Parental Scaffolding of Puzzle Play in Preterm and Term Preschoolers: Differential Role of Strategy Use

• In Event: Broadening the Lens on Parent-Child Interaction as a Mechanism of Developmental Change in Children’s Skills

Abstract

Introduction: One out of 10 babies are born premature (gestational age < 37 weeks) in the US. Preterm birth is associated with a wide range of neurodevelopmental delays, including delays in spatial development (Neel et al., 2018). Although PT children as a group are at particular risk for falling behind in their spatial development, they also demonstrate considerable individual variability (Raju et al., 2006; Chyi et al., 2008). Current models developed for predicting the variability in PT children’s cognitive outcomes fall short. One possible reason is that existing models heavily rely on biological risk factors, such as gestational age. Prior work with term-born (TB) children emphasized the specific role of parent-child interactions in children’s spatial development (Levine et al., 2012). Here, we examined the role of parental scaffolding of puzzle play, a task deemed important for spatial development, for PT and TB preschoolers. We asked 1) whether parents of PT and TB preschoolers differ in the strategies they use during puzzle play, and 2) how the strategies parents use relate to the dyad’s performance on the puzzle.

Population/Methods: Parents and their 4- to 5-year-old children (M = 4.93, SD = 0.53) were videotaped while working on completing a puzzle (20 TB and 19 PT preschoolers). The dominant strategy that the parent used during puzzle play was divided into 3 categories: edge strategy (focusing on the edges of puzzles), grouping strategy (grouping of puzzle pieces), and no specific strategy. The correct number of puzzle pieces placed at the end of the interaction was noted.

Results: There were no significant differences between parents of TB and PT in terms of the strategy use, χ²(2) = 2.71, p = 0.258. GLM analyses showed that PT dyads placed fewer number of puzzle pieces correctly than TB dyads, F(1,33) = 6.403, p = 0.016. Strategy use did not predict the number of pieces correctly placed, F(2,33) = 0.39, p = 0.680. However, there was a significant interaction between prematurity and strategy, F(2, 33) = 3.460, p = 0.043. Follow-up analyses showed that PT dyads performed lower (placed fewer number of pieces) when the parents did not use a strategy as opposed to a defined strategy (edge, grouping), p = 0.002, whereas strategy did not predict outcomes for TB children. Results remained the same controlling for parent education and child age. Exploratory analyses showed that PT dyads’ puzzle play were more likely to be parent-led, whereas TB dyads exhibited more frequent joint play, χ²(2) = 9.43, p = 0.009. Ongoing analyses aim to relate differences during puzzle play to children’s performance on independent spatial tasks.

These findings suggest that specific features of parent-child interactions contribute to variability in not only TB but also PT children’s spatial performance. Moreover, our results are consistent with the differential susceptibility hypothesis suggesting children who face biological risks might also be more sensitive to variability in environmental experiences – specifically parental scaffolding (Belsky et al., 2017).

Authors

• Ece Demir-Lira, University of Iowa
  Presenting Author

• Raquel Gomez, University of Iowa

• Isabel Goetz, University of Iowa

• Tilbe Göksun, Koç University