Center for Biobehavioral Health.
Department of Pediatrics.
J Consult Clin Psychol. 2019 Mar;87(3):313-318. doi: 10.1037/ccp0000375. Epub 2018 Dec 27.
Parent-training interventions to reduce behavior problems in young children typically coach parents on the content of their speech, but rarely assess parents' prosody during parent-child interactions. Infant-directed speech helps shape the parent-infant relationship and promote language development, which predicts adaptive behavioral outcomes in children. The current study examined (a) the effect of a parent-training intervention on parents' vocal cues in interactions with their infant and (b) whether parental prosody mediated the impact of the intervention on infant language production.
Sixty families with 12- to 15-month-old infants (47% female; 95% of Hispanic/Latino ethnicity) participated in the Infant Behavior Program (IBP), a brief home-based adaptation of Parent-Child Interaction Therapy, or received standard pediatric care. Speech analysis was performed on mothers' ( = 40) utterances during infant-led play pre- and postintervention. Infants' number of utterances spoken during play was assessed at pre- and postintervention, and at 3- and 6-month follow-ups.
Mothers who received the IBP spoke with greater pitch range and slower tempo postintervention, when controlling for baseline prosody. Change in these vocal cues, which are typical of infant-directed speech, mediated the effect of the intervention on infants' word production after 6 months.
Interventions targeting the content of parents' speech during parent-infant interactions may lead to changes in parental prosody, which may be beneficial for infants' language development. Impaired linguistic abilities in infancy are strongly associated with behavior problems in later childhood; thus, these findings highlight a potential mechanism for intervention efficacy in promoting positive socioemotional and behavioral outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
减少幼儿行为问题的家长培训干预措施通常会指导家长说话的内容，但很少评估家长在亲子互动中的韵律。婴儿导向的语言有助于塑造亲子关系，促进语言发展，从而预测儿童的适应性行为结果。本研究考察了 (a) 家长培训干预措施对父母与婴儿互动中声音线索的影响，以及 (b) 父母韵律是否中介了干预对婴儿语言产生的影响。
60 个有 12-15 个月大婴儿的家庭（47%为女性；95%为西班牙裔/拉丁裔）参与了婴儿行为计划 (IBP)，这是亲子互动疗法的简短家庭改编版，或接受标准儿科护理。在干预前后，对母亲 ( = 40) 在婴儿主导的游戏中说出的话语进行了语音分析。在干预前后以及 3 个月和 6 个月的随访中，评估了婴儿在游戏中说出的话语数量。
在控制基线韵律的情况下，接受 IBP 的母亲在干预后会使用更大的音高范围和更慢的节奏说话。这些声音线索的变化是婴儿导向语言的典型特征，它们介导了干预对婴儿 6 个月后单词产生的影响。
针对亲子互动中父母言语内容的干预措施可能会导致父母韵律发生变化，这对婴儿的语言发展可能是有益的。婴儿时期语言能力受损与以后儿童时期的行为问题密切相关；因此，这些发现突出了干预有效性的潜在机制，可促进积极的社会情感和行为结果。
