This study compared language skills in a group of very low-income toddlers with those of a middle-income sample matched on age and sex. The assessment instrument used was the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory for toddlers, a parent report form. Scores for low-income group were strikingly lower on three key indices evaluated: size of…

Examined distractibility during visual fixations in 6- to 24-month-olds. Found that latency to turn toward a distractor was a function of length of look before distractor onset. Immediately before onset, children had greater sustained lowered heart rate for trials on which they continued looking at television monitor than for trials on which they…

Language and reading outcomes at 6 to 9 years of age were examined in 34 children who were late talkers as toddlers. Late talkers performed in the average range on most language and reading tasks by age 5 and 6 but were somewhat less skilled than comparison children at ages 8 and 9. (Contains references.) (Author/DB)

Tested predictions of infantile amnesia theory compared with social-interactionist account of autobiographical memory. Found maternal reminiscing style and self-recognition when child was 19 months old uniquely predicted children's shared memory reports across time, even with children's initial language and nonverbal memory factored out.…

Examined effect of toddler temperament on caregiver-toddler interaction in child care. Found that children classified as difficult attracted significantly more attention, not necessarily positive, from caregivers. Children rated as easy were overlooked more often than others. Children's sociability/withdrawal made little difference to caregiver…

Mental state language was examined in Mandarin- speaking and Cantonese-speaking toddlers. Results suggested that theory-of-mind development was similar to that in English, with early use of desire terms followed by other mental state references. Much earlier emergence of desire terms and infrequent use of thinking terms suggests cultural…

Studied toddler's regulation of negative emotions in Japan and Germany by comparing the responses of 20 2-year-old girls from each country (in the presence of their mothers) to a playmate's distress. Found culture specific differences in the children's regulation patterns and the qualities of mother-child interactions. (SLD)

This study developed a test battery to assess the cognitive skills in children with physical limitations. A preliminary battery of 83 items was administered to 26 children, aged 26 to 36 months, with severe physical impairments. Rasch analysis yielded a final battery of 35 items with high internal consistency, interrater reliability, and…

This preliminary study assessed differences in symbolic play behavior among 20 verbal and nonverbal children with autism, ages 2.5 to 3.6 years. Results indicated significant differences in symbolic play behavior with the verbal group demonstrating a higher order level of performance. Results underscore the importance of not considering all young…

Tested two hypotheses about how English-speaking children learn to avoid making argument structure errors such as "don't giggle me." Ninety-six children were introduced to two nonce verbs, one as a transitive verb and one as an intransitive verb. Found empirical support for the constraining role of verb classes and preemption, but only for…

This article chronicles changes in vowel production by a child with congenital deafness who received a multichannel cochlear implant at 19 months. The child exhibited three vowel types before implantation, however, a total of nine different vowel types were observed during her first year of implant experience. (Contains references.) (Author/CR)

Investigates mixed early two-word utterances by bilinguals to determine whether function words match the language context less frequently than content words. Data collected from two language contexts from a child acquiring English and Spanish from birth were used to identify those two-word utterances occurring in the first 2 months of two-word…

The validity of the Fundacion MacArthur Inventaria de Habilidades Communicativas: Palabras y Enuciados was examined with twenty 20- and nineteen 28-month-old, typically developing, monolingual, Spanish-speaking children in Mexico. Results indicated validity for assessing expressive vocabulary in 20-month-olds and expressive vocabulary and grammar…

Child positive affect and task orientation in response to cognitively demanding puzzle tasks were assessed at two time points separated by 12 months in children with mild mental retardation and mental age and chronological age matched controls (ages 1-5 years). Results suggested correlates of motivation were similar for children with mild mental…

Very young infants are sensitive to and follow other people's gaze. By 18 months children, like chimpanzees, apparently represent the spatial relationship between viewer and object viewed: they can follow eye-direction alone, and react appropriately if the other's gaze is blocked by occluding barriers. This paper assesses when children represent…