Early gesture use predicts children's language development in South Korea: New evidence supporting the cross-cultural importance of pointing

Research in the U.S. and other Western countries shows that children's early gesture use, which starts prior to verbal communication, is an important predictor of children's later language development. Despite increasing efforts to study gesture use in diverse contexts, most of our knowledge on the role of gesture is largely based on populations of Western countries. In this study, we add to the growing body of international research by examining gesture use by 31 mothers and their 14-month-old infants (12 girls) in South Korea and investigate the gestures used during interaction, and whether early gesture use at 14 months predicts Korean children's later language skills at 36 months. The results showed that in addition to using gestures observed in other cultural contexts, Korean mother-child dyads used culturally specific gesture (i.e., bowing), showing an early sign of socialization that starts with preverbal children. In addition, Korean infants' index-finger pointing, but not showing and giving, predicted their later receptive and expressive vocabulary skills at 36 months, providing additional support for the importance of pointing in early language development.

The Role of Gesture in Language Development for Neurotypical Children and Children With or at Increased Likelihood of Autism

For young children, gesture is found to precede and predict language development. However, we are still building a knowledge base about the specific nature of the relationship between gesture and speech. While much of the research on this topic has been conducted with neurotypical children, there is a growing body of work with children who have or are at increased likelihood of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Here, we summarize the literature on relations between gesture and speech, including the role of child gesture production as well as that of gesture exposure (caregiver gesture). We include literature on both neurotypical children and children with or at likelihood of ASD, highlight the similarities and differences across populations, and offer implications for research as well as early identification and intervention.

Conversation disruptions in early childhood predict executive functioning development: A longitudinal study

Conversational turn-taking is a complex communicative skill that requires both linguistic and executive functioning (EF) skills, including processing input while simultaneously forming and inhibiting responses until one's turn. Adult-child turn-taking predicts children's linguistic, cognitive, and socioemotional development. However, little is understood about how disruptions to temporal contingency in turn-taking, such as interruptions and overlapping speech, relate to cognitive outcomes, and how these relationships may vary across developmental contexts. In a longitudinal sample of 275 socioeconomically diverse mother-child dyads (children 50% male, 65% White), we conducted pre-registered examinations of whether the frequency of dyads' conversational disruption during free play when children were 3 years old related to children's executive functioning (EF; 9 months later), self-regulation skills (18 months later), and externalizing psychopathology in early adolescence (age 10-12 years). Contrary to hypotheses, more conversational disruptions significantly predicted higher inhibition skills, controlling for sex, age, income-to-needs (ITN), and language ability. Results were driven by maternal disruptions of the child's speech, and could not be explained by measures of overall talkativeness or interactiveness. Exploratory analyses revealed that ITN moderated these relationships, such that the positive effect of disruptions on inhibition was strongest for children from lower ITN backgrounds. We discuss how adult-driven "cooperative overlap" may serve as a form of engaged participation that supports cognition and behavior in certain cultural contexts.

Chinese parents' support of preschoolers' mathematical development

Research has documented the critical role played by the early home environment in children's mathematical development in Western contexts. Yet little is known about how Chinese parents support their preschoolers' development of math skills. The Chinese context is of particular interest because Chinese children outperform their Western counterparts in math, even early in development. The current study sought to fill this gap by examining a sample of 90 families of 4- and 5-year-olds from mainland China. Parental support-as measured by the frequency of parent-child engagement in home activities as well as parent number talk-and parents' role in children's numeracy skills were investigated. Results indicate wide variation among parents in both types of support. Frequency of engagement in formal numeracy activities, including counting objects and reading number story books, was related to children's knowledge of cardinality. A principal components analysis did not identify informal numeracy activities as a distinct home activity component, likely due to the infrequent occurrences of game-like numeracy activities among the Chinese families. Instead, a structured activity component emerged (e.g., playing musical instruments) and was positively related to children's arithmetic skills. Diversity, but not quantity, of parent number talk was related to children's symbolic magnitude understanding. The distinctive relationships between specific parental measures and child outcomes speak to the need for nuanced identification of home environment factors that are beneficial to particular math competencies. The findings also suggest cultural variations in the mechanisms that support children's mathematical development, highlighting the merits of investigating this topic in non-Western contexts.

Parents' talk about conceptual categories with infants: stability, variability, and implications for expressive language development

Children's exposure to talk about conceptual categories plays a powerful role in shaping their conceptual development. However, it remains unclear when parents begin to talk about categories with young children and whether such talk relates to children's language skills. This study examines relations between parents' talk about conceptual categories and infants' expressive language development. Forty-seven parent-infant dyads were videotaped playing together at child age 10, 12, 14, and 16 months. Transcripts of interactions were analyzed to identify parents' talk about conceptual categories. Children's expressive language development was assessed at 18 months. Findings indicate that parents indeed talked about conceptual categories with infants and that talk was stable across time, with college-educated parents producing more than non-college-educated parents. Further, parents' talk about conceptual categories between 10 and 16 months predicted children's 18-month expressive language. This study sheds new light on mechanisms through which early experiences may support children's language development.

