Mother-child conversation during joint picture book reading in Japan and the USA

Abstract

This study compared the sequential structure of mother-child conversation during joint picture book reading in Japanese and American dyads with children between 12 and 27 months. Although there were commonalities such as increased maternal elaborative information-asking in response to children's labelling with children's vocabulary growth, there were substantial differences. Japanese children produced labelling following maternal labelling more than American children, while American children produced labelling following information-asking more than Japanese children. Japanese mothers responded to children's labelling with interpersonal utterances more than American mothers, while American mothers responded to labelling with elaborative informationasking more than Japanese mothers. Interaction in American dyads generally followed an instruction model, while interaction in Japanese dyads reflected aspects of an osmosis model.

Parental explanations of vocabulary during shared book reading: A missed opportunity

“…This mirrors Study 1, in which a similar low percentage and low frequency of words were discussed when children did most of the reading. These findings stand in contrast to the substantial vocabulary teaching done by parents when reading books to babies and toddlers (e.g., Murase et al, 2005;Ninio, 1983;Snow & Goldfield, 1983). In the current study, approximately 30% of all discussions surrounding unusual vocabulary were initiated by the child, showing that, to some extent, grade 1 children were responsible for potentially instructive interactions.…”

Narrative Elaboration and Participation: Two Dimensions of Maternal Elicitation Style

“…As with family reminiscing interactions, however, cultural norms and socialization goals are embedded in the manner in which books are shared with children. To maintain interpersonal harmony, Japanese mothers, for example, typically ask basic questions their children can easily answer (Kato-Otani, 2004), thus appearing less elaborative than European American mothers (Murase, Dale, Ogura, Yamashita, & Mahieu, 2005). Middle-class East Indian preschool children sharing picture books with their mothers serve as an attentive audience while their mothers act as the main narrator.…”

Mother–child talk during joint book reading in low-income American and Taiwanese families

“…First, they focused only on maternal input and/or interaction styles (Chan et al, 2009;Choi, 2000;Melzi & Caspe, 2005), without examining children's talk. Second, these studies have focused only on limited aspects of mother-child interactions during joint book reading, such as the usage of nouns and verbs (Chan et al, 2009;Choi, 2000;Ogura et al, 2006;Tardif, 1996;Tardif et al, 1997Tardif et al, , 1999 and the maternal utterances preceding or following child-produced labels (Murase et al, 2005). Other potentially revealing aspects of joint book reading, such as the purposes and the content of mothers' and children's talk, were not examined.…”