Parental Language Behaviors
Conditions
Keywords
Language, Behavior change, Intervention, Home visiting, Child language development
Brief summary
The purpose of the proposed research is to evaluate the Thirty Million Words (TMW) Intervention through a randomized, controlled pilot study. The primary goal of the intervention is to enrich the early language learning environment of children from low-socioeconomic status (SES) backgrounds by targeting parent skills that relate to adult word input and conversational turn taking. The investigators hypothesize that receiving the TMW intervention will result in changes in parent behaviors.
Detailed description
The investigators propose to administer the TMW intervention to a small group of parents from low SES backgrounds in the Chicago area, assessing outcomes for caregivers at specific time intervals after administration. An audio environment recording device, the Language ENvironment Analysis recorder (LENA), will be used to gather information about the child's home language environment. The treatment group will receive feedback from some of these home audio recordings to motivate behavior change. A comparison between measurements from baseline recordings (without linguistic feedback given) and recordings during the intervention program (with linguistic feedback given) will be used to evaluate changes in caregiver linguistic behavior. In addition to the report information, parents will also be provided with strategies for enriching the child's language environment, including advice on book reading and narration. A control arm will receive a brief nutrition intervention and complete the same number of recordings as the treatment group. The control group will complete the same assessment schedule as the treatment group. Assessment data will aid in evaluating the effects of the TMW intervention. This pilot work is a critical step in understanding the language environment provided by parents of low-SES, the effectiveness of objective feedback, and the potential for change and improvement in parental behavior. After establishing a baseline of parent-child communication levels, LENA recordings will be performed at regular intervals to provide essential feedback and motivation for parents to continually optimize the language environment they provide for their children.
Interventions
BEHAVIORALLENA Linguistic Feedback Reports
LENA feedback reports show hourly/daily estimates for AWC/CTC and TV/electronic media. The feedback reports will include data obtained from LENA home audio recordings that the families complete. Feedback reports are only given to parents for 8 weekly recordings. The parent does not receive a feedback report for the baseline recordings or the follow-up recordings.
BEHAVIORALHome Visiting Educational Session
A research assistant visited the homes of the participants to discuss strategies, skills, and barriers related to enriching children's language environments. The visits included a multi-media educational module, video modeling exercise, goal setting, and linguistic feedback report review. There were 8 weekly home visits in the intervention program.
BEHAVIORALChildhood Nutrition Education
The childhood nutrition education intervention is a brief home-visiting intervention during which parents receive information on nutrition from a research assistant. The intervention mirrored the experimental group's educational intervention and decreased the likelihood of differences between groups being the result of attentional effects. This intervention is received by the control group.
Sponsors
University of Chicago
Study design
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH
Masking
SINGLE (Subject)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
17 Months to 36 Months
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
* Low-SES: income proxies and education proxies
Exclusion criteria
* High-SES: income proxies and education proxies * developmental delays * medical conditions that affect child speech or hearing
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Parental Behavior Change - Language ENvironment Analysis (LENA): Quantitative Behavior Change (16 LENA recordings) | Baseline (3 Recordings), 1 per week for 8 weeks (8 recordings), Week 14, Week 18, Week 22 | The LENA provides data for the following categories of adult behaviors: Adult Word Count (AWC), Conversational Turn Count (CTC), and Television Time (TVT). |
| Child Behavior Change - LENA: Quantitative Linguistic Change (16 recordings) | Baseline (3 weeks pre-intervention), 1 per week for 8 weeks (8 recordings), Week 14, Week 18, Week 22 | LENA system provides information on Child Vocalization Count (CVC) and Conversational Turn Count (CTC) in the home environment. |
Secondary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Parent Behavior Checklist (PBC) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention, 4-months post-intervention | Validated assessment concerning different types of parenting 'style' |
| Wechsler Abbreviated Scales of Intelligence (WASI) | Approximately 3 week pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Parent IQ |
| Child Receptive One Word Picture Vocabulary Test (ROWPVT) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Interactive assessment of child's receptive vocabulary |
| Child MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory Short Form (CDI) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention program; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Parent self-report of child expressive vocabulary. |
| Achenbach Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Parent reported assessment of child problematic behaviors. |
| Bayley Child Development Screener | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention | Short screener to assess child's level of development for five categories: cognitive, fine motor, gross motor, expressive, and receptive vocabulary. |
| TMW Questionnaire | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Novel questionnaire developed for use in the study. Assessed parent level of knowledge concerning child language development. |
| Parental Behavior Change - LENA and Video: Qualitative Changes | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | LENA transcription:Mean length utterance (MLU), type/token, syntactical complexity, gesture. Video: gesture, responsive parenting behaviors (e.g. being on child's level) |
| STAR Reading | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention | Computerized assessment of parent reading level. |
| Parent Working Memory Test (Sym-Span) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention | Computer administered assessment of parent working memory. |
| Knowledge of Infant Development Index (KIDI) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention | Questionnaire assessing parent knowledge of infant development |
| Theories of Intelligence (TOI) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | 6 item questionnaire regarding incremental and entity theories of intelligence |
| Parent Stress Index (PSI) short form | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Parent self-report assessment of stress levels related to parenting |
| Models of Developing Language | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Parent self report evaluating parent's beliefs about language acquisition. |
| Demographics | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Questionnaire about family background information and the child's developmental history |
| LENA Developmental Snapshot | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention program; 1 week post-intervention program; 4 months post-intervention program | Parent report of child's language development level |
| Child Expressive One Word Picture Vocabulary Test (EOWPVT) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention; 1 week post-intervention; 4 months post-intervention | Interactive assessment that evaluates child's expressive vocabulary. |
| Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Screen, short form (CESD-10) | Approximately 3 weeks pre-intervention program | Validated brief depression screen for parent. Appropriate referrals were made for parents who received a score above the CESD-10 cut score and who experienced suicidal ideation or self harm. |
Countries
United States
Outcome results
None listed