"Mom said it in quotation marks!" Irony comprehension and metapragmatic awareness in 8-year-olds

This study investigated links between the development of children's understanding of ironic comments and their metapragmatic knowledge. Forty-six 8-year-olds completed the short version of the Irony Comprehension Task, during which they were presented with ironic comments in three stories and asked to provide reasons for why the speaker in a story uttered an ironic comment. We coded their responses and compared the results to similar data collected previously with 5-year-olds. Results showed that compared to younger children, 8-year-olds frequently refer to interlocutors' emotions, intentions, and to metapragmatics. These results support the view that comprehension of verbal irony is an emerging skill in children.

Experience with pointing gestures facilitates infant vocabulary growth through enhancement of sensorimotor brain activity

Exposure to communicative gestures, through their parents' use of gestures, is associated with infants' language development. However, the mechanisms supporting this link are not fully understood. In adults, sensorimotor brain activity occurs while processing communicative stimuli, including both spoken language and gestures. Using electroencephalogram (EEG) mu rhythm desynchronization (mu ERD), a marker of sensorimotor activity, we examined whether experimental manipulation of infants' exposure to gestures would affect language development, and specifically whether such an effect would be mediated by changes in sensorimotor brain activity. Mu ERD was measured in 10- to 12-month-old infants (N = 81; 42 male; 15% Hispanic, 62% White) recruited from counties surrounding a large mid-Atlantic university while they observed an experimenter gesturing toward or grasping an object. Half of the infants were randomized to receive increased gesture exposure through a parent-directed training. All 81 infants provided behavioral (infant and parent pointing and infant vocabulary) data prior to intervention and 72 provided behavioral data postintervention. Forty-two infants provided usable (post artifact removal) EEG data prior to intervention and 40 infants provided usable EEG data post-intervention. Twenty-nine infants provided usable EEG data at both sessions. Increased parent gesture due to the intervention was associated with increased infant right lateralized mu ERD at follow-up, but only while observing the experimenter gesturing not grasping. Increased mu ERD, again only while observing the experimenter gesture, was associated with increased infant receptive vocabulary. This is the first evidence suggesting that increasing exposure to gestures may impact infants' language development through an effect on sensorimotor brain activity. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

American High School Students' Knowledge and Beliefs about Parenting and Early Childhood Development

Income-based achievement gaps in cognitive skills are already large when children enter Kindergarten. By adopting a preventative approach that considers the efficacy of providing parenting knowledge to individuals before they become parents while they are still in secondary school, we may be able to reduce achievement gaps. In this study, we examined adolescents' knowledge and understanding of parenting and child development by creating and validating the Adolescent Parenting Knowledge and Attitudes Survey and administering it to over 1000 US high school students. This study shows that while many high school students hold beliefs consistent with successful outcomes for young children and their learning, there is much room for increasing their knowledge. The findings are discussed as presenting a potential opportunity to use high school as a site to improve adolescents' knowledge and attitudes related to child rearing and development.

“Let’s Read Together”: A Parent-Focused Intervention on Dialogic Book Reading to Improve Early Language and Literacy Skills in Preschool Children

Many children are at risk for reading difficulties because of inadequate emergent literacy skills. It is widely accepted that development of emergent literacy skills is strictly related to children’s early literacy experiences at home and school. Dialogic reading is an evidence-based intervention to promote the language skills of preschool children. This study examined the feasibility and efficacy of a parent-focused dialogic book reading intervention that aimed to foster the early language and literacy skills of pre-school children. A sample of 40 Italian preschoolers (Mage = 62.9 months, SD = 6.3) and their parents were divided into three groups: treatment group (n = 12); information group (n = 12) and control group (n = 16). The efficacy of the intervention for oral language skills was examined by analyzing the improvements from pre- to post-intervention in children’s oral language outcomes, through ad hoc and standardized tasks; specifically, by measuring proximal and distal abilities. Additionally, we analyzed the intervention effects on parent–child interaction and dialogic behaviors during shared book reading. Results suggest that a relatively brief intervention (6 weeks) using dialogic book reading strategies can lead to sustained improvements in early language and literacy skills in preschoolers (both proximal and distal) and in parent dialogic behaviors during shared book reading.

