Study of Cultural and socioeconomic effects over development of children

Abstract

While most children throughout the world develop language at similar rates and without difficulty, cultural and socioeconomic differences have been shown to influence development. An example of cultural differences in language development can be seen when comparing the interactions of mothers in the United States with their infants with mothers in Japan. Mothers in the United States use more questions, are more information-oriented, and use more grammatically correct utterances with their 3-month-olds.[citation needed] Mothers in Japan, on the other hand, use more physical contact with their infants, and more emotion-oriented, nonsense, and environmental sounds, as well as baby talk, with their infants. These differences in interaction techniques reflect differences in "each society's assumptions about infants and adult-to-adult cultural styles of talking.