Prosodic input and children’s word learning in infant- and adult-directed speech

Mengru Han; Nivja de Jong; René Kager

doi:10.1016/j.infbeh.2022.101728

Prosodic input and children’s word learning in infant- and adult-directed speech

Mengru Han^*, Nivja de Jong, René Kager

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Academic › peer-review

Abstract

This study examines (1) whether infant-directed speech (IDS) facilitates children's word learning compared to adult-directed speech (ADS); and (2) the link between the prosody of IDS in word-learning contexts and children's word learning from ADS and IDS. Twenty-four Dutch mother-child dyads participated when children were 18 and 24 months old. We collect mothers’ ADS and IDS at both ages and test children's word learning from ADS and IDS at 24 months. We find that Dutch 24-month-old children could reliably learn novel words from both ADS and IDS, and IDS had a facilitative effect. In addition, children's word learning from IDS (but not ADS) is predicted by IDS pitch range when mothers introduce unfamiliar words to children at 18 months. Our findings contribute to an understanding of the role of IDS prosody in language development, highlighting both individual differences and contextual differences in IDS prosody.

Original language	English
Article number	101728
Number of pages	11
Journal	Infant Behavior and Development
Volume	68
Early online date	14 Jun 2022
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2022.101728
Publication status	Published - Aug 2022

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This work was partly supported by Shanghai Planning Project of Philosophy and Social Sciences ( 2020EYY001 ); Fundamental Research Funds for the Chinese Central Universities Research, East China Normal University ( 43800–20101-222054 ); Universiteit Utrecht .

Funding Information:
We thank Chris van Run for scripting the experiment. We thank Suzanne Dekker, Maartje de Klerk, Karlijn Kouwer, and Yuchen Li, for their help with data collection and annotation. We are grateful to all the families who participated in this study. This work was partly supported by Shanghai Planning Project of Philosophy and Social Sciences (2020EYY001); Fundamental Research Funds for the Chinese Central Universities Research, East China Normal University (43800–20101-222054); Universiteit Utrecht. We thank the reviewers for the CogSci 2022 conference for their useful suggestions on an earlier version of this manuscript. We acknowledge the editor and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Authors

Keywords

Infant-directed speech
Maternal input
Prosody
Word-learning

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Prosodic inputFinal published version, 989 KBLicence: CC BY

Cite this

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title = "Prosodic input and children{\textquoteright}s word learning in infant- and adult-directed speech",

abstract = "This study examines (1) whether infant-directed speech (IDS) facilitates children's word learning compared to adult-directed speech (ADS); and (2) the link between the prosody of IDS in word-learning contexts and children's word learning from ADS and IDS. Twenty-four Dutch mother-child dyads participated when children were 18 and 24 months old. We collect mothers{\textquoteright} ADS and IDS at both ages and test children's word learning from ADS and IDS at 24 months. We find that Dutch 24-month-old children could reliably learn novel words from both ADS and IDS, and IDS had a facilitative effect. In addition, children's word learning from IDS (but not ADS) is predicted by IDS pitch range when mothers introduce unfamiliar words to children at 18 months. Our findings contribute to an understanding of the role of IDS prosody in language development, highlighting both individual differences and contextual differences in IDS prosody.",

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author = "Mengru Han and {de Jong}, Nivja and Ren{\'e} Kager",

note = "Funding Information: This work was partly supported by Shanghai Planning Project of Philosophy and Social Sciences ( 2020EYY001 ); Fundamental Research Funds for the Chinese Central Universities Research, East China Normal University ( 43800–20101-222054 ); Universiteit Utrecht . Funding Information: We thank Chris van Run for scripting the experiment. We thank Suzanne Dekker, Maartje de Klerk, Karlijn Kouwer, and Yuchen Li, for their help with data collection and annotation. We are grateful to all the families who participated in this study. This work was partly supported by Shanghai Planning Project of Philosophy and Social Sciences (2020EYY001); Fundamental Research Funds for the Chinese Central Universities Research, East China Normal University (43800–20101-222054); Universiteit Utrecht. We thank the reviewers for the CogSci 2022 conference for their useful suggestions on an earlier version of this manuscript. We acknowledge the editor and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2022 The Authors",

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doi = "10.1016/j.infbeh.2022.101728",

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volume = "68",

journal = "Infant Behavior and Development",

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PY - 2022/8

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N2 - This study examines (1) whether infant-directed speech (IDS) facilitates children's word learning compared to adult-directed speech (ADS); and (2) the link between the prosody of IDS in word-learning contexts and children's word learning from ADS and IDS. Twenty-four Dutch mother-child dyads participated when children were 18 and 24 months old. We collect mothers’ ADS and IDS at both ages and test children's word learning from ADS and IDS at 24 months. We find that Dutch 24-month-old children could reliably learn novel words from both ADS and IDS, and IDS had a facilitative effect. In addition, children's word learning from IDS (but not ADS) is predicted by IDS pitch range when mothers introduce unfamiliar words to children at 18 months. Our findings contribute to an understanding of the role of IDS prosody in language development, highlighting both individual differences and contextual differences in IDS prosody.

AB - This study examines (1) whether infant-directed speech (IDS) facilitates children's word learning compared to adult-directed speech (ADS); and (2) the link between the prosody of IDS in word-learning contexts and children's word learning from ADS and IDS. Twenty-four Dutch mother-child dyads participated when children were 18 and 24 months old. We collect mothers’ ADS and IDS at both ages and test children's word learning from ADS and IDS at 24 months. We find that Dutch 24-month-old children could reliably learn novel words from both ADS and IDS, and IDS had a facilitative effect. In addition, children's word learning from IDS (but not ADS) is predicted by IDS pitch range when mothers introduce unfamiliar words to children at 18 months. Our findings contribute to an understanding of the role of IDS prosody in language development, highlighting both individual differences and contextual differences in IDS prosody.

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JO - Infant Behavior and Development

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ER -

Prosodic input and children’s word learning in infant- and adult-directed speech

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

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