Let’s Chat: On-Screen Social Responsiveness Is Not Sufficient to Support Toddlers’ Word Learning From Video

Joint engagement with a speaker is one cue children may use to establish that an interaction is relevant to them and worthy of attention. People on pre-recorded video cannot engage contingently with a viewer in shared experiences, possibly leading to deficits in learning from video relative to learning from responsive face-to-face encounters. One hundred and seventy-six toddlers (24 and 30 months old) were offered referential social cues disambiguating a novel word’s meaning in one of four conditions: responsive live (a speaker was present and engaged with children); unresponsive video (a speaker on video looked at the camera and smiled at scripted times); unresponsive live (although present, the speaker behaved as she did on the unresponsive video), and responsive video (a speaker on closed-circuit video engaged with children, as in video chat). Children of both ages reliably learned the word in the responsive live condition, and older children (30 months) learned in the unresponsive live condition. Neither group learned in the responsive or unresponsive video conditions. The results show that the addition of communicative social cues to the video presentation via video chat was not sufficient to support learning in this case. Rather, toddlers’ transfer and generalization of words presented on video chat may depend on other contextual factors, such as co-viewers who scaffold their learning. Live, responsive video as implemented in this and prior studies is compared, with implications for the use of video chat via the Internet with young children

Sharing culture in a tech world: Grandparent–grandchild cultural exchanges over video chat.

Grandparents who were separated from their infant grandchildren during COVID-19 sought other ways to connect, including video chat. Video chat supports learning, and its features (e.g., contingent responsiveness) may allow for cultural exchange. However, technological problems may disrupt these exchanges. In a semi-naturalistic, longitudinal study, 47 families submitted up to three video chats and surveys. Families were predominantly White/Caucasian, highly-educated, and lived between 1 and 2700 miles apart. Multilevel models were used to predict the proportion of the sessions devoted to exchanging culture (e.g., holidays, parenting advice) and managing tech problems. Culture exchange did not change as a function of infant age, video chat experience, or when encountering tech problems. Although only marginally statistically significant, culture exchange increased as distance increased. Tech problems changed as a function of tech talk. A qualitative analysis revealed that cultural transmission occurred via a culture of care and sharing of information across video chat, that families adapted their behaviors to the new technology, and that technology disruptions rarely interfered with the flow of information. These findings demonstrate the ability to share culture when physically separated and in the presence of tech disruptions. Further, this study supports previous work on the emerging culture of video chat. Families adapted to being separated, and grandparents and infants successfully communicated through a new modality. Because video chat supports family relationships, equitable access to high-speed internet should be a priority to enable more families to use it

TV Guide: Learning to Use Video as a Source of Information

68 p.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2000.To gain information from a symbol, one must recognize the relation between the symbol and what it stands for. Although the relation between a live video image and a real, current event seems obvious to adults, this is not true of very young children: In a series of previous studies, 2-year-olds did not reliably use a video view of a hiding event to find a hidden object. Children's experience with television (which typically is not related to present reality) may predispose them to overlook relevant information presented by this medium. In the research reported here, the effect of experience on children's use of information from video was examined. In Experiments 1 and 2, 2-year-old children were exposed to live video at home over the course of two weeks. They were subsequently able to use video to solve an object-retrieval task in the lab. After gaining experience with live video, the children also successfully used information from a different symbolic medium, pictures, to solve a similar problem. This is the first evidence of transfer from one symbolic medium to another by this age group. The limits of transfer from live video experience were explored in Experiments 3A and 3B. In Experiment 4, two potentially helpful factors present in live video were examined. When contingency and auditory cues were added to 2-year-olds' experience with live video in the lab, they succeeded at the video object-retrieval task and a later picture transfer task. Thus, giving 2-year-olds relevant experience with video helped them detect the relation between video and reality. Age differences in young children's use of video suggest that symbolic experience and cognitive flexibility are involved in symbolic development.U of I OnlyRestricted to the U of I community idenfinitely during batch ingest of legacy ETD