Parental Language Input Predicts Neuroscillatory Patterns Associated with Language Development in Toddlers at Risk of Autism

In this study we investigated the impact of parental language input on language development and associated neuroscillatory patterns in toddlers at risk of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Forty-six mother-toddler dyads at either high (n = 22) or low (n = 24) familial risk of ASD completed a longitudinal, prospective study including free-play, resting electroencephalography, and standardized language assessments. Input quantity/quality at 18 months positively predicted expressive language at 24 months, and relationships were stronger for high-risk toddlers. Moderated mediations revealed that input-language relationships were explained by 24-month frontal and temporal gamma power (30-50 Hz) for high-risk toddlers who would later develop ASD. Results suggest that high-risk toddlers may be cognitively and neurally more sensitive to their language environments, which has implications for early intervention.

Exploring the Linguistic, Cognitive, and Social Skills Underlying Lexical Processing Efficiency as Measured by the Looking-while-Listening Paradigm

The looking-while-listening (LWL) paradigm is frequently used to measure toddlers' lexical processing efficiency (LPE). Children's LPE is associated with vocabulary size, yet other linguistic, cognitive, or social skills contributing to LPE are not well understood. It also remains unclear whether LPE measures from two types of LWL trials (target-initial versus distractor-initial trials) are differentially associated with the abovementioned potential correlates of LPE. We tested 18- to 24-month-olds and found that children's word learning on a fast-mapping task was associated with LPE measures from all trials and distractor-initial trials but not target-initial trials. Children's vocabulary and pragmatic skills were both associated with their fast-mapping performance. Executive functions and pragmatic skills were associated with LPE measures from distractor-initial but not target-initial trials. Hence, LPE as measured by the LWL paradigm may reflect a constellation of skills important to language development. Methodological implications for future studies using the LWL paradigm are discussed.

Show, give, and point gestures across infancy differentially predict language development

It is well established that deictic gestures, especially pointing, play an important role in children's language development. However, recent evidence suggests that other types of deictic gestures, specifically show and give gestures, emerge before pointing and are associated with later pointing. In the present study, we examined the development of show, give, and point gestures in a sample of 47 infants followed longitudinally from 10 to 16 months of age and asked whether there are certain ages during which different gestures are more or less predictive of language skills at 18 months. We also explored whether parents' responses vary as a function of child gesture types. Child gestures and parent responses were reliably coded from videotaped sessions of parent-child interactions. Language skills were measured at 18 months using standardized (Mullen Scales of Early Learning) and parent report (MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory) measures. We found that at 10 months, show+give gestures were a better predictor of 18-month language skills than pointing gestures were, yet at 14 months, pointing gestures were a better predictor of 18-month language skills than show+give gestures. By 16 months, children's use of speech in the interaction, not gesture, best predicted 18-month language skills. Parents responded to a higher proportion of shows+gives than to points at 10 months. These results demonstrate that different types of deictic gestures provide a window into language development at different points across infancy. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

A parent gesture intervention as a means to increase parent declarative pointing and child vocabulary

This study examined whether a brief parent gesture training resulted in a change in the communicative intent of pointing gestures used by parents of infants from age 10-12 months and whether specific types of points (declarative vs. imperative) were more or less likely to predict later child language skill at 18 months. Compared to parents who were randomized to the control group, parents in the intervention group produced significantly more declarative pointing gestures as a result of the intervention. Moreover, parents' use of declarative points at 12 months was predictive of later child vocabulary comprehension at 18 months. These findings suggest that a short-term parent training can have important effects on the communicative intentions conveyed through gesture which predict vocabulary development.

Neuroplasticity associated with changes in conversational turn-taking following a family-based intervention

Children's early language environments are associated with linguistic, cognitive, and academic development, as well as concurrent brain structure and function. This study investigated neurodevelopmental mechanisms linking language input to development by measuring neuroplasticity associated with an intervention designed to enhance language environments of families primarily from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. Families of 52 4-to-6 year-old children were randomly assigned to a 9-week, interactive, family-based intervention or no-contact control group. Children completed pre- and post-assessments of verbal and nonverbal cognition (n = 52), structural magnetic resonance imaging (n = 45), and home auditory recordings of language exposure (n = 39). Families who completed the intervention exhibited greater increases in adult-child conversational turns, and changes in turn-taking mediated intervention effects on language and executive functioning measures. Collapsing across groups, turn-taking changes were also positively correlated with cortical thickening in left inferior frontal and supramarginal gyri, the latter of which mediated relationships between changes in turn-taking and children's language development. This is the first study of longitudinal neuroplasticity in response to changes in children's language environments, and findings suggest that conversational turns support language development through cortical growth in language and social processing regions. This has implications for early interventions to enhance children's language environments to support neurocognitive development.

