Parental input during book reading and toddlers' elicited and spontaneous communicative interactions

Abstract

This study examined the relation between characteristics of parental input, particularly focusing on questions and pointing gestures directed to toddlers during book reading, and toddlers' elicited and spontaneous communicative interactions. A total of 30 Turkish speaking parents and their toddlers (18 girls, Mage = 18.79 SDage = 1.55) were observed during shared book reading. The communicative interactions were coded for parents' questions and pointing, and toddlers' elicited and spontaneous speech and pointing. The results showed that parents' label questions with pointing were positively associated with toddlers' elicited speech. Similarly, parents' label questions without pointing, and parents' description questions with pointing were positively associated with toddlers' elicited pointing. These findings highlight the importance of parental questions accompanied by pointing when eliciting toddler communicative interactions both in the form of speech and pointing, and provides insight for how to best communicate with toddlers during such interactions.