Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T13:33:19.972Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Validity of caregiver-report measures of language skill for Wolof-learning infants and toddlers living in rural African villages

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 March 2018

Ann M. WEBER ,
Virginia A. MARCHMAN Open the ORCID record for Virginia A. MARCHMAN [Opens in a new window] ,
Yatma DIOP  and
Anne FERNALD
Ann M. WEBER*
Affiliation:
Department of Pediatrics, Stanford University School of Medicine, USA
Virginia A. MARCHMAN
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Stanford University, USA
Yatma DIOP
Affiliation:
Human Development and Family Studies, Michigan State University, USA
Anne FERNALD
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Stanford University, USA
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Valid indigenous language assessments are needed to further our understanding of how children learn language around the world. We assessed the psychometric properties and performance of two caregiver-report measures of Wolof language skill (language milestones achieved and vocabulary knowledge) for 500 children (ages 0;4 to 2;6) living in rural Senegal. Item response models (IRM) evaluated instrument- and item-level performance and differential function by gender. Both caregiver-report measures had good psychometric properties and displayed expected age and socioeconomic effects. Modest concurrent validity was found by comparing the caregiver-report scores to transcribed child language samples from a naturalistic play session. The caregiver-report method offers a valid alternative to more costly tools, such as direct behavioral assessments or language sampling, for measuring early language development in non-literate, rural African communities. Recommendations are made to further improve the performance of caregiver-report measures of child language skill in these settings.

