Poster #134 - A Comparison of Mother-Preschooler Book Sharing Practices in the United States and Thailand

• In Event: 2-002 - Special Poster Session 05 with Continental Breakfast Reception
  In Poster Session: PS 05 - International Section

Integrative Statement

Children’s language development is shaped by interactions with social partners, most typically their mothers (Vygotsky, 1978). One common context of mother-child interaction that has been shown to promote children’s language and literacy skills is joint book reading (e.g., Fletcher & Reese, 2005). The nature of maternal language input that children receive during this activity is variable across different cultures (e.g., Luo et al., 2014; Murase et al., 2005). Thus, the present study compared book sharing practices of American and Thai mother-preschooler dyads. We expected that American and Thai dyads would differ in the quantity and quality of their interactions, and that maternal and child patterns of conversation will be related.

Participants were 21 English monolingual mother-child dyads in the United States and 21 Thai monolingual mother-child dyads in Thailand. Children were 4-year-old preschoolers. Mothers filled out the Language Experience and Proficiency Questionnaire (Marian, Blumenfeld, & Kaushanskaya, 2007) to assess the language profiles of the mother and the child. Dyads completed a book reading task in their homes and their interactions were video-recorded. The mothers were asked to share one of two wordless picture books with their children. Half of the dyads in each group shared Frog, where are you? (Mayer, 1969), while the other half shared Frog goes to dinner (Mayer, 1974). Recordings were transcribed using Codes for the Analysis of Human Language (MacWhinney, 2000) and coded for specific language measures (inter-rater reliability kappa=.93).

Data were analyzed using t-tests to compare the two groups’ mean frequency of each language measure. Results revealed differences in book sharing practices between the American and Thai groups (ps<.05). American children spoke significantly more than their Thai peers, whereas Thai children repeated their mothers’ utterances more than American children. Thai mothers talked more about behavioral expectations (e.g., “It’s rude to stare”) and used more attention directives (e.g., “Look!”) than American mothers, whereas American mothers used more affirmations (e.g., “That’s right!”) and discussed both their own and their children’s thoughts and feelings (e.g., “I’m happy”) more than Thai mothers did. Significant positive correlations (ps<.05) were observed between maternal and child length, discussions of child’s and mother’s thoughts and feelings, and discussions of behavioral expectations.

These findings provide evidence for cross-cultural differences in book sharing practices of American and Thai mother-child dyads and reflect culture-specific socialization goals. Fewer utterances but more repetition produced by Thai children compared to American children may indicate differences in the child’s expected role during book reading (i.e., audience versus co-constructor; Melzi & Caspe, 2005). Greater use of affirmations and discussion of thoughts and feelings by American mothers compared to Thai mothers, and greater use of attention directives and discussion of behavioral expectations by Thai mothers compared to American mothers may be indicative of differences in individualistic and collectivist cultural values (Mullen & Yi, 1995). Lastly, associations between maternal and child book sharing pattern suggest that by interacting with more competent social partners, children start to internalize specific communicative styles and learn to use them appropriately.

Authors

• Sirada Rochanavibhata, Northwestern University
  Presenting Author

• Julia Borland, Northwestern University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Viorica Marian, Northwestern University
  Non-Presenting Author