Language production and comprehension: The effect of pre-school aged siblings on toddlers language development

Despite previous works showing that mothers, fathers, and siblings provide input to their toddler, the role of siblings on specific changes that they may cause, remains obscure. Since most work in this area has concentrated on the input provided by parents, this study extended prior work by comparing how specifically parents and sibling could influence different aspects of language development in toddlers up to age 24 months. 20 children (1; 8) were videotaped interacting with their family members. Two groups of children were compared in this study: group A) toddlers who do not have a sibling, group B) toddlers who have a preschoolaged sibling (4:8). To see if there were a significant difference between the toddler's comprehension and production abilities, two separate t-tests were compared. Analysis of groups revealed that group A was superior on production but group B acted better in comprehension. These results are discussed in terms of quality and quantity of the input provided by family members. Index Terms--language comprehension, language production, input, toddlers, first language