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| Participants: | 47 |
| Type of Study: | longitudinal |
| Location: | USA |
| Media type: | audio |
| DOI: | doi:10.21415/T56W2N |
Rowe, M. L., & Leech, K. A. (2019). A parent intervention with a growth mindset approach improves children’s early gesture and vocabulary development. Developmental Science, 22(4), e12792. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.12792
Additional publications based on this dataset include:
Eligible children were full-term (minimum 37 weeks gestational age), had no known developmental or language delays, and heard English at least 75% of the time at home. Children averaged 10 months and 7 days old at the start of the study (range 9;7–11;6). The sample included 22 boys and 25 girls; 26 were firstborn and 21 later-born.
Race/ethnicity of children: 34 White, 4 Black or African American, 8 more than one race, 1 Other.
The sample was recruited such that half of the participants had a college degree and half did not (47% had less than a 4-year college degree; 53% had at least a 4-year degree).
Baseline visit (10 months). Prior to randomization, parents completed questionnaires on family demographics, child vocabulary (MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory short form, MB-CDI; Fenson et al., 1994), and parents’ own intelligence mindsets (Theories of Intelligence questionnaire; Dweck, 1999). The researcher then videotaped a 15-minute semi-structured play session in which the parent–child dyad played with the contents of three bags containing a developmentally appropriate book and two toys (e.g., a picture book, a shape sorter, a farm set; the book "Good Dog Carl" was used across visits). After the play session, families were randomly assigned to the intervention or control group.
Intervention. Parents in the intervention group watched a 5-minute video, Pointing to Success, which explained the importance of pointing gestures for child development, showed dyads playing and pointing together, and delivered repeated growth-mindset messaging (i.e., that children’s language development is malleable and that parents play an important role in shaping it). Following the video, the researcher briefly discussed it with the parent as a comprehension check, then gave the parent a set of developmentally appropriate toys and encouraged 15 minutes/day of play with as much pointing as possible. Researchers sent intervention parents weekly text reminders between child age 10 and 12 months reinforcing the importance of pointing. Control-group parents received an identical set of toys but no video, discussion, or text reminders.
Follow-up visits (12, 14, 16, 18 months). Procedures were identical across conditions at each visit: parents completed the MB-CDI, and the dyad was videotaped in another 15-minute play session with three bags of toys, following the same format as baseline. At the final visit (18 months), the researcher also administered the Expressive Language subscale of the Mullen Scales of Early Learning (Mullen, 1995).
Of 235 possible video recordings across all visits, 17 were missing (15 due to inability to schedule within 2 weeks of the target date, 2 due to infant fussiness).
Transcription/Coding/Data. Videotapes were transcribed using the CHAT conventions for speech and gestures. Gestures were described on the %gpx tier and then coded further on the %gcd tier. The gesture coding scheme is included here.
Treatment/Control groups and parent education (college vs no college degree) are available here/