Sharing stories with preschool children : do parents modify their utterances?

Abstract

The present study investigated how the parental discourse style during joint book reading changed with children’s age and language ability. Thirty-two parents and their children (age ranged from 3;1-6;0) were recruited and engaged in a joint book reading interaction. The amounts of parental utterances in four levels of abstraction were compared among the three age groups (3-, 4- and 5-year-old). Result revealed parents of 3-year-old children produced more low level and fewer high level utterances than parents of 4- and 5-year-old. Furthermore, percentages of utterances in each level were correlated with children’s age and language ability. Percentages of high level utterances was found to be negatively correlated with children’s ages while percentages of low level utterances was found to be positively correlated with children’s language ability. Clinical implication and interesting observation were discussed.