An intervention to increase conversational turns between parents and young children

Behavioral and neural evidence indicates that young children who engage in more conversations with their parents have better later language skills such as vocabulary and academic language abilities. Previous studies find that the extent to which parents engage in conversational turn-taking with children varies considerably. How, then, can we promote extended conversations between parents and their children? Instead of asking parents to engage in longer turn-taking episodes, we provided parents with information on conversational content that we hypothesized would lead to increased episodes of longer, more sustained conversational turn-taking. Specifically, we found that boosting the frequency of parent-child talk about abstract, non-present concepts - decontextualized language - led to an increase in dyadic conversational turn-taking during home mealtimes several weeks later.

A Longitudinal Study of Parent Gestures, Infant Responsiveness, and Vocabulary Development in Infants at Risk for Autism Spectrum Disorder

We investigated gestures that parents used with 12-, 18-, and 24-month-old infants at high or low risk for autism spectrum disorder (ASD; high-risk diagnosed with ASD: n = 21; high-risk classified as no ASD: n = 34; low-risk classified as no ASD: n = 34). We also examined infant responses to parent gestures and assessed the extent to which parent gesture relates to vocabulary development. Parents of three groups gestured in similar frequencies and proportions. Infants, in turn, responded similarly to parent gestures regardless of the infant's ASD risk and later diagnosis. Finally, parents who gestured more at 12 months had children with better vocabulary at 36 months than parents who gestured less. These findings highlight the importance of examining parent gestures when predicting language development.

Reciprocal Influences Between Parent Input and Child Language Skills in Dyads Involving High- and Low-Risk Infants for Autism Spectrum Disorder

We examined the language input of parents of infants at high and low familial risk for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and investigated reciprocal associations between parent input and child language skills in the first 2 years of life. Parent-infant dyads (high-risk: n = 53; low-risk: n = 33), 19 of whom included an infant later diagnosed with ASD, were videotaped during free play interactions at 12, 18, and 24 months. Measures of parent input were derived from parent-child interactions. Children's language skills were assessed using the Mullen Scales of Early Learning at 12, 18, and 24 months. Results suggested that (a) parents of high- and low-risk infants produced similar word tokens, word types, and proportions of contingent verbal responses, but parents of high-risk infants used shorter mean length of utterances (MLU) than parents of low-risk infants at 18 and 24 months; (b) parents' MLU at 18 months was positively associated with their infants' language at the subsequent visit after 6 months, regardless of group; and (c) infants' language at 18 months was positively associated with parents' MLU at the subsequent visit after 6 months in the high-risk group only. These findings contribute to our understanding of the mechanisms underlying early language learning of high-risk infants who have an increased risk for language delays and deficits. Autism Res 2020, 13: 1168-1183. © 2020 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc. LAY SUMMARY: Parents provide an important source of language input to their children. In this study, we looked at parent input to infants at high- and low-risk for autism spectrum disorder and relations between parent input and child language in the first 2 years of life. We found that parents of high- and low-risk infants provided similar quantity and quality of input, except shorter average length of utterances at 18 and 24 months in the high-risk group. Also, there were bidirectional relations between parent input and child language at 18 and 24 months in high-risk pairs, suggesting that parents and children collectively shape the early language environment.

Analyzing input quality along three dimensions: interactive, linguistic, and conceptual

This paper provides an overview of the features of caregiver input that facilitate language learning across early childhood. We discuss three dimensions of input quality: interactive, linguistic, and conceptual. All three types of input features have been shown to predict children's language learning, though perhaps through somewhat different mechanisms. We argue that input best designed to promote language learning is interactionally supportive, linguistically adapted, and conceptually challenging for the child's age/level. Furthermore, input features interact across dimensions to promote learning. Some but not all qualities of input vary based on parent socioeconomic status, language, or culture, and contexts such as book-reading or pretend play generate uniquely facilitative input features. The review confirms that we know a great deal about the role of input quality in promoting children's development, but that there is much more to learn. Future research should examine input features across the boundaries of the dimensions distinguished here.

Does intention matter? Relations between parent pointing, infant pointing, and developing language ability

Infants' pointing is associated with concurrent and later language development. The communicative intention behind the point-i.e., imperative versus declarative-can affect both the nature and strength of these associations, and is therefore a critical factor to consider. Parents' pointing is associated with both infant pointing and infant language; however, less work has examined the intent behind parents' points. We explore relations between parents' and infants' pointing at the level of communicative intention, and examine how pointing relates to concurrent and longitudinal infant language skills. In a sample of 52 mother-infant dyads, we measured mother and infant pointing at infant age 12-months, and infant expressive and receptive language at 12-, 18-, and 24-months. We found that mothers produced points with a variety of intentions, however we did not find relations between mother and infant pointing within the different communicative intentions. Replicating previous research, infant declarative pointing was related both concurrently and longitudinally to their language ability. Mothers' declarative pointing was related to their infants' concurrent language, while their imperative pointing was not. Further, there was an interaction between parent and infant declarative pointing, such that the positive relation between parents' declarative pointing and their infants' concurrent receptive language was present only for those infants who were also producing declarative points themselves. Findings suggest that parents' declarative pointing may support both their infants' early word learning and, perhaps, provides a model for their infant to begin using points as well. This study constitutes an important initial exploration of these relations.

