week we found was associated with a small negative affect.

“To put them in context, it really was more than affects like a child’s gender, their health status or the household economic conditions.

“If the family are having financial difficulties that has a really strong affect on the child’s emotional outcome.”