Poster #32 - Making Shape Talk Count: Caregiver Language During a Math vs. Creativity Task

• In Event: 3-206 - Poster Session 13
  In Poster Session: PS 13 Section - Cognitive Processes

Integrative Statement

The present study examined the relationship between parents’ belief about the goal of a play activity and parent-child language and interactions during the activity. Four to seven-year-old parent-child dyads were asked to use wooden geometric blocks to create as many hexagon shapes as possible within 5 minutes (see Figure 1 for examples). Dyads were randomly assigned to one of two conditions. In the math condition, parents were told that the study examined how parent-child play can enhance children’s math skills. In the creativity condition, they were told that the study examined how parent-child play can enhance children’s creativity.

Our final sample size will be 48 parent-child dyads; 36 dyads have participated in the study to date. Due to the time-intensive nature of the language and behavioral coding, our preliminary results include data from 21 dyads (creativity condition, n = 10; math condition, n = 11). Preliminary analyses show interesting language trends. First, there is no condition difference in the amount of language that parents and children produce, and we control for total language produced in the following analyses. Parents are producing more shape words (e.g., “triangle”) in the math condition (M = 3.46, SD = 3.73) than in the creativity condition (M = 1.50, SD = 2.07), p = .048. Similarly, parents may be producing more spatial words (e.g., “under”, “smaller”, “horizontal”) in the math condition (M = 31.73, SD = 19.35) than in the creativity condition (M = 25.80, SD = 14.84), p = .056. Contrary to our hypothesis, parents are not producing more color words (e.g., “blue”) in the creativity condition than in the math condition. Surprisingly, however, parents are using more counting words (e.g., “two”, “fourth”) in the creativity condition (M = 16.80, SD = 9.47) than in the math condition (M = 10.45, SD = 7.45), p = .040. We hypothesize that participants in the creativity condition will produce more hexagon shapes, and so one possibility is that participants in this condition are counting the number of iterations more often than participants in the math condition. Lastly, parents may be asking more questions in the math condition (M = 19.45, SD = 11.03) than in the creativity condition (M = 15.90, SD = 7.46), p = .084.

Additionally, parent and child spatial words and color words are correlated. Parents who produce more spatial words have children who produce more spatial words, p = .021, and parents who produce more color words have children who produce more color words, p = .004. There is no significant correlation between parent and child shape words or parent and child counting words.

These results suggest that parents’ belief about the goal of a play activity shapes the amount and type of language they provide. Furthermore, these results offer insight into how parents’ production of specific categories of words impacts children’s production of these same words. This study has important implications for how educational toys are marketed to parents as promoting math or creativity skills.

Authors

• Ashley Ransom, Cornell University
  Presenting Author

• Marianella Casasola, Cornell University
  Non-Presenting Author