Teaching a novel word: Parenting styles and toddlers' word learning

We examined the styles that parents adopted while teaching a novel word to their toddlers and whether those styles related to children's word learning and engagement during the task. Participants were 36 parents and their toddlers (M_age = 20 months). Parents were videotaped while teaching their children a name for a novel object. Parental utterances were transcribed verbatim and coded for cognitive and autonomy support. Children's utterances were coded for elicited and spontaneous contributions. Children's ability to recognize and process the novel word was assessed using the Looking-While-Listening task. Two parental cognitive support styles were identified via cluster analysis: "Cognitive Scaffolders," who combined a diversity of teaching moves, and "Labelers," who focused on labeling the novel object for the children. Similarly, two parental autonomy support styles were identified: "Followers," who focused on following the children's lead and providing positive feedback, and "Non-followers," who used diverse communicative ways to engage the children. Compared with parents who were Labelers, parents who were Cognitive Scaffolders were not more or less likely to be Followers. Children of Cognitive Scaffolders were better at recognizing the novel word, and children of Followers were more engaged (provided more elicited and spontaneous contributions) in the word-teaching task. Children's ability to recognize the novel word was not related to their engagement. Findings highlight the unique contributions of parental cognitive and autonomy support to children's word learning and engagement.

Language Matters: Denying the Existence of the 30-Million-Word Gap Has Serious Consequences

Sperry, Sperry, and Miller (2018) aim to debunk what is called the 30-million-word gap by claiming that children from lower income households hear more speech than Hart and Risley () reported. We address why the 30-million-word gap should not be abandoned, and the importance of retaining focus on the vital ingredient to language learning-quality speech directed to children rather than overheard speech, the focus of Sperry et al.'s argument. Three issues are addressed: Whether there is a language gap; the characteristics of speech that promote language development; and the importance of language in school achievement. There are serious risks to claims that low-income children, on average, hear sufficient, high-quality language relative to peers from higher income homes.

Conversation about the future self improves preschoolers' prospection abilities

Prospection, the ability to engage in future-oriented thinking and decision making, begins to develop during the preschool years yet remains far from adult-like. One specific challenge for children of this age is with regard to thinking and reasoning about their future selves. Drawing from work indicating the importance of adult-child conversation in language and cognitive development, the current study examined the extent to which conversations about the future and the self may facilitate preschool-aged children's prospective thinking. The participants, 4- and 5-year-old children (N = 68), were randomly assigned to read books surrounding one of four topics with an adult experimenter: their present self, their future self, another child's present self, or another child's future self. Children whose conversations were centered on their future selves outperformed other children in the sample on a battery of prospection assessments taken immediately after the manipulation. Of the three prospection assessments administered, the manipulation had the strongest effect on children's prospective memories. Results are discussed in terms of the role that everyday conversation can play in fostering children's cognitive development during the early childhood years.

A parent intervention with a growth mindset approach improves children's early gesture and vocabulary development

Socioeconomic disparities in children's early vocabulary skills can be traced back to disparities in gesture use at age one and are due, in part, to the quantity and quality of communication children are exposed to by parents. Further, parents' mindsets about intelligence contribute to their interactions with their children. We implemented a parent gesture intervention with a growth mindset component with 47 parents of 10-month-olds to determine whether this approach would increase parents' use of the pointing gesture, infants' use of pointing, and child vocabulary growth. The intervention had an effect on parent gesture such that by child age 12-months, parents who received the intervention increased in their pointing more than parents in the control condition. Importantly, the intervention also had a significant effect on child gesture use with parents. There was no main effect of the intervention on child vocabulary. Further, the effect of the intervention on pointing was stronger for parents who endorsed fixed mindsets at baseline, and had an added benefit of increased vocabulary growth from 10-18 months for children of those parents who endorsed fixed mindsets. Incorporating growth mindset approaches into parenting interventions is encouraged.

Beyond the 30-Million-Word Gap: Children's Conversational Exposure Is Associated With Language-Related Brain Function

Children's early language exposure impacts their later linguistic skills, cognitive abilities, and academic achievement, and large disparities in language exposure are associated with family socioeconomic status (SES). However, there is little evidence about the neural mechanisms underlying the relation between language experience and linguistic and cognitive development. Here, language experience was measured from home audio recordings of 36 SES-diverse 4- to 6-year-old children. During a story-listening functional MRI task, children who had experienced more conversational turns with adults-independently of SES, IQ, and adult-child utterances alone-exhibited greater left inferior frontal (Broca's area) activation, which significantly explained the relation between children's language exposure and verbal skill. This is the first evidence directly relating children's language environments with neural language processing, specifying both an environmental and a neural mechanism underlying SES disparities in children's language skills. Furthermore, results suggest that conversational experience impacts neural language processing over and above SES or the sheer quantity of words heard.

