Abstract
Individual differences in children's language skills have been shown to stem in part
from variations in the quantity and quality of parent speech input. However, most
research focuses on mothers' input whereas less is known about the effects of variability
in father input. In this article, we review the relation between parent input and
child language development with a focus on low-income families, and review general
findings about similarities and differences in mother and father speech. Within this
review, we highlight conversation-eliciting speech, such as wh questions and clarification requests, which occur, on average, more frequently in
father input than mother input. Conversation-eliciting speech is challenging for 2-year-old
children and has been shown in research with mothers to relate to child vocabulary
development. We then report a study examining whether fathers' use of conversation-eliciting
speech relates to children's developing vocabulary skills at 24 months of age within
a sample of low-income African American families. Understanding that speech input
varies among fathers, and specific strengths that fathers bring to interactions with
their young children can help speech-language pathologists develop and implement more
effective interventions.
Keywords
Fathers - vocabulary development - conversation-eliciting speech - low-income families
