Mother–infant social and language interactions at 3 months are associated with infants’ productive language development in the third year of life

Abstract

Previous studies underscore the importance of social interactions for child language development—particularly interactions characterized by maternal sensitivity, infant-directed speech (IDS), and conversational turn-taking (CT) in one-on-one contexts. Although infants engage in such interactions from the third month after birth, the prospective link between speech input and maternal sensitivity in the first half year of life and later language development has been understudied. We hypothesized that social interactions embodying maternal sensitivity, IDS and CTs in the first 3 months of life, are significantly associated with later language development and tested this using a longitudinal design. Using a sample of 40 3-month-old infants, we assessed maternal sensitivity during a structured mother–infant one-on-one (1:1) interaction based on a well-validated scoring system (the Coding Interactive Behavior system). Language input (IDS, CT) was assessed during naturally occurring interactions at home using the Language ENvironment Analysis (LENA) system. Language outcome measures were obtained from 18 to 30 months of age using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory. Three novel findings emerged. First, maternal sensitivity at 3 months was significantly associated with infants’ productive language scores at 18, 21, 24, 27, and 30 months of age. Second, LENA-recorded IDS during mother–infant 1:1 interaction in the home environment at 3 months of age was positively correlated with productive language scores at 24, 27, and 30 months of age. Third, mother–infant CTs during 1:1 interaction was significantly associated with infants’ productive language scores at 27 and 30 months of age. We propose that infants’ social attention to speech during this early period—enhanced by sensitive maternal one-on-one interactions and IDS—are potent factors in advancing language development.