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--></style><title>Re: Amount of time parents spend in conversation
with chil</title></head><body>
<div>Hi, Just picked up on this discussion. I would add that it
might be useful to look at the work of Gordon Wells and colleagues in
which they did sampling across all periods in the day--extrapolations
to total hours per week should be easy and they may have done
it. Best regards, Keith Nelson</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
<div>At 1:50 PM -0700 5/27/05, Lynn Santelmann wrote:</div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Thanks to everyone who responded to my
query about the amount of time in conversation that parents spend with
their children.<br>
<br>
The most oft cite resource was:<br>
Hart, B. & Risley T. (1995). Meaningful Differences in the
Everyday Experience of Young American Children. Baltimore, MD:
Brookes.<br>
<br>
This is the reference that talks about the striking number of
different words children hear, and extrapolates the amount of language
experience children from different SES backgrounds hear.<br>
<br>
In addition,<br>
I received 2 other citations:<br>
Bogaerde, E.M. van den (2000). Input and Interaction in Deaf Families,
2000, Utrecht: LOT (wwwlot.let.uu.nl)<br>
<font face="Comic Sans MS">Weijer, J. van de (2002).</font> <a
href="http://www.ling.lu.se/persons/Joost/Texts/gala01.pdf"><font
face="Comic Sans MS">How much does an infant hear in a
day?</font></a><font face="Comic Sans MS"> In: J. Costa and M. João
Freitas (eds.).<i> Proceedings of the GALA2001 Conference on Language
Acquisition</i> (pp. 279-282). Lisboa: Associação Portuguesa de
Linguistíca.<br>
<br>
</font>Most studies address the issue of "how much input"
with a tally of number of words, rather than total time. (Though, I
suppose one can be converted into the other.)<br>
<br>
van de Weijer (2002) recorded all input to an infant in the
Netherlands for several months. This infant received about 20 minutes
a day of direct interaction with the parents and/or caregivers.
However, the infant's older sister (age 2) spent approximately 90
minutes PER DAY (60% of the recorded data) either addressing (45 min)
or being addressed by (45 min) an adult. Since the recordings were
made for the infant and not the older sibling, it's possible that
recordings of the older sibling would be different.<br>
<br>
This is a 2 year old in an academic family in the Netherlands, so we
should probably be hesitant to generalize this to U.S. American
families, but it makes me all the more suspicious of the oft cited
"38.5 minutes" PER WEEK of "meaningful conversation"
with parents. (The author of that figure has clearly never driven home
with my son!)<br>
<br>
Lynn<br>
<br>
<font face="Comic Sans MS">Thanks to:<br>
</font><font face="Arial">Shanley Allen,<br>
Annick De Houwer<br>
Laura DeThorne<br>
Eve V. Clark<br>
Lois Bloom<br>
John N. Bohannon III<x-tab>
</x-tab><br>
Linda Cote<br>
Beppie van den Bogaerde<br>
Diane Pesco<br>
Gedeon De</font>á<font face="Arial">k<br>
<br>
</font><font face="Comic Sans MS">Apologies to anyone I've forgotten -
-I had a massive e-mail failure this week and am slowly reconstructing
the missing links.</font><br>
<font face="Comic Sans MS"></font></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Original Query:<br>
Does anyone have figures or references as to a rough amount of time
that parents spend in conversation with preschool and school age
children?<br>
<br>
I have read numerous places (mostly parenting type publications or web
sites) that "the average American parent spends 38.5 minutes a
week with their child in meaningful conversation". Having read
this EXACT same figure over and over again, I became suspicious and
began to search for the source. If they give a source, it's always
"American Family Research Council. "Parents Fight 'Time
Famine'as Economic Pressures Increase." 1990."<br>
<br>
I cannot, however, track down the original article (nor can I seem to
find the American Family Research Council, though it may be part of a
conservative political group of some sort).<br>
<br>
Does anyone have any reliable references/data on how much parents do
converse with children (leaving aside the "meaningful"
issue, which is, at best, difficult to operationalize)?<br>
<br>
I remember the work in differences in communication for different
socioecomonic levels (though I couldn't cite it or find it off hand),
and somewhere I remember seeing a figure comparing Philadelphia
(Jewish?) families with Pennsylvania Dutch families, but can't find
the reference.<br>
<br>
Exact citations or directions to look in would be
appreciated.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
Thanks<br>
<br>
Lynn<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
<br>
<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite
>********************************************************************<span
></span>*******************<br>
Lynn Santelmann, Ph.D.<br>
Associate Professor, Applied Linguistics<br>
Portland State University<br>
P.O. Box 751<br>
Portland, OR 97201-0751<br>
phone: 503-725-4140<br>
fax: 503-725-4139<br>
e-mail: santelmannl@pdx.edu (that's last name, first initial)<br>
web: www.web.pdx.edu/~dbls<br>
*********************************************************************<span
></span>**********</blockquote>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
<x-sigsep><pre>--
</pre></x-sigsep>
<div>Keith Nelson<br>
Professor of Psychology<br>
414/423 Moore Building<br>
Penn State University<br>
University Park, PA 16802<br>
<br>
<br>
keithnelsonart@psu.edu<br>
<br>
And what is mind<br>
and how is it recognized ?<br>
It is clearly drawn<br>
in Sumi ink, the sound<br>
of breezes drifting through pine.<br>
<br>
--Ikkyu Sojun<br>
Japanese Zen Master, 1394-1481</div>
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