Department of Psychology, Florida International University, Miami, FL 33199, USA.
Dev Sci. 2011 Nov;14(6):1417-30. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2011.01088.x. Epub 2011 Oct 4.
In this paper we examine the relations between parent spatial language input, children's own production of spatial language, and children's later spatial abilities. Using a longitudinal study design, we coded the use of spatial language (i.e. words describing the spatial features and properties of objects; e.g. big, tall, circle, curvy, edge) from child age 14 to 46 months in a diverse sample of 52 parent-child dyads interacting in their home settings. These same children were given three non-verbal spatial tasks, items from a Spatial Transformation task (Levine et al., 1999), the Block Design subtest from the WPPSI-III (Wechsler, 2002), and items on the Spatial Analogies subtest from Primary Test of Cognitive Skills (Huttenlocher & Levine, 1990) at 54 months of age. We find that parents vary widely in the amount of spatial language they use with their children during everyday interactions. This variability in spatial language input, in turn, predicts the amount of spatial language children produce, controlling for overall parent language input. Furthermore, children who produce more spatial language are more likely to perform better on spatial problem solving tasks at a later age.
在本文中，我们研究了父母的空间语言输入、儿童自身的空间语言产出以及儿童后期空间能力之间的关系。我们采用纵向研究设计，从 52 对亲子互动的家庭环境中，对 14 至 46 个月大的儿童的空间语言使用情况（即描述物体空间特征和属性的词语；例如，大、高、圆、弯曲、边缘）进行了编码。这些相同的孩子在 54 个月大时接受了三个非言语空间任务，包括来自空间转换任务（Levine 等人，1999）的项目、WPPSI-III 的积木设计子测验（Wechsler，2002）以及来自 Primary Test of Cognitive Skills 的空间类比测验（Huttenlocher 和 Levine，1990）的项目。我们发现，父母在日常互动中与孩子使用的空间语言量存在很大差异。这种空间语言输入的可变性反过来又可以预测儿童产生的空间语言量，同时控制了整体父母语言输入。此外，产生更多空间语言的儿童在以后的年龄更有可能在空间解决问题任务上表现更好。
