Zahir Vally|Lynne Murray|Mark Tomlinson|Peter Cooper
The impact of dialogic book?sharing training on infant language and attention: a randomized controlled trial in a deprived South African community
University of Reading|University of Reading|Stellenbosch University|Stellenbosch University|University of Reading|Stellenbosch University
background dialogic booksharing interactive form shared reading shown high income countries hic significant benefit child cognitive development evidence benefit low middle income countries lmic scarce although feasibility study produced encouraging findings accordingly aimed establish impact child language attention providing training dialogic booksharing carers infants impoverished south african community methods conducted randomized controlled trial khayelitsha informal settