Factors affecting children's graphic symbol use in the third year: Language,similarity, and iconicity

The question addressed in this study is whether the claim that children understand the symbolic status of pictures by the middle of their third year is an overestimate of their ability. Specifically, we asked whether children use language if possible to facilitate their performance in graphic symbolic tasks. Language (availability of verbal labels) was manipulated along with iconicity (degree of resemblance between symbol and referent) and perceptual similarity (between choice items) in a series of four experiments. Children 2.5 and 3 years old were presented with a graphic symbol for 4 s and immediately asked to choose the object depicted (referent) from two choice objects. In Study 1, degree of iconicity between picture and referent was varied and both choice objects had the same verbal label. The 2.5-year-olds failed to use any pictures or replicas as symbols. The 3-year-olds performed well with all types of symbols and better with highly iconic symbols. In Study 2, verbal label availability was manipulated by presenting choice objects having the same or different labels and by varying familiarity of labels. The 2.5-year-olds performed at chance when verbal labels were unavailable but above chance when they were available. The 3-year-olds were above chance in all conditions but performed less well when verbal labels were unavailable. Study 3 confirmed that young children use language to mediate picture symbol use. When 2.5-year-olds were provided with subordinate verbal labels in the matching task, subsequent performance was good even when choice objects had the same basic level verbal label. In Study 4, verbal label availability was contrasted with perceptual similarity between choice objects. When verbal labels could be used and choice objects were dissimilar, performance was best, and when verbal labels could not be used and choice objects were similar, it was worst. The results suggest that children's developing understanding of the symbolic function of pictures is tenuous in the third year, and is supported by their use of verbal labels.     

Does child verbal ability mediate the relationship between maternal sensitivity and later self‐regulation? A longitudinal study from infancy to 4 years

There is a need to further examine the mechanisms by which maternal sensitivity influences the development of child self‐regulation. This study investigated the role of maternal sensitivity when infants were 10 months old and child verbal ability at 18 months, in relation to various aspects of self‐regulation at 48 months, in a sample of 95 typically developing children (46.3% girls). In particular, the study examined, from a Vygotskian perspective, whether child verbal ability, as measured by receptive and expressive language, mediated the relationship between maternal sensitivity and hot and cool aspects of self‐regulation in the child. As hypothesized, maternal sensitivity predicted child verbal ability, as well as working memory, set shifting, and delay of gratification. Child receptive language predicted set shifting, inhibition, and delay of gratification. In addition, receptive language mediated the relationship between maternal sensitivity and inhibition only. Additive effects of maternal sensitivity and child receptive language in relation to set shifting were found, and a main effect of maternal sensitivity on child delay of gratification. The results add to the body of research suggesting that responsive parenting and child verbal ability are important for the development of self‐regulation, and suggest that different mechanisms may be at work for different aspects of self‐regulation.     

The link between maternal and child verbal abilities: An indirect effect through maternal responsiveness

Language abilities in early childhood show stability over time and play an important role in the development of other cognitive processes. Identifying modifiable environmental risk factors is important to informing prevention and early intervention efforts. Maternal verbal ability has been previously linked to child verbal ability. The current study examined whether maternal and child verbal abilities were linked indirectly through early childhood maternal responsiveness. Data come from a longitudinal birth cohort study. Participants included 133 mothers and their children recruited from maternity wards shortly after birth. Maternal verbal ability was measured using the Vocabulary subtest from the Wechsler Abbreviated Scale of Intelligence, Second Edition (child age 8 months). Child verbal ability was assessed using the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (36 months). A latent maternal responsiveness variable was estimated using three developmentally sensitive indicators; one during infancy (child age 8 months) and two when children were 36 months. Results of a structural equation model indicated a significant indirect effect from maternal verbal abilities to child verbal abilities through maternal responsiveness. This indirect path was significant even after inclusion of another indirect path from maternal executive functioning to child verbal ability through maternal responsiveness (which was not significant). Future studies will benefit from experimental, genetically sensitive and/or cross‐lagged designs to allow for conclusions related to directionality and causality. This body of research has implications for the study of the intergenerational transmission of verbal abilities and associated skills, behaviours and adaptive outcomes.     

