2011 Theses Bachelor's

Exposure to Infant-Directed Speech and Its Effect on Language Development of Orphaned and Non-Orphaned Infants

Siniscalchi, Viana S.

Many studies have investigated the role infant-directed speech plays in the development of language. However, the majority of this research focuses on the speech directed by parents to their infants. There is a visible lack of research on the type of speech used by caregivers to address infants in orphanages and how this impacts the language development of these orphans. This project is intended to fill this gap in the research. The present study intends to test the hypothesis that orphaned infants receive less exposure to infant-directed speech than non-orphaned infants; however, regardless of environment, those infants who receive the most exposure to this type of speech when they are observed at four-months-old will be the most linguistically advanced when tested at age one.