Exploring Infant Gesture and Joint Attention as Related Constructs and as Predictors of Later Language

In infancy, use of gesture and the ability to engage in joint attention with others both predict later language development. Conceptually, gesture and joint attention abilities may reflect a similar underlying social communicative skill. However, these abilities are often studied separately. Despite the fact that gesture is often used in episodes of joint attention, little is known about the degree to which measures of gesture use and joint attention ability are associated with one another or how they similarly, or differentially, predict children's language abilities. Participants in the current study were 53 infants. At 12-months, multiple measures of infants' gesture use were gleaned from a free-play interaction with a parent. Infants' responding to and initiating joint attention were measured via the Early Social-Communicative Scales (ESCS, Mundy et al., 2003). Infants' expressive and receptive language was measured at 24-months with the Mullen Scales of Early Learning (Mullen, 1995). A factor analysis including gesture and joint attention measures indicated that at 12-months joint attention, particularly responding to joint attention, reflects a similar underlying construct with infant gesture use, yet they uniquely predict later language ability.

Fathers' repetition of words is coupled with children's vocabularies

Differences in vocabulary size among children can be explained in part by differences in parents' language input, but features of caregivers' input can be more or less beneficial depending on children's language abilities. The current study focused on a specific feature of infant-directed speech: parents' repetition of words across utterances. Although previous work with infants showed a positive relation between repetition and children's vocabulary, we predicted that this would not be the case later in development. Instead, parents may use less repetition as their children become increasingly proficient language learners. In the current study, we examined the extent to which low-income fathers of 24-month-olds (N=41) repeat words to their children using three indices: type-token ratio, automated repetition index, and partial repetition of open-class words. The same finding emerged across all measures of repetition: Fathers whose children had larger vocabularies at 24months repeated wordslessoften, suggesting a developmental coupling of fathers' input and children's language proficiency.

Children's Early Decontextualized Talk Predicts Academic Language Proficiency in Midadolescence

This study examines whether children's decontextualized talk-talk about nonpresent events, explanations, or pretend-at 30 months predicts seventh-grade academic language proficiency (age 12). Academic language (AL) refers to the language of school texts. AL proficiency has been identified as an important predictor of adolescent text comprehension. Yet research on precursors to AL proficiency is scarce. Child decontextualized talk is known to be a predictor of early discourse development, but its relation to later language outcomes remains unclear. Forty-two children and their caregivers participated in this study. The proportion of child talk that was decontextualized emerged as a significant predictor of seventh-grade AL proficiency, even after controlling for socioeconomic status, parent decontextualized talk, child total words, child vocabulary, and child syntactic comprehension.

Young children communicate their ignorance and ask questions

Children acquire information, especially about the culture in which they are being raised, by listening to other people. Recent evidence has shown that young children are selective learners who preferentially accept information, especially from informants who are likely to be representative of the surrounding culture. However, the extent to which children understand this process of information transmission and actively exploit it to fill gaps in their knowledge has not been systematically investigated. We review evidence that toddlers exhibit various expressive behaviors when faced with knowledge gaps. They look toward an available adult, convey ignorance via nonverbal gestures (flips/shrugs), and increasingly produce verbal acknowledgments of ignorance ("I don't know"). They also produce comments and questions about what their interlocutors might know and adopt an interrogative stance toward them. Thus, in the second and third years, children actively seek information from interlocutors via nonverbal gestures or verbal questions and display a heightened tendency to encode and retain such sought-after information.

Variations in the recruitment of syntactic knowledge contribute to SES differences in syntactic development

Average differences in children's language abilities by socioeconomic status (SES) emerge early in development and predict academic achievement. Previous research has focused on coarse-grained outcome measures such as vocabulary size, but less is known about the extent to which SES differences exist in children's strategies for comprehension and learning. We measured children's (N = 98) comprehension of passive sentences to investigate whether SES differences are more pronounced in overall knowledge of the construction or in more specific abilities to process sentences during real-time interpretation. SES differences in comprehension emerged when syntactic revision of passives was necessary, and disappeared when the need to revise was removed. Further, syntactic revision but not knowledge of the passive best explained the association between SES and a standardized measure of syntactic development. These results demonstrate that SES differences in syntactic development may result from how children recruit syntactic information within sentences.