Mother and father language input to young children: Contributions to later language development

There has been little research comparing the nature and contributions of language input of mothers and fathers to their young children. This study examined differences in mother and father talk to their 24 month-old children. This study also considered contributions of parent education, child care quality and mother and father language (output, vocabulary, complexity, questions, and pragmatics) to children's expressive language development at 36 months. It was found that fathers' language input was less than mothers' language input on the following: verbal output, turn length, different word roots, and wh-questions. Mothers and fathers did not differ on type-token ratio, mean length of utterance, or the proportion of questions. At age 36 months, parent level of education, the total quality of child care and paternal different words were significant predictors of child language. Mothers' language was not a significant predictor of child language.     

The suppression of visualization by reading

Four experiments are described which demonstrate a conflict between reading verbal messages and imagining the spatial relations described by those messages. Listening to the same messages did not produce comparable interference with visualization. The conflict between reading and visualizing was obtained even when the subject previously had seen the referent of the message. In contrast, when the subject was induced to treat the messages as rote strings of words instead of visualizing their referents, reading was a more effective means of presentation than was listening.

Two interpretations of these results were proposed. (a) Visualization and reading compete of the use of neural pathways specialized for visual perception. (b) The process of reading hinders the conversion of input material into any non-verabl form; that is, reading forces the subject to deal with information in a more exclusively verbal form than does listening. It was suggested that regardless of interpretation this method provides a means of investigating the internal processes underlying concrete verbal reference.     

The impact of early maternal verbal scaffolding and child language abilities on later decoding and reading comprehension skills

This study examined, via structural equation modeling, early predictors of children's 8 year reading decoding and 10 year comprehension at later school age. Maternal verbal scaffolding indirectly influenced both decoding and comprehension, through its support of children's language abilities at 3 and 4 years of age. Additionally, there was a trend for a direct effect of 4 year child language on reading comprehension at 10 years. As maternal verbal scaffolding was assessed during every day routines, this suggests that rich language input in the broad social context of the home promotes language and, in turn, later reading skills. Given that maternal verbal scaffolding can be enhanced through interventions, these results have important educational implications.     

From top to bottom: spatial shifts of attention caused by linguistic stimuli

Interacting with the world around us involves dealing with constant information input. Thus, humans must selectively filter and focus attention on relevant aspects for the current situation. The current study investigates orientations of attention after words that do not convey spatial information in their meaning (e.g. cloud, shoe). The current study minimizes both the linguistic demands by simply presenting task-irrelevant words and the visual processing demands by implementing a simple target detection task. According to automatic response biases in the motor domain (Lachmair et al. 2011), we hypothesized that words such as cloud produce attention shifts in the direction of the typical location of the word's referent in the world (e.g. cloud up in the sky). Indeed, target detection was facilitated if target location matched the typical location of the word's referent. These findings are strong evidence for the important role of space during language processing, showing that vertical attention is modulated even by task-irrelevant verbal cues.     

Competence in Language at 24 Months: Relations with Attachment Security and Home Stimulation

This study explored the interrelations among attachment, home stimulation, and language development in 58 toddlers (36 medically high risk and 22 low risk) at 24 months of age. The results indicated that there were additive effects of attachment and home stimulation on language competence, especially on receptive abilities. Mothers who had established secure relationships and provided stimulating home environments had children with the highest language scores.     

Competence in language at 24 months: relations with attachment security and home stimulation

This study explored the interrelations among attachment, home stimulation, and language development in 58 toddlers (36 medically high risk and 22 low risk) at 24 months of age. The results indicated that there were additive effects of attachment and home stimulation on language competence, especially on receptive abilities. Mothers who had established secure relationships and provided stimulating home environments had children with the highest language scores.     

