Characterization of children's verbal input in a forager ‐farmer population using long‐form audio recordings and diverse input definitions

We report on an ecologically-valid analysis of speech experienced over the course of a day by young children (N = 24, 6–58 months old, 33% female) in a forager-horticulturalist population of lowland Bolivia. A permissive definition of input (i.e., including overlapping, background, and non-linguistic vocalizations) leads to massive changes in terms of input quantity, including a quadrupling of the estim ate for overall input compared to a restrictive definition (only near and clear speech), while who talked to and around a focal child is relatively stable across input definitions. We discuss implications of these results for theoretical and empirical research into language acquisition.
Source: Infancy - Category: Child Development Authors: Tags: RESEARCH ARTICLE Source Type: research