Maternal Responsiveness and Children's Achievement of Language Milestones

• Published in: Child development Vol. 72; no. 3; pp. 748 - 767
• Main Authors: Tamis-LeMonda, Catherine S., Bornstein, Marc H., Baumwell, Lisa
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Boston, USA and Oxford, UK Blackwell Publishers Inc 01-05-2001; Blackwell Publishers; Blackwell; Blackwell Publishing Ltd
• Subjects: Achievement; Adult; Attention; Biological and medical sciences; Child Development; Child psychology; Children; Cognition and Language; Developmental psychology; Developmental Stages; Effects; Expressive Language; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Humans; Imitative Behavior; Infant; Infants; Language; Language Acquisition; Language Development; Language Skills; Longitudinal Studies; Male; Maternal Behavior; Maternal Responsiveness; Mother-Child Relations; Motherhood; Mothers; Newborn. Infant; Parent Child Relationship; Parent-child relations; Play and Playthings; Play languages; Predictor Variables; Prospective Studies; Psychology; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Reliability functions; Responsiveness; Sex Factors; Verbal Behavior; Vocal imitations; Vocalization; Wordplay; Words; Human; Maternal behavior; Play; Language; Follow up study; Social interaction; Imitation; Language development; Infant; Mother child relation; Verbal communication
• ISSN: 0009-3920; 1467-8624
• DOI: 10.1111/1467-8624.00313

This prospective longitudinal study examined the contribution of dimensions of maternal responsiveness (descriptions, play, imitations) to the timing of five milestones in children's (N = 40) early expressive language: first imitations, first words, 50 words in expressive language, combinatorial speech, and the use of language to talk about the past. Events-History Analysis, a statistical technique that estimates the extent to which predictors influence the timing of events, was used. At 9 and 13 months, maternal responsiveness and children's activities (e. g., vocalizations, play) were coded from videotaped interactions of mother-child free play; information about children's language acquisition was obtained through biweekly interviews with mothers from 9 through 21 months. Maternal responsiveness at both ages predicted the timing of children's achieving language milestones over and above children's observed behaviors. Responsiveness at 13 months was a stronger predictor of the timing of language milestones than was responsiveness at 9 months, and certain dimensions of responsiveness were more predictive than others. The multidimensional nature of maternal responsiveness and specificity in mother-child language relations are discussed.