Keywords

Parent report methodologyEarly language milestonesWest African Languages (Wolof)
Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 45 , Issue 4 , July 2018 , pp. 939 - 958
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alcock, K. J., Rimba, K., Holding, P., Kitsao-Wekulo, P., Abubakar, A., & Newton, C. R. J. C. (2015). Developmental inventories using illiterate parents as informants: Communicative Development Inventory (CDI) adaptation for two Kenyan languages. Journal of Child Language, 42(4), 763–85.Google Scholar
Baranowski, T., Allen, D. D., Masse, L. C., & Wilson, M. (2006). Does participation in an intervention affect responses on self-report questionnaires? Health Education Research, 21(Supplement 1), i98–i109.Google Scholar
Bates, E. & Goodman, J. C. (2001). On the inseparability of grammar and the lexicon: evidence from acquisition. In Tomasello, M. & Bates, E. (Eds.), Language development: the essential readings (pp. 134–62). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Inc.Google Scholar
Bayley, N. (2006). BSID-III: Bayley Scales of Infant Development, 3rd edn. San Antonio, TX: Harcourt Assessment.Google Scholar
Blau, D. M. (1999). The effect of income on child development. Review of Economics and Statistics, 81(2), 261–76.Google Scholar
Cislaghi, B. F., Gillespie, D., & Mackie, G. (2016). Values deliberations and collective action: community empowerment in rural Senegal. New York: Palgrave MacMillan.Google Scholar
Cronbach, L. J. (1951). Coefficient alpha and the internal structure of tests. Psychometrika, 16(3), 297–334.Google Scholar
Currie, J. (2009). Healthy, wealthy, and wise: socioeconomic status, poor health in childhood, and human capital development. Journal of Economic Literature, 47(1), 87–122.Google Scholar
Currie, J., & Vogl, T. (2013). Early-life health and adult circumstances in developing countries. Annual Review of Economics, 5, 1–36.Google Scholar
De Swaan, A. (2001). Words of the world: the global language system. Cambridge: Polity Press and Blackwell.Google Scholar
Dearing, E., McCartney, K., & Taylor, B. A. (2001). Change in family income-to-needs matters more for children with less. Child development, 72(6), 1779–93.Google Scholar
Duncan, G. J., Dowsett, C. J., Claessens, A., Magnuson, K., Huston, A. C., Klebanov, P., … Japel, C. (2007). School readiness and later achievement. Developmental Psychology, 43(6), 1428–46.Google Scholar
Fenson, L., Marchman, V. A., Thal, D. J., Dale, P. S., Reznick, S. J., & Bates, E. (2007). MacArthur–Bates Communicative Development Inventories: user's guide and technical manual, 2nd edn. Baltimore, MD: Brookes Publishing.Google Scholar
Fernald, L. C. H., Kariger, P., Engle, P. L., & Raikes, H. A. (2009). Examining early child development in low-income countries. Washington, DC: The World Bank.Google Scholar
Fernald, L. C. H., Kariger, P. K., Hidrobo, M., & Gertler, P. J. (2012). Socio-economic gradients in child development in very young children: evidence from India, Indonesia, Peru and Senegal. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS), 109(Supplement 2), 17273–80.Google Scholar
Fernald, L. C., Weber, A., Galasso, E., & Ratsifandrihamanana, L. (2011). Socioeconomic gradients and child development in a very low income population: evidence from Madagascar. Developmental Science, 14(4), 832–47.Google Scholar
Gilkerson, J., & Richards, J. A. (2008). The LENATM developmental snapshot (Technical Report No. LTR-07-2). Boulder, CO: LENA Research Foundation.Google Scholar
Hamadani, J. D., Baker-Henningham, H., Tofail, F., Mehrin, F., Huda, S. N., & Grantham-McGregor, S. M. (2010). Validity and reliability of mothers’ reports of language development in 1-year-old children in a large-scale survey in Bangladesh. Food and Nutrition Bulletin, 31(2 Supplement 2), S198–S206.Google Scholar
Huttenlocher, J., Haight, W., Bryk, A., Seltzer, M., & Lyons, T. (1991). Early vocabulary growth: relation to language input and gender. Developmental Psycholology, 27(2), 236–48.Google Scholar
Jackson-Maldonado, D., Marchman, V. A., & Fernald, L. C. H. (2013). Short-form versions of the Spanish MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories. Applied Psycholinguistics, 34, 837–68.Google Scholar
Kuhl, P., & Rivera-Gaxiola, M. (2008). Neural substrates of language acquisition. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 31(1), 511–34.Google Scholar
MacWhinney, B. (2000). The CHILDES Project: tools for analyzing talk. Mahwah, NJ & London: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Marchman, V. A., & Fernald, A. (2008). Speed of word recognition and vocabulary knowledge in infancy predict cognitive and language outcomes in later childhood. Developmetal Science, 11(3), F9–F16.Google Scholar
Marchman, V. A., & Martínez-Sussmann, C. (2002). Concurrent validity of caregiver/parent report measures of language for children who are learning both English and Spanish. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 45, 983–97.Google Scholar
Paek, I., & Wilson, M. (2011). Formulating the Rasch Differential Item Functioning Model under the marginal maximum likelihood estimation context and its comparison with Mantel-Haenszel Procedure in short test and small sample conditions. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 71(6), 1023–46.Google Scholar
Pollitt, E., & Triana, N. (1999). Stability, predictive validity, and sensitivity of mental and motor development scales and pre-school cognitive tests among low-income children in developing countries. Food and Nutrition Bulletin, 20(1), 45–52.Google Scholar
Prado, E. L., Adu-Afarwuah, S., Lartey, A., Ocansey, M., Ashorn, P., Vosti, S. A., & Dewey, K. G. (2016). Effects of pre- and post-natal lipid-based nutrient supplements on infant development in a randomized trial in Ghana. Early Human Development, 99, 43–51.Google Scholar
Richman, A. L., Miller, P. M., & LeVine, R. A. (1992). Cultural and educational variations in maternal responsiveness. Developmental Psychology, 28(4), 614–21.Google Scholar
Shonkoff, J. P., Boyce, W. T., & McEwen, B. S. (2009). Neuroscience, molecular biology, and the childhood roots of health disparities: building a new framework for health promotion and disease prevention. Jama, 301(21), 2252–9.Google Scholar
Squires, J., Potter, L., & Bricker, D. (1995). The ASQ user's guide for the Ages & Stages Questionnaires: a parent-completed, child-monitoring system. Baltimore, MD: Paul H Brookes Publishing.Google Scholar
Thal, D., Jackson-Maldonado, D., & Acosta, D. (2000). Validity of a parent-report measure of vocabulary and grammar for Spanish-speaking toddlers. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 43(5), 1087–100.Google Scholar
Tostan (n.d.). Online: http://www.tostan.org/program/reinforcement-parental-practices-module.Google Scholar
UNICEF (n.d.). Senegal – Statistics. Online: http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/senegal_statistics.html#117 (last accessed 1 September 2011).Google Scholar
Weber, A., Fernald, A., & Diop, Y. (2017). When cultural norms discourage talking to babies: effectiveness of a parenting program in rural Senegal. Child Development, 88(5), 1513–26.Google Scholar
Wilson, M. (2005). Constructing measures: an item response modeling approach. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Wilson, M., Allen, D. D., & Li, J. C. (2006). Improving measurement in health education and health behavior research using item response modeling: introducing item response modeling. Health Education Research, 21(Supplement 1), i4–i18.Google Scholar
Wu, M. L., Adams, R., Wilson, M. R., & Haldane, S. A. (2007). ACER ConQuest: generalized item response modeling software (version 2). Camberwell: ACER Press.Google Scholar
Zeitlin, M. (2011). New information on West African traditional education and approaches to its modernization. Dakar: Tostan.Google Scholar