Training preschoolers' prospective abilities through conversation about the extended self

The ability to act on behalf of one's future self is related to uniquely human abilities such as planning, delay of gratification, and goal attainment. Although prospection develops rapidly during early childhood, little is known about the mechanisms that support its development. Here we explored whether encouraging children to talk about their extended selves (self outside the present context) boosts their prospective abilities. Preschoolers (N = 81) participated in a 5-min interaction with an adult in which they were asked to talk about events in the near future, distant future, near past, or present. Compared with children discussing their present and distant future, children asked to discuss events in their near future or near past displayed better planning and prospective memory. Additionally, those 2 conditions were most effective in eliciting self-projection (use of personal pronouns). Results suggest that experience communicating about the temporally contiguous, extended self may promote children's future-oriented thinking. (PsycINFO Database Record

Exploring socioeconomic differences in syntactic development through the lens of real-time processing

Differences in caregiver input across socioeconomic status (SES) predict syntactic development, but the mechanisms are not well understood. Input effects may reflect the exposure needed to acquire syntactic representations during learning (e.g., does the child have the relevant structures for passive sentences?) or access this knowledge during communication (e.g., can she use the past participle to infer the meaning of passives?). Using an eye-tracking and act-out paradigm, the current study distinguishes these mechanisms by comparing the interpretation of actives and passives in 3- to 7-year-olds (n=129) from varying SES backgrounds. During the presentation of spoken sentences, fixations revealed robust disambiguation of constructions by children from higher-SES backgrounds, but less sensitivity by lower-SES counterparts. After sentence presentation, decreased sensitivity generated interpretive challenges and average SES-related differences for passives requiring syntactic revision ("The seal is quickly eaten by it"). Critically, no differences were found when revision was not needed ("It is quickly eaten by the seal"). These results suggest that all children shared an ability to acquire passives, but SES-related differences in real-time processing can impact the accuracy of utterance interpretation.

Low-income fathers' speech to toddlers during book reading versus toy play

Fathers' child-directed speech across two contexts was examined. Father-child dyads from sixty-nine low-income families were videotaped interacting during book reading and toy play when children were 2;0. Fathers used more diverse vocabulary and asked more questions during book reading while their mean length of utterance was longer during toy play. Variation in these specific characteristics of fathers' speech that differed across contexts was also positively associated with child vocabulary skill measured on the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory. Results are discussed in terms of how different contexts elicit specific qualities of child-directed speech that may promote language use and development.

Perceived communicative intent in gesture and language modulates the superior temporal sulcus

Behavioral evidence and theory suggest gesture and language processing may be part of a shared cognitive system for communication. While much research demonstrates both gesture and language recruit regions along perisylvian cortex, relatively less work has tested functional segregation within these regions on an individual level. Additionally, while most work has focused on a shared semantic network, less has examined shared regions for processing communicative intent. To address these questions, functional and structural MRI data were collected from 24 adult participants while viewing videos of an experimenter producing communicative, Participant-Directed Gestures (PDG) (e.g., "Hello, come here"), noncommunicative Self-adaptor Gestures (SG) (e.g., smoothing hair), and three written text conditions: (1) Participant-Directed Sentences (PDS), matched in content to PDG, (2) Third-person Sentences (3PS), describing a character's actions from a third-person perspective, and (3) meaningless sentences, Jabberwocky (JW). Surface-based conjunction and individual functional region of interest analyses identified shared neural activation between gesture (PDGvsSG) and language processing using two different language contrasts. Conjunction analyses of gesture (PDGvsSG) and Third-person Sentences versus Jabberwocky revealed overlap within left anterior and posterior superior temporal sulcus (STS). Conjunction analyses of gesture and Participant-Directed Sentences to Third-person Sentences revealed regions sensitive to communicative intent, including the left middle and posterior STS and left inferior frontal gyrus. Further, parametric modulation using participants' ratings of stimuli revealed sensitivity of left posterior STS to individual perceptions of communicative intent in gesture. These data highlight an important role of the STS in processing participant-directed communicative intent through gesture and language. Hum Brain Mapp 37:3444-3461, 2016. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Input and uptake at 7 months predicts toddler vocabulary: the role of child-directed speech and infant processing skills in language development

Both the input directed to the child, and the child's ability to process that input, are likely to impact the child's language acquisition. We explore how these factors inter-relate by tracking the relationships among: (a) lexical properties of maternal child-directed speech to prelinguistic (7-month-old) infants (N = 121); (b) these infants' abilities to segment lexical targets from conversational child-directed utterances in an experimental paradigm; and (c) the children's vocabulary outcomes at age 2;0. Both repetitiveness in maternal input and the child's speech segmentation skills at age 0;7 predicted language outcomes at 2;0; moreover, while these factors were somewhat inter-related, they each had independent effects on toddler vocabulary skill, and there was no interaction between the two.

