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Updated: May 15, 2025

Experience is Instrumental in Tuning a Link Between Language and Cognition: Evidence from 6- to 7- Month-Old Infants' Object Categorization
Published on: April 19, 2017
Context Shapes (Proto)Conversations in the First Year of Life.
Zuzanna Laudańska1,2, Karolina Babis1, Agata Kozioł1
1Institute of Psychology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland.
Infant vocalizations change with context by 12 months, with book-sharing promoting more vocalizations and conversational turns between infants and caregivers.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Linguistics
- Child Development
Background:
- Infant speech development is influenced by environmental factors.
- The impact of specific situational contexts on early infant vocalizations remains understudied.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate how different play contexts affect infant vocalizations and caregiver-child interactions.
- To examine the emergence of context-specific vocalizations in infants.
Main Methods:
- Longitudinal study of 104 infant-caregiver dyads at 4, 6, 9, and 12 months.
- Vocalizations measured across three play contexts: book-sharing, toy play, and rattle-shaking.
Main Results:
- Infant vocalization frequency varied by context at 12 months.
- Caregivers spoke more during book-sharing from 4 months onward.
- Book-sharing fostered more dyadic conversational turns from 9 months.
Conclusions:
- Infants begin to differentiate vocalizations based on play context.
- Book-sharing plays a significant role in facilitating early vocal turn-taking and speech development.
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