Parent distraction can hinder babies’ language skills

Though parents are often concerned about the effects of too much screen time on young children, it may be the adults who need to set aside their devices.

Recent research by Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, a psychology professor at Temple University and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, reveals the detrimental effects of parent screen time on their children’s language development. Babies rely on continuous one-on-one interaction to learn words, and interruptions that distract parents and caregivers cut off what Hirsh-Pasek calls the “conversational duet” that grows language skills.

“When babies are 8 weeks old, they already understand they can have a conversation with you,” Hirsh-Pasek said. “They look at you and make a sound, you make it back and repeat. And while it starts with just sounds, it develops, and it happens through human interaction only.”

Television won’t do it. Nor will toys that spew sound, she added.

In the study, “Learning on hold: Cell phones sidetrack parent-child interactions,” parents were asked to teach their 2-year-old two words they knew the children could learn. But between the two words, the parent received a phone call, cutting off the two-word sequence. Outcomes revealed that the interruption barred the toddler from learning the second word.

And it isn’t just about cell phones. It’s one more piece of science illustrating that young children learn language through a social behavior.

It may seem obvious that interruptions get in the way of conversation, but many parents don’t realize just how much babies rely on them for continuous interaction, regardless of how young they are, Hirsh-Pasek said.

Language doesn’t just unfold, Hirsh-Pasek explained. The way it really happens is being in an environment of adults involved in conversation. The more exposure, the more language your child will learn. When conversation is a back-and-forth of sounds and expressions, early learning is optimized, even with video chats on services like FaceTime, for instance.

Not only do text and email alerts that parents turn to look at interrupt early language acquisition, they distract parents from baby’s cues.

“Look at what baby is looking at. Comment on it,” said Hirsh-Pasek. “The thing we don’t do these days is have quiet attentiveness without the beeps and the sounds. They need to not see us constantly turn away. They need our full attention.”

Knowing that one-on-one interaction is at the core of early learning, Hirsh-Pasek and other researchers are working on turning everyday, ordinary places into opportunities for conversation. Urban Thinkscape, an ongoing project, embeds games and puzzles into public places such as playgrounds, supermarkets and laundromats, where children routinely spend time during non-school hours.

Many adults have been duped into thinking if they don’t drill kids on things like ABCs, babies won’t be primed to learn language, Hirsh-Pasek said. But babies are really smart, and respond to patterns and interaction. She suggested parents take their lead and learn to be the follower sometimes.

“Human interaction is just too important, and it’s just what we do best,” she said. “If we’re constantly interrupting the foundation of everything we learn, we’re depriving our children of their connection-building.”

This story comes from a partnership between the Sarasota Herald-Tribune and The Patterson Foundation, to cover issues surrounding the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading. More than 300 communities around the country are part of the campaign, which is an effort to have all children reading at grade level by the end of third grade.