Title: | Effects of Maternal Input on Language in the Absence of Genetic Confounds: Vocabulary Development in Internationally Adopted Children |
Author: |
Snedeker, Jesse; Geren, Joy; Shafto, Carissa L.
Note: Order does not necessarily reflect citation order of authors. |
Citation: | Shafto, Carissa L., Joy Geren, and Jesse Snedeker. 2010. Effects of maternal input on language in the absence of genetic confounds: Vocabulary development in internationally adopted children. In CogSci 2010: Proceedings of the 32nd Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society: August 11-14, 2010, Portland, Oregon, ed. Stellan Ohlsson and Richard Catrambone, 2775-2780. Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society. |
Full Text & Related Files: |
Snedeker_EffectsMaternal.pdf (154.6Kb; PDF) ![]() |
Abstract: | Parents provide children with both genes (nature) and linguistic input (nurture). A growing body of research demonstrates that individual differences in children's language are correlated with differences in parental speech. Although this suggests a causal link between parental input and the pace of language development, these correlations could reflect effects of shared genes on language, rather than a causal link between input and outcome. We explored effects of maternal input on English vocabulary development in internationally-adopted (IA) children - a population with no genetic confound. IA preschoolers demonstrated some of the same correlations with input as in previous studies; specifically, measures of input quality were significantly correlated with vocabulary. However, IA infants did not demonstrate this pattern. Differences between the age groups may be related to the pace of acquisition; more rapid vocabulary development in the preschoolers suggests that access to, and children's ability to make use of input, may be a limiting factor for the infants. |
Published Version: | http://mindmodeling.org/cogsci2010/papers/0659/index.html |
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Citable link to this page: | http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:9978130 |
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