Going Beyond Input Quantity: Wh-Questions Matter for Toddlers' Language and Cognitive Development

There are clear associations between the overall quantity of input children are exposed to and their vocabulary acquisition. However, by uncovering specific features of the input that matter, we can better understand the mechanisms involved in vocabulary learning. We examine whether exposure to wh-questions, a challenging quality of the communicative input, is associated with toddlers' vocabulary and later verbal reasoning skills in a sample of low-income, African-American fathers and their 24-month-old children (n = 41). Dyads were videotaped in free play sessions at home. Videotapes were transcribed and reliably coded for sheer quantity of fathers' input (number of utterances) as well as the number of wh-questions fathers produce. Children's productive vocabulary was measured at 24 months using the McArthur Bates Communicative Development Inventory MCDI (completed by the mothers), and children's verbal reasoning skills were measured 1 year later using the Bayley Scales of Infant Development. Results indicate that the overall quantity of father talk did not relate to children's vocabulary or reasoning skills. However, fathers' use of wh-questions (but not other questions) related to both vocabulary and reasoning outcomes. Children's responses to wh-questions were more frequent and more syntactically complex, measured using the mean length of utterance (MLU), than their responses to other questions. Thus, posing wh-questions to 2-year-olds is a challenging type of input, which elicits a verbal response from the child that likely helps build vocabulary and foster verbal reasoning abilities.

Vocabulary, syntax, and narrative development in typically developing children and children with early unilateral brain injury: early parental talk about the "there-and-then" matters

This study examines the role of a particular kind of linguistic input--talk about the past and future, pretend, and explanations, that is, talk that is decontextualized--in the development of vocabulary, syntax, and narrative skill in typically developing (TD) children and children with pre- or perinatal brain injury (BI). Decontextualized talk has been shown to be particularly effective in predicting children's language skills, but it is not clear why. We first explored the nature of parent decontextualized talk and found it to be linguistically richer than contextualized talk in parents of both TD and BI children. We then found, again for both groups, that parent decontextualized talk at child age 30 months was a significant predictor of child vocabulary, syntax, and narrative performance at kindergarten, above and beyond the child's own early language skills, parent contextualized talk and demographic factors. Decontextualized talk played a larger role in predicting kindergarten syntax and narrative outcomes for children with lower syntax and narrative skill at age 30 months, and also a larger role in predicting kindergarten narrative outcomes for children with BI than for TD children. The difference between the 2 groups stemmed primarily from the fact that children with BI had lower narrative (but not vocabulary or syntax) scores than TD children. When the 2 groups were matched in terms of narrative skill at kindergarten, the impact that decontextualized talk had on narrative skill did not differ for children with BI and for TD children. Decontextualized talk is thus a strong predictor of later language skill for all children, but may be particularly potent for children at the lower-end of the distribution for language skill. The findings also suggest that variability in the language development of children with BI is influenced not only by the biological characteristics of their lesions, but also by the language input they receive.

Non-word repetition in 2-year-olds: Replication of an adapted paradigm and a useful methodological extension

Accurate non-word repetition (NWR) has been largely attributed to phonological memory, although the task involves other processes including speech production, which may confound results in toddlers with developing speech production abilities. This study is based on Hoff, Core and Bridges' adapted NWR task, which includes a real-word repetition (RWR) condition. We tested 86 typically developing 2-year-olds and found relationships between NWR and both receptive and expressive vocabulary using a novel measure that controls for speech production by comparing contextually matched targets in RWR. Post hoc analyses demonstrated the influence of lexical and sublexical factors in repetition tasks. Overall, results illustrate the importance of controlling for speech production differences in young children and support a useful methodological approach for testing NWR.

Low-income, minority fathers' control strategies and their children's regulatory skills

The current study explored the bidirectional association of children's individual characteristics, fathers' control strategies at 24 months, and children's regulatory skills at prekindergarten (pre-K). Using a sample of low-income, minority families with 2-year-olds from the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation Project (n = 71), we assessed the association between child gender and vocabulary skills, fathers' control strategies at 24 months (e.g., regulatory behavior and regulatory language), and children's sustained attention and emotion regulation at prekindergarten. There were three main findings. First, fathers overwhelmingly used commands (e.g., "Do that.") to promote compliance in their 24-month-old children. Second, children's vocabulary skills predicted fathers' regulatory behaviors during a father-child interaction whereas children's gender predicted fathers' regulatory language during an interaction. Third, controlling for maternal supportiveness, fathers' regulatory behaviors at 24 months predicted children's sustained attention at pre-K whereas fathers' regulatory language at 24 months predicted children's emotion regulation at pre-K. Our findings highlight the importance of examining paternal contributions to children's regulatory skills.