Does personalized book intervention promote parental beliefs regarding their toddlers’ interest in shared reading?

• In Event: Evidence of the benefits of early childhood programs on child development in international contexts

Abstract

This intervention responds to findings that i) there are benefits of early exposure to books on the development of oral and written language (Sénéchal, 2017), ii) in low-SES populations children are exposed to books with less frequency compared to their peers from higher-SES households (Strasser & Lissi, 2009), iii) in low-SES households, parents increase their children’s exposure to reading when they perceive an interest in books (Pezoa, Mendive, & Strasser, 2019), and iv) school-based interventions with families have been shown to have limited effects due to difficulties on family participation rates (Brotman, et al., 2011). Thus, less time-consuming interventions are needed to promote parental beliefs that toddlers are indeed interested in books.
Based on exploratory evidence of the engagement and enjoyment of a parent-child dyad when jointly reading a personalized book (where the child is the protagonist, carrying out his/her favorite activities), compared to reading non-personalized books (Kucirkova, Messer, & Whitelock, 2013), our intervention evaluated experimentally that the repeated reading of a personalized book increases parents’ perception that their children are interested in books. This perception was captured by measuring: a) whether the child has a favorite book (yes/ no); and b) the frequency with which the child looks through books on his/her own, asks an adult to read to him/her, and shows or hands a book to an adult. This last measure was done using a 5-point Likert scale, averaging the three questions.
The intervention was carried out with 237 families that had children between 2 and 3 years of age, recruited from childcare centers serving low-income families in Chile. The participants were randomly assigned to three groups. After they were shown a video modeling shared reading, the parents of the personalization and comparison groups were given a book and were asked to read it with their children a minimum of 3 times a week for two weeks. The personalization group was given a personalized album. The comparison group was given an equivalent book, in terms of length and narration, but without personalization. The control group was given the same materials as the comparison group following the post-intervention evaluation.
The intervention indicated partial effectiveness, as the post-intervention evaluation found that the odds of a child having a favorite book in the personalized is 4.9 times greater than the odds in the comparison group, and 6.93 times greater than the odds in the control group. Odds of comparison was 1.4 times greater than control group (p = 0.465). Additionally, through log-linear analysis, we found that caregivers from personalization group mentioned more likely the book given in the project as their children’s favorite (p < .05), which was not the case in the comparison group. In contrast, on the scale of perception of interest in books, comparison group obtained a greater average rating of perceived child interest than in the control group (p = 0.013).
An explanation of these inconsistent findings is offered, and the implications are discussed for refining interventions with low-SES families that favor early exposure to reading.

Authors

• Susana Mendive, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile
  Presenting Author

• Katherine Strasser, Pontifical Catholic University of Chile
  Non-Presenting Author

• Paola Domínguez, Universidad de Concepción
  Non-Presenting Author

• Natalia Kucirkova, Norwegian Centre for Learning Environment and Behavioural Research, University of Stavanger
  Non-Presenting Author