NotesFAQContact Us
Collection
Advanced
Search Tips
Back to results
Peer reviewed Peer reviewed
Direct linkDirect link
ERIC Number: EJ920408
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2011-Apr
Pages: 18
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1092-4388
EISSN: N/A
Predictors of Morphosyntactic Growth in Typically Developing Toddlers: Contributions of Parent Input and Child Sex
Hadley, Pamela A.; Rispoli, Matthew; Fitzgerald, Colleen; Bahnsen, Alison
Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, v54 n2 p549-566 Apr 2011
Purpose: Theories of morphosyntactic development must account for between-child differences in morphosyntactic growth rates. This study extends Legate and Yang's (2007) theoretically motivated cross-linguistic approach to determine if variation in properties of parent input accounts for differences in the growth of tense productivity. Method: Fifteen toddlers (and parents) participated. None were producing tense morphemes productively at 21 months. Two dependent measures of morphosyntactic growth between 21 and 30 months were used: empirical Bayes linear coefficients at 21 months and predicted productivity scores at 30 months. Predictor variables included child sex, vocabulary, and mean length of utterance as well as 4 measures of parent language input at 21 months. Results: Input informativeness for tense was the most consistent predictor of morphosyntactic growth, explaining 28.3% of the unique variance in children's linear growth coefficients at 21 months and 23.0% of the unique variance in predicted tense productivity scores at 30 months. General input measures were unrelated. Child sex explained an additional 24.7% of the variance in early linear growth. Child vocabulary at 21 months did not explain a significant proportion of unique variance. Conclusion: The findings provide evidence that "input informativeness," an abstract and distributed property of input, contributes to morphosyntactic growth.
American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA). 10801 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD 20852. Tel: 800-638-8255; Fax: 301-571-0457; e-mail: subscribe@asha.org; Web site: http://jslhr.asha.org
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A