Background

 

Methods Discussion

Previous research states that nonverbal aspects of communication – such as warmth and affection, tone of voice and facial expressions– are important influences on an infant’s language skills (Grebelsky-Lichtman, 2014). Since there is current emphasis on teaching parents to talk to children more, less emphasis has been placed on the other aspects of communication such as nonverbal (Nielsen, 2014). This study seeks to understand whether nonverbal aspects of parent-infant interactions will affect infant’s language development.

Do nonverbal qualities of parents communication influence the infant’s expressive and receptive language skills?

Question

Sample: 42 parent-infant dyads, with the infants ranging from 10 to 14 months of age with an average of 12 months. Procedure: The parents and infants were observed at home or a child care center. Parent-infant interactions were videotaped for a five-minute free play.Measurements: Parents nonverbal qualities were coded based on the Care Giver Sensitivity Scale (see table 1). The infants language skills were assessed using the Bayley Language Scale (Bayley, 2006), which is a standardized language assessment for infants and toddlers. A scale was created using certain items off of the Sensitivity Scale to assess the nonverbal qualities of parent communication. These items had good reliability, = .823α

References

Analysis and Results

Grebelsky-Lichtman, T. (2014). Parental Patterns of Cooperation in Parent-Child Interactions: The Relationship Between Nonverbal and Verbal Communication. Human Communication Research, 40: 1-29.

Huttchenlocher, J., Waterfall, H., Vasilyeva, M., Vevea, J., & Hedges, L. (2010). Sources Of Variability In Children’s Language Growth. Cognitive Psychology, 61(4), 343-365.

Nielsen, K. (2014). Phonetic Imitation by Young Children and Its Developmental Changes. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, 57, 2065-2075.

The fact that the correlation between nonverbal communication and receptive language is .122 and the correlation between nonverbal communication and expressive language is .306 goes against our hypothesis that nonverbal communication helps children with receptive language (learning concepts). The fact that expressive language has the stronger correlation shows that nonverbal communication doesn’t help children understand concepts, but it helps them communicate it to others. We also expected a stronger overall correlation but in order to accurately determine the strength of the correlation between the two we will need a bigger sample size.

The Importance of Parent’s Nonverbal Communication to Support Child Language Development

Rachel Nelson and Simone AlhagriUnder the direction of Claire Vallotton, Department of Human Development and Family Studies

Nonverbal qualities of Parent Communication Nonverbal qualities of Parent Communication

The overall correlation was .238 which is trending on significance. The correlation between nonverbal communication and receptive language is .122 and the correlation between nonverbal communication and expressive language is .306.

Our hypothesis was that nonverbal communication will enhance language development, as a result, we expected to see a strong correlation between nonverbal communication and receptive score ( underlying thought). Unexpectedly, the correlation was weaker than we thought and there was a strong correlation between nonverbal and expressive.Eight of the most appropriate items were chosen from the Sensitivity Scale ( see figure 1) and used to calculate the Bivariate Spearman’s Rho Correlation since the patterns were skewed ( see figures 2 &3)Two histograms were made showing the overall correlation