It takes a village: Caregiver diversity and language contingency in the UK and rural Gambia
Katus, Crespo-Llado, Milosavljevic, Saidykhan, Njie, Fadera, McCann, Acolatse, Amadó, Rozhko, Moore, Elwell, Lloyd-Fox
Infant Behavior and Development
Introduction:
There is substantial diversity within and between contexts globally in
caregiving practices and family composition, which may have implications for
the early interaction’s infants engage in. We draw on data from the Brain
Imaging for Global Health (BRIGHT, www.globalfnirs.org/the-bright-project)
project, which longitudinally examined infants in the UK and in rural Gambia,
West Africa. In The Gambia, households are commonly characterized by
multigenerational, frequently polygamous family structures, which, in part,
is reflected in the diversity of caregivers a child spends time with. In this
paper, we aim to 1) evaluate and validate the Language Environment Analysis
(LENA) for use in the Mandinka speaking families in The Gambia, 2) examine
the nature (i.e., prevalence of turn taking) and amount (i.e., adult and
child vocalizations) of conversation that infants are exposed to from 12 to
24 months of age and 3) investigate the link between caregiver diversity and
child language outcomes, examining the mediating role of contingent turn
taking.