Reading, Playing and Talking
Research type
Research Study
Full title
How to promote children's language development using family-based shared book reading. Study A: Identifying language-boosting behaviours with children with language impairment.
IRAS ID
177246
Contact name
Anne Hesketh
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
The University of Manchester
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 6 months, 11 days
Research summary
The promotion of language and communicative development in the early years is extremely important. Children who enter school with good language skills have better educational and economic success. This study is part of a large project across Liverpool, Manchester and Sheffield Universities to determine how shared reading promotes child language development, and use this knowledge to make it an effective language boosting tool for children across the whole socio-economic spectrum. The overall project includes:
• observational studies to identify what language boosting behaviours are responsible for shared reading’s effectiveness, and how parents from different socio-economic groups use these behaviours during shared reading;
• intervention studies to evaluate packages designed to train parents in the use of specific language boosting behaviours during reading;
• a qualitative exploration of the reasons people may not read with their children.This individual study uses naturalistic observation of language behaviours of parents and their children with language impairment. The research questions are:
i) do parents use more language-boosting behaviours in shared book reading than in free play?
ii) are these behaviours used less frequently by low, than high, income parents during shared book reading?
iii) are language boosting behaviours are used less by parents of children with language impairment compared to parents of typically developing children?Our participants will be parents and their children, aged 30-54 months, with language impairment. They will be recruited via speech and language therapy services in the North West. Data collection will be carried out by the research team in participants’ homes, taking 60-90 minutes in total over 1-2 appointments. The sessions will be video-recorded and will include parents completing questionnaires, reading with and playing with their children.
REC name
North West - Haydock Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
15/NW/0780
Date of REC Opinion
25 Sep 2015
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion