The Language Landscapes of Crawling and Walking Infants

• In Event: Poster Session 05
  In Poster Session: PS 05 Topic - Perceptual, Sensory, Motor

Abstract

Caregivers tailor their moment-to-moment language—nouns and verbs—to infants’ ongoing actions (Custode & Tamis-LeMonda, 2020; Tamis-LeMonda, Kuchirko, & Tafuro, 2013; West & Iverson, 2017; Yu & Smith, 2012). For example, caregiver says, “Throw the ball” as infant plays with a ball. Consequently, when infants develop new motor skills, caregivers’ language may also change. Thus, as infants learn to walk, caregivers may increase their talk about locomotion with words like “come,” “go,” “step,” and “walk.” In addition, caregivers’ verbs may prompt infants to locomote. We tested whether language input differed to same-aged crawling and walking infants and to older walking infants. We predicted that mothers would use more locomotion-relevant verbs to walking infants compared to crawling infants, but we were agnostic about whether mothers would use more manual-relevant verbs or more language overall based on infants’ age and locomotor status.

We video recorded 32 mother-infant dyads (Ns = 8 13-month-old crawlers, 8 13-month-old walkers, and 16 18-month-old walkers) during two hours of naturalistic activity at home (planned sample size = 16 infants per group). Caregivers were instructed to go about their day as they usually would. Videos were transcribed verbatim and coded for mothers’ locomotor verbs (“bring,” “go,” “get”) and manual verbs (“stack,” “twist,” “clap”). Coders were naive to infants’ crawling or walking status.

Overall, caregivers directed a similar number of utterances to 13-month-old crawling (M = 1,553.75, SD = 728.42) and walking infants (M = 1,363.50, SD = 619.29), but 18-month-olds received more utterances than did 13-month-olds (M = 2,006.00, SD = 579.02), F (2, 31) = 3.23, p = .052 (Figure 1). Likewise, caregivers directed a similar number of manual verbs to 13-month-old crawling (M = 71.63, SD = 33.85) and walking infants (M = 61.00, SD = 53.18), but 18-month-olds (M = 122.88, SD = 50.92) received more manual verbs than did 13-month-olds, F (2, 31) = 5.66, p = .008.

Notably, caregivers directed half as many locomotor verbs to 13-month-old crawlers (M = 25.25, SD = 12.87) than to 13- and 18-month-old walkers (M = 53.13, SD = 15.40; M = 53.00, SD = 25.14, respectively), F (2, 31) = 5.46, p = .01. Thus, the content, but not the quantity, of language input differed for crawling and walking infants. Findings provide compelling evidence that infants’ developing motor skills shape their language environment. Thus, the verbs that infants hear (as well as the nouns and adjectives) are related—both in the moment and over developmental time—to infants’ motor actions.

Authors

• Annissa Noor Saleh, New York University
  Presenting Author

• Kelsey L West, New York University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Karen E Adolph, New York University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Catherine S Tamis-Lemonda, New York University
  Non-Presenting Author