Non-verbal and verbal parental mentalization as predictors of infant attachment security: Contributions of parental embodied mentalizing and mind-mindedness and the mediating role of maternal sensitivity

Interest in studying the relative contributions of verbal (e.g., maternal mind-mindedness [MM]) and non-verbal dimensions (i.e., parental embodied mentalizing [PEM]) of parental mentalization to child socio-emotional development is relatively recent. To date, only one study has addressed this issue in relation to child attachment security, suggesting a complementary and unique contribution of each one. The purpose of the present study was to further examine the specific contribution of PEM to infant attachment security by considering MM. In addition, this study aimed to explore the mediating role of maternal sensitivity linking PEM, MM to infant attachment security within 110 mother-infant dyads at moderate psychosocial risk. The two dimensions of parental mentalization (PEM and MM) were assessed on the basis of observations made during a videorecorded sequence of mother-child interactions in a context of free play with and without toys when the infants were 8 months old. The Maternal Behavior Q-Sort was used to measure the mothers’ sensitivity in a natural setting based on observations of daily mother-child interactions, also when the infants were about 8 months old. Attachment security was measured using The Strange Situation Procedure at infant age 16 months. The results showed positive correlations between maternal sensitivity and both verbal and non-verbal measures of parental mentalization. The mediation analyses first revealed that PEM had a significant indirect effect on attachment security, with sensitivity being identified as a mediator in this association. No indirect effect linking MM and attachment security via sensitivity was observed. These results highlight the contribution of PEM to maternal sensitivity and show maternal sensitivity to be a factor that partly explains the influence of PEM on attachment security in children.     

Role of referent concreteness in the acquisition of passive sentence comprehension through abstract modeling

The present experiment tested the hypothesis that development of syntactic comprehension through verbal modeling is enhanced by referent concreteness as a contextual influence. Young children heard a model narrate a series of events in passive form while the model either performed the corresponding activities, showed pictures portraying the same activities, or displayed no referential aids. In accord with prediction, verbal modeling with enactive referents produced higher levels of comprehension of passives than modeling with pictorial referents or modeling without referential aids. Modeling with pictorial referents and modeling without referents did not differ in overall efficacy. However, modeling alone produced results that were less consistent across different measures of comprehension. Children who lacked understanding of passives were more dependent on concrete referents than those who had some initial comprehension of the linguistic form. The results suggest that verbal modeling with pictorial referents and verbal modeling alone facilitate comprehension of passives, whereas verbal modeling with enactive referents promotes learning. Findings of a supplemental experiment reveal that the effects of verbal modeling on comprehension are enhanced when syntactic forms occur in a meaningful verbal context.     

TOP‐DOWN AND BOTTOM‐UP: THE ROLE OF SOCIAL INFORMATION PROCESSING AND MINDFULNESS AS PREDICTORS IN MATERNAL–INFANT INTERACTION

The cross‐generational transmission of attachment appears to reflect a complex interplay of factors, which have been challenging to identify. The current longitudinal study explored the maternal cognitive model of relationships through language use, maternal mindfulness, and attachment style assessed prenatally, as predictors of maternal response to distress and infant behavior at 6 months’ postpartum. Infant behavior to the mother also was examined to provide an understanding of the evolving relationship. Thirty‐two females were interviewed prenatally regarding social and family experiences. At 6 months’ postpartum, each mother participated in a video‐recorded session where she was asked to teach her infant a developmentally appropriate task. Videos were analyzed using the NCAST Teaching Protocol. Language use prenatally as well as the mindfulness facets (acting with awareness and describing) predicted the mothers’ ability to respond to infant distress, indicating greater attunement. Infant's response to mother and clarity of cues also were predicted by maternal pronoun use. The study highlights the role of internal working models reflective of interpersonal beliefs, cognitive models, and current‐moment awareness in maternal behavior. The effect of maternal language on infant behavior arguably indicates the infant's integration of maternal internal working models.     

