INFANT
COMMUNICATION
I. DEVELOPMENT IN RELATED
DOMAINS**
•***For the
exam: Infant
development
milestones in
McLaughlin pp.
175-177—
lecture notes
only will be on
exam
A. Cognitive Developments
Cognitive developments
(contd.)
B. Social Developments
C. Motor Developments
By one year of age…
II. GENERAL PRECURSORS TO
LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT**
•Ability to engage in reciprocal
interactions, routines, and general
exchanges with others
•Ability to recognize and attend to
environmental change
•Awareness that she can be an agent
of change in
her own environment
As an example of reciprocal
interactions…
• Talking twin boys official video
#2
Harrison, L.J., & McLeod, S. (2010).
Risk and protective factors
associated with speech and
language impairment… Journal of
Speech, Language, and Hearing
Research, 53, 508-529.
III. DEVELOPMENTAL MILESTONES
OF INFANT SPEECH**
•(TEST 1: please know chart at the top of page 182)
•A. Birth-4 weeks: Vegetative sounds like burps,
cries
•B. 1-4 months: Cooing—vowels that sound like
/u/--often accompanied by /k/ and /g/-type
sounds (velars). Cooing usually happens in
pleasurable face-face interactions with
caregivers
During babbling…**
•The most common sounds are the
front and middle sounds
•By 1 year of age, most American
babies use: /h, d, b, m, t, g, w, n, k/
• **E. 8-12 months—echolalia (not like
in autism) This is the baby’s relatively
immediate reproduction of speech heard in
the immediate environment
• F. 9-12 months—jargon. This consists
of strings of syllables produced with stress
and intonation that sound like real speech.
Youtube example of jargon
• Baby Talk bla bla bla
For test one, do not worry about:**
• McLaughlin pages 186 (where it begins
Babbling: Discontinuity vs. Continuity)
to the bottom of page 188)
• I am not interested in this section; it
won’t be asked.
IV. INFANT AND CAREGIVER
COMMUNICATION: RESEARCH DESIGNS**
• In longitudinal research, observe same
babies over extended period of time
• In cross-sectional research,
simultaneously observe groups of
babies who are different ages
• For example, in October, 2012, they
might observe ten 8-month olds, ten
9-month olds, and ten 10-month olds.
In single-subject experimental
designs:
V. PRELINGUISTIC
COMMUNICATION**
•A. Perlocutionary Stage
(0-6 months)
•Caregivers infer
messages--impose
communicative
significance on babies’
behaviors such as vocal
sounds, cries, and
smiles.
When babies cry…**
• There is stimulation of laryngeal and
oral functions
• Crying alerts caregivers to the baby’s
needs
• Babies begin to understand causeeffect relationships—they cry (cause),
and there is an effect (someone comes
to meet their needs)
Paul & Norbury, 2012:
There are 2 different kinds of
smiles:**
• Reflexive smiles result
from internal
physiological stimuli
• They occur primarily
during sleep
• Social smiles occur in
response to another
person
In terms of gaze patterns…
Caregivers establish joint attention
with their babies
Caregivers’ Communication (Please
know the chart at the top of p. 199)**
• On p. 198, McLaughlin discusses baby
talk/motherese/parentese. I will call it
motherese.
• Motherese has a number of
characteristics: high pitch, more
pauses, slower rate, simpler utterances,
and others.
• Babies seem to prefer motherese.
Caregivers also engage babies in
turntaking activities:
Youtube
• Cute Baby Playing Pat A Cake - 8
months old - Londyn
Thus, again, in the perlocutionary
stage…
B. Illocutionary Stage (6-12
months)**
•The baby’s behavior is
consciously directed
toward influencing
other people to act on
some object (e.g., the
baby points at a
balloon)
Halliday classified communicative
functions of this stage:**
Personal—the baby expresses a sense of
herself and her personal feelings
• Regulatory—baby is trying to obtain a
particular type of interaction (e.g., being
picked up, getting fed, trying to get a toy)
Babies also often use**
• Phonetically consistent forms
• These are not attempts at real words
• They are reliably associated with
certain situations
• For example, when the family dog
comes in, the baby may say “eebye”
VI. EMERGENT LITERACY**
•Babies can be
introduced to books!
•McLaughlin
discusses reading
beginning at 5-6
months of age
•I began on day one

Books for babies should…
VII. CULTURAL AND
SOCIOECONOMIC DIFFERENCES**
Caregivers from different cultures
interact with infants in a variety of ways.
For example:
To gain their babies’ attention…
In some cultures…
In terms of socioeconomic status…