TV Guide: Learning to Use Video as a Source of Information

68 p.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2000.To gain information from a symbol, one must recognize the relation between the symbol and what it stands for. Although the relation between a live video image and a real, current event seems obvious to adults, this is not true of very young children: In a series of previous studies, 2-year-olds did not reliably use a video view of a hiding event to find a hidden object. Children's experience with television (which typically is not related to present reality) may predispose them to overlook relevant information presented by this medium. In the research reported here, the effect of experience on children's use of information from video was examined. In Experiments 1 and 2, 2-year-old children were exposed to live video at home over the course of two weeks. They were subsequently able to use video to solve an object-retrieval task in the lab. After gaining experience with live video, the children also successfully used information from a different symbolic medium, pictures, to solve a similar problem. This is the first evidence of transfer from one symbolic medium to another by this age group. The limits of transfer from live video experience were explored in Experiments 3A and 3B. In Experiment 4, two potentially helpful factors present in live video were examined. When contingency and auditory cues were added to 2-year-olds' experience with live video in the lab, they succeeded at the video object-retrieval task and a later picture transfer task. Thus, giving 2-year-olds relevant experience with video helped them detect the relation between video and reality. Age differences in young children's use of video suggest that symbolic experience and cognitive flexibility are involved in symbolic development.U of I OnlyRestricted to the U of I community idenfinitely during batch ingest of legacy ETD

Value Added: Digital Modeling of Dialogic Questioning Promotes Positive Parenting During Shared Reading

American parents describe bonding with their child as a primary reason for engaging in shared picture book reading. One prominent reading intervention (dialogic reading) reliably increases language outcomes, but until recently, has not been evaluated for how well it promotes warm parent-child interactions. In this study, a digital application designed to promote parent-child conversation by modeling dialogic questioning also increased mutuality, positivity, and on-task behaviors. Three- and four-year-old American children (n = 73) and their parents were randomly assigned to read 10 times at home either: 1) an eBook with a character who modeled dialogic questioning (experimental); 2) a version of the same eBook without modeling (control); or 3) to choose between versions for each reading (choice). An adaption of the PARCHISY coding scheme was used to evaluate parent, child, and dyadic behaviors during in-lab readings at the beginning and end of the two-week home reading period. At the final visit, experimental group families showed significant growth in mutuality (i.e., responsiveness, reciprocity, and cooperation), on-task behaviors, and parent and child positivity, and displayed more of these behaviors than families not exposed to modeling. Some increases in mutuality and positivity also emerged in families in the choice condition, but fewer than in families who only read the eBook with modeling. Parents and children exhibited no significant changes in negativity in any condition. This study suggests that carefully designed digital technology has the potential to foster positive shared reading interactions between parents and young children

Let’s Chat: On-Screen Social Responsiveness Is Not Sufficient to Support Toddlers’ Word Learning From Video

Joint engagement with a speaker is one cue children may use to establish that an interaction is relevant to them and worthy of attention. People on pre-recorded video cannot engage contingently with a viewer in shared experiences, possibly leading to deficits in learning from video relative to learning from responsive face-to-face encounters. One hundred and seventy-six toddlers (24 and 30 months old) were offered referential social cues disambiguating a novel word’s meaning in one of four conditions: responsive live (a speaker was present and engaged with children); unresponsive video (a speaker on video looked at the camera and smiled at scripted times); unresponsive live (although present, the speaker behaved as she did on the unresponsive video), and responsive video (a speaker on closed-circuit video engaged with children, as in video chat). Children of both ages reliably learned the word in the responsive live condition, and older children (30 months) learned in the unresponsive live condition. Neither group learned in the responsive or unresponsive video conditions. The results show that the addition of communicative social cues to the video presentation via video chat was not sufficient to support learning in this case. Rather, toddlers’ transfer and generalization of words presented on video chat may depend on other contextual factors, such as co-viewers who scaffold their learning. Live, responsive video as implemented in this and prior studies is compared, with implications for the use of video chat via the Internet with young children