Quantity and Quality of Parental Linguistic Input to Young Children with Cochlear Implants: A Longitudinal Study

Objectives: This study aims to investigate longitudinal changes in the quantity and quality of the parental linguistic input of children with cochlear implants (CIs) and children with typical hearing (TH) and find the significant parental linguistic variables that might positively be related to children’s language development in the CI group. Methods: Participants were 33 parent-child dyads, including 16 children with CIs and 17 with TH at the initial visit. They participated in a 20-minute free-play task at three-time points (initial, 6-month, and 12-month visits). Results: There were no significant differences between the CI and TH groups in the total number of utterances (NTU) and the total number of words (NTW). However, the two groups significantly differed in the different number of words (NDW) and higher-level facilitative language techniques (FLTs). In addition, the CI group produced more utterances than TH parents at the initial visit. However, there were no significant differences in the NTU between CI and TH groups at 6- and 12-month visits. Furthermore, both groups used fewer NDW and mental state words at the initial visit than at the 12-month visit. Nevertheless, CI and TH groups used fewer higher-level FLTs at the initial visit than at the 6- and 12-month visits. Lastly, qualitative parental linguistic input is a critical factor, continuously affecting language development in children with CIs. Conclusion: These findings suggest that early intervention programs should be designed to enable parents to use more qualitative linguistic features in daily routines to build their child’s language skills.