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Parentese in infancy predicts 5-year language complexity and conversational turns

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 February 2023

Naja FERJAN RAMÍREZ*
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
Yael WEISS
Affiliation:
Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
Kaveri K. SHETH
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
Patricia K. KUHL
Affiliation:
Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
*
Corresponding author. Naja Ferjan Ramírez, Email: naja@uw.edu

Abstract

Parental input is considered a key predictor of language achievement during the first years of life, yet relatively few studies have assessed its effects on longer-term outcomes. We assess the effects of parental quantity of speech, use of parentese (the acoustically exaggerated, clear, and higher-pitched speech), and turn-taking in infancy, on child language at 5 years. Using a longitudinal dataset of daylong LENA recordings collected with the same group of English-speaking infants (N=44) at 6, 10, 14, 18, 24 months and then again at 5 years, we demonstrate that parents’ consistent (defined as stable and high) use of parentese in infancy was a potent predictor of lexical diversity, mean length of utterance, and frequency of conversational turn-taking between children and adults at Kindergarten entry. Together, these findings highlight the potential importance of a high-quality language learning environment in infancy for success at the start of formal schooling.

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Type
Article
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press

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