More than talk: Relations between emotion understanding and positive behaviour in toddlers

Background. Associations between positive behaviour, emotion understanding and verbal ability have been reported in studies of preschoolers ( Cassidy, Werner, Rourke, Zubernis, & Balaraman, 2003 ), but have yet to be investigated in younger children. Methods. In this study the performance of 36 toddlers (17 boys and 19 girls; mean age = 29 months, SD = 3.9 months) on standardized verbal ability assessments and four simple tests of emotion understanding was examined in relation to three measures of positive behaviour: maternal ratings of prosocial behaviour (Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire; Goodman, 1997 ), and video‐based coding of the toddlers in 20‐minutes dyadic play with (i) mothers and (ii) familiar peers. Results. Relations between the three measures of positive behaviour were rather modest, and only significant for the association between maternal ratings and observed positive behaviours with peers. Maternal ratings of prosocial behaviour were significantly correlated with performance on the emotion‐understanding tasks, even when age effects were controlled. Together, emotion understanding and verbal ability explained over half the variance in maternal ratings of prosocial behaviour; unique predictive effects were significant for emotion understanding but not verbal ability. Further, emotion understanding mediated the relationship between verbal ability and mothers' ratings of prosocial behaviour. Conclusions. These findings highlight the importance of emotion understanding as a proximal influence on very early prosocial behaviour.     

MEDIATING ROLE OF MATERNAL SENSITIVITY: ENHANCING LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT IN AT‐RISK FAMILIES

Home‐visiting programs have gained increasing importance in family‐centered prevention and intervention. However, few studies have examined the mechanisms underlying early intervention treatment effects. The goal of this study is to analyze the mediating role of maternal sensitivity in enhancing language development with the home‐visiting program Parents as Teachers (PAT). Data were collected and analyzed within the ongoing, long‐term ZEPPELIN study, a randomized controlled trial with 251 participating at‐risk families. Via longitudinal mediation analysis, we examined whether effects of the PAT on receptive and expressive language outcomes at 24 and 36 months were mediated by maternal sensitivity at 12 months. Within a moderated mediation framework, we investigated whether the level of family psychosocial stress affects this mediation. Results showed that intervention effects on language outcomes are mediated by maternal sensitivity—weakly and through specific pathways. Moderation and moderated mediation analyses indicated that effects of the PAT and also specific mediation effects increase with the level of psychosocial stress. Implications of the results for practice are discussed.     

The Development of Communicative Competence of Securely and Insecurely Attached Children in Interactions with Their Mothers

Coordinated interpersonal timing in preverbal mother-child interactions is assumed to be one fundamental feature of interpersonal relatedness and the basis for parent-child bonding. The ubiquity of and early evidence for this phenomenon in ontogeny hint at its biological prewiredness and relevance for development. The quality of interpersonal timing in early preverbal parent-child interactions was hypothesized (and partially shown) to predict quality of attachment, level of cognitive functioning, and patterns of language acquisition. The aim of this study was to investigate the assumption of a facilitating effect of adequate interpersonal coordination (measured by quality of attachment) on the development of verbal communicative competence in children during the first stages of language development. On the basis of longitudinal data for 25 mother-child dyads, videotaped when the children were 17, 23, 30, and 36 months old in a free play and a short separation situation, it was investigated whether securely and insecurely attached children differ with respect to the amount of verbal contributions, their realization as alternating or simultaneous utterances, and the duration of intra-turn and inter-turn pauses. The results show that attachment was related to children's use of communicative competence especially in stressful situations, its development being paced by the age or maturation of the child.     

Responsive Parenting in the Second Year: Specific Influences on Children's Language and Play

In two longitudinal studies, relations between dimensions of maternal responsiveness at 13 months and children's language and play abilities at 13 and at 20 months were examined. We characterized mothers' responsive exchanges by assessing the targets of maternal responses (i.e. what child activities mothers respond to) and the verbal contents of maternal responses (i.e. what mothers said when they responded), and we asked whether subtypes of responsiveness would relate differentially to children's language and play abilities. In general, maternal responsiveness to children's vocalizations predicted children's language, and maternal responses to children's play predicted children's play. These findings suggest that maternal responsiveness can be profitably categorized into subtypes that relate to domains of child outcomes in specialized ways. The specific nature of mother–child associations in the domains of early language and play is discussed. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Do Verbal Interactions with Infants During Electronic Media Exposure Mitigate Adverse Impacts on their Language Development as Toddlers?

The goal of this study was to determine whether verbal interactions between mothers and their 6-month-old infants during media exposure ('media verbal interactions') might have direct positive impacts, or mitigate any potential adverse impacts of media exposure, on language development at 14 months. For 253 low-income mother-infant dyads participating in a longitudinal study, media exposure and media verbal interactions were assessed using 24-hour recall diaries. Additionally, general level of cognitive stimulation in the home [StimQ] was assessed at 6 months and language development [Preschool Language Scale-4] was assessed at 14 months. Results suggest that media verbal interactions play a role in the language development of infants from low-income, immigrant families. Evidence showed that media verbal interactions moderated adverse impacts of media exposure found on 14-month language development, with adverse associations found only in the absence the these interactions. Findings also suggest that media verbal interactions may have some direct positive impacts on language development, in that media verbal interactions during the co-viewing of media with educational content (but not other content) were predictive of 14-month language independently of overall level of cognitive stimulation in the home.     

What's mom got to do with it? Contributions of maternal executive function and caregiving to the development of executive function across early childhood

Executive functions (EFs; e.g. working memory, inhibitory control) are mediated by the prefrontal cortex and associated with optimal cognitive and socio‐emotional development. This study provides the first concurrent analysis of the relative contributions of maternal EF and caregiving to child EF. A group of children and their mothers (n = 62) completed age‐appropriate interaction (10, 24, 36 months) and EF tasks (child: 24, 36, and 48 months). Regression analyses revealed that by 36 months of age, maternal EF and negative caregiving behaviors accounted for unique variance in child EF, above and beyond maternal education and child verbal ability. These findings were confirmed when using an early child EF composite‐our most reliable measure of EF – and a similar pattern was found when controlling for stability in child EF. Furthermore, there was evidence that maternal EF had significant indirect effects on changes in child EF through maternal caregiving. At 24 months, EF was associated with maternal EF, but not negative caregiving behaviors. Taken together, these findings suggest that links between negative caregiving and child EF are increasingly manifested during early childhood. Although maternal EF and negative caregiving are related, they provide unique information about the development of child EF. A video abstract of this article can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPKXFbbrkps     

Attachment Anxiety, Verbal Immediacy, and Blood Pressure: Results from a Laboratory-Analogue Study Following Marital Separation

Marital separation and divorce increase risk for all-cause morbidity and mortality. Using a laboratory analogue paradigm, the present study examined attachment anxiety, language use, and blood pressure (BP) reactivity among 119 (n = 43 men, 76 women) recently separated adults who were asked to mentally reflect on their relationship history and separation experience. We created a language use composite of verbal immediacy from participants' stream-of-consciousness recordings about their separation experience as a behavioral index of attachment-related hyperactivation. Verbal immediacy moderated the association between attachment anxiety and BP at the beginning of a divorce-specific activation task. Participants reporting high attachment anxiety who discussed their separation in a first-person, present-oriented and highly engaged manner evidenced the highest levels of BP at the start of the divorce-specific task. Results provide a deeper understanding of the association between marital dissolution and health and suggest that verbal immediacy may be a useful behavioral index of hyperactivating coping strategies.