Effects of English versus Spanish Exposure on Multisensory Attention Skills from 3-36 Months of Age

• In Event: Poster Session 06
  In Poster Session: PS 06 Topic - Attention, Learning, Memory

Abstract

Multisensory attention skills (MASks) including sustaining attention, shifting/disengaging attention, and intersensory matching of synchronous sights and sounds, are foundational for language development (Bahrick et al., 2020). However, developmental trajectories of MASks and pathways to outcomes remain unclear. Two new individual difference measures for young children can address these questions. The Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP; Bahrick et al., 2018a) measures all three MASks and the Intersensory Processing Efficiency Protocol (IPEP; Bahrick et al., 2018b) is a more fine-grained measure of just intersensory matching (i.e., audiovisual synchrony detection). Both assess attention to audiovisual social (women speaking English) and nonsocial (objects dropping) events and the MAAP has been shown to predict language outcomes (Bahrick et al, 2018a).
Many U.S. children (33%; US Census 2016) come from homes in which a second language (e.g., Spanish) is spoken part of the time. Given the increasing use of the MAAP and IPEP, it is essential to determine the effectiveness of these protocols for children who have differential exposure to English. Although both protocols assess basic attention skills not requiring language, children from predominantly English-speaking homes may have an advantage in attending to the social (but not nonsocial) events, given they depict audiovisual speech in a more familiar language, women speaking English. Here, we evaluated differences in basic MASks assessed by the MAAP and IPEP across 3-36 months of age as a function of language exposure.
Children (N=103) participating in a longitudinal study received the MAAP and IPEP (Figures 1 and 2) at 3, 6, 12, 18, 24, and 36 months. Based on parental report at 3 months, children were categorized as Predominantly English (PE; >60% English exposure; N=52) or Bilingual/Predominantly Spanish (PS; <60% English exposure; N=51).
Few group differences were evident. For MAAP measures (sustained attention, shifting/disengaging, intersensory matching), results indicated no differences between groups for any measures, except that the PE group, collapsed across all ages, showed faster speed of shifting than the PS group for nonsocial (but not social) events, p=.02. Similarly, for the IPEP, for speed and accuracy of intersensory matching (i.e., finding the sound-synchronous target event), only a few group differences emerged. First, at 18 months, the PE group showed faster speeds than the PS group to find nonsocial (but not social) synchronous targets, p=.001). Second, at 3 months, the PE group showed greater proportion of looking time than the PS group to nonsocial (but not social) synchronous targets, p=.003. Finally, at 3, 12, and 24 months, the PS group found social targets (i.e., sound-synchronous speaker) more often than the PE group, ps<.01.
Results indicate that predominantly English language exposure does not provide an advantage on measures of basic MASks (sustaining attention, shifting/disengaging, or matching sights and sounds) for audiovisual speech events on the MAAP or IPEP. The primary English language-advantages found were for a few nonsocial events. In contrast, children with greater Spanish exposure appeared to have some advantage in synchrony detection on the IPEP for English audiovisual speech events. Future research will examine the basis for this unexpected finding.

Authors

• Elizabeth V. Edgar, Yale University
  Presenting Author

• Lorraine E. Bahrick, Florida International University
  Non-Presenting Author

• James Torrence Todd, Florida International University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Bret Eschman, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
  Non-Presenting Author