Infants who experience more adult-initiated conversations have better expressive language in toddlerhood

Parental sensitivity and family conversation: A naturalistic longitudinal study with both mothers and fathers across three time-points in early infancy

Parental verbal sensitivity is known to promote child language skills, but few studies have considered: (a) links between global (i.e., verbal, behavioral, and affective) measures of parental sensitivity and infant-initiated conversations, an important precursor to language development; (b) whether maternal and paternal sensitivity show similar links with infant-initiated conversation; or (c) the transactional role of infant conversation for later parental sensitivity. Addressing these gaps, this study of 186 British first-time parents (93 families) examines the developmental dynamics between parental sensitivity and infant communication across the first year of life. We explore; (i) the role of maternal and paternal sensitivity (assessed during structured home observations at 4 months post-partum) for parent-infant conversational interactions at 7 months (indexed by day-long naturalistic recordings), and (ii) whether these mother-infant and father-infant conversations at 7 months shape maternal and paternal sensitivity at 14 months (also assessed via structured home observations). For both male and female infants, maternal (but not paternal) sensitivity at 4 months predicted infant vocalisations and conversational initiation at 7-months. By contrast, neither index of infant talk predicted maternal or paternal sensitivity at 14 months. Together these findings refine understanding of theoretical models of social development and suggest new possibilities for future research.

Caregiving relationships are a cornerstone of developmental psychopathology

The interdisciplinary field of developmental psychopathology has made great strides by including context into theoretical and empirical approaches to studying risk and resilience. Perhaps no context is more important to the developing child than their relationships with their caregivers (typically a child's parents), as caregivers are a key source of stimulation and nurturance to young children. Coupled with the high degree of brain plasticity in the earliest years of life, these caregiving relationships have an immense influence on shaping behavioral outcomes relevant to developmental psychopathology. In this article, we discuss three areas within caregiving relationships: (1) caregiver-child interactions in everyday, naturalistic settings; (2) caregivers' social cognitions about their child; and (3) caregivers' broader social and cultural context. For each area, we provide an overview of its significance to the field, identify existing knowledge gaps, and offer potential approaches for bridging these gaps to foster growth in the field. Lastly, given that one value of a scientific discipline is its ability to produce research useful in guiding real-world decisions related to policy and practice, we encourage developmental psychopathology to consider that a focus on caregiving, a modifiable target, supports this mission.

Parent coaching from 6 to 18 months improves child language outcomes through 30 months of age

Interventions focused on the home language environment have been shown to improve a number of child language outcomes in the first years of life. However, data on the longer-term effects of the intervention are still somewhat limited. The current study examines child vocabulary and complex speech outcomes (N = 59) during the year following completion of a parent-coaching intervention, which was previously found to increase the quantity of parent-child conversational turns and to improve child language outcomes through 18 months of age. Measures of parental language input, child speech output, and parent-child conversational turn-taking were manually coded from naturalistic home recordings (Language Environment Analysis System, LENA) at regular 4-month intervals when children were 6- to 24-months old. Child language skills were assessed using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (CDI) at four time-points following the final intervention session (at 18, 24, 27, and 30 months). Vocabulary size and growth from 18 to 30 months was greater in the intervention group, even after accounting for differences in child language ability during the intervention period. The intervention group also scored higher on measures of speech length and grammatical complexity, and these effects were mediated by 18-month vocabulary. Intervention was associated with increased parent-child conversational turn-taking in home recordings at 14 months, and mediation analysis suggested that 14-month conversational turn-taking accounted for intervention-related differences in subsequent vocabulary. Together, the results suggest enduring, positive effects of parental language intervention and underscore the importance of interactive, conversational language experience during the first 2 years of life. RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS: Parent coaching was provided as part of a home language intervention when children were 6-18 months of age. Naturalistic home language recordings showed increased parent-child conversational turn-taking in the intervention group at 14 months of age. Measures of productive vocabulary and complex speech indicated more advanced expressive language skills in the intervention group through 30 months of age, a full year after the final intervention session. Conversational turn-taking at 14 months predicted subsequent child vocabulary and accounted for differences in vocabulary size across the intervention and control groups.