Galeote Miguel, Checa Elena, Soto Pilar
University of Malaga, Spain.
University of Malaga, Spain.
J Commun Disord. 2020 March-April;84:105975. doi: 10.1016/j.jcomdis.2020.105975. Epub 2020 Feb 12.
Joint attention is considered a prerequisite for language development. Although language is one of the most impaired domains in Down syndrome (DS), few studies have examined the relationship between caregiver behavior during episodes of joint attention and vocabulary development in these children. Consequently, our primary aim was to analyze the behaviors of caregivers of children with DS and of children with typical development (TD) in the early stages of vocabulary development. A second objective was to examine the kind of words that caregivers use to refer to the object that is the focus of attention. We also consider the concurrent relationship between joint attention and vocabulary development in both groups of children.
We studied 28 children with DS and 28 children with TD, individually matched on mental age and gender, and their respective caregivers. The mean mental age for children with DS and children with TD was around 12 months. The mean chronological age of caregivers of children with DS and children with TD was around 35 years. Each child and his or her caregiver were video-recorded during a free-play session involving different objects.
Although the total time engaged in joint attention was greater among caregivers of children with DS, caregivers of both groups of children were more likely to direct than follow their child's attentional focus. The caregivers of children with DS used a greater number of appropriate terms to refer to the object of attention. We found no significant correlation in either group of children between vocabulary development and joint attention behaviors.
The results may be due to the fact that the children studied are still very young in developmental terms and have yet to develop all the skills required for joint attention. At this early stage, directing the child's attention would promote the development of joint attention. A possible explanation for the lack of a correlation between vocabulary development and joint attention is that children may use an associative mechanism in the early stages of lexical learning, and hence the learning of new words is a slow process.
共同注意被认为是语言发展的一个先决条件。尽管语言是唐氏综合征（DS）中受损最严重的领域之一，但很少有研究探讨这些儿童在共同注意过程中照顾者行为与词汇发展之间的关系。因此，我们的主要目的是分析唐氏综合征儿童和发育正常（TD）儿童的照顾者在词汇发展早期阶段的行为。第二个目标是研究照顾者用来指代注意力焦点对象的词汇类型。我们还考虑了两组儿童中共同注意与词汇发展之间的并发关系。
我们研究了28名唐氏综合征儿童和28名发育正常儿童，他们在心理年龄和性别上进行了个体匹配，以及他们各自的照顾者。唐氏综合征儿童和发育正常儿童的平均心理年龄约为12个月。唐氏综合征儿童和发育正常儿童的照顾者的平均实际年龄约为35岁。在一个涉及不同物体的自由玩耍环节中，对每个孩子及其照顾者进行了录像。
尽管唐氏综合征儿童的照顾者参与共同注意的总时间更长，但两组儿童的照顾者更倾向于引导而非跟随孩子的注意力焦点。唐氏综合征儿童的照顾者使用了更多恰当的词汇来指代注意力对象。我们发现两组儿童的词汇发展与共同注意行为之间均无显著相关性。
结果可能是由于所研究的儿童在发育方面仍然非常年幼，尚未发展出共同注意所需的所有技能。在这个早期阶段，引导孩子的注意力将促进共同注意的发展。词汇发展与共同注意之间缺乏相关性的一个可能解释是，儿童在词汇学习的早期阶段可能使用一种联想机制，因此新词的学习是一个缓慢的过程。
