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Maternal speech to prelingual infants in Japan and the United States: relationships among functions, forms and referents*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Hiromi Morikawa ,
Nancy Shand  and
Yorio Kosawa
Hiromi Morikawa*
Affiliation:
University of Kansas
Nancy Shand
Affiliation:
Menninger Foundation
Yorio Kosawa
Affiliation:
Kobe University
*
Child Language Program, University of Kansas, 1043 Indiana, Lawrence, Kansas 66044, USA.
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Abstract

Maternal speech to 3-month-old infants was compared for American and Japanese mother-infant dyads. Utterances were analysed at the levels of function, form and referent, and in relation to infant gaze direction. Loglinear categorical analysis revealed that infant gaze affected the intended functions of maternal speech differently for the two cultural groups. Cultural differences were also seen in the nature of function-form, and function-referent relationships. The differences seem to be consistent with culture-characteristic profiles of maternal behaviour towards older infants and children. It is suggested that transmission of culture through maternal speech starts at the earliest stage of infant development.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 15 , Issue 2 , June 1988 , pp. 237 - 256
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1988

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Footnotes

*

This study was supported in part by grants from the National Science Foundation (BNS80-07131, BNS76-83007), Japan Ministry of Education and Research Department of Menninger Foundation awarded to the second and third authors. We acknowledge Jan Lyle for her assistance in transcribing and coding utterances. We thank Susan Kemper for her continuing support during the preparation of this manuscript. We would also like to thank Edwin Martin for his statistical advice, and Mabel Rice, Clifton Pye, Jeanne Johnson and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable suggestions and comments on earlier versions of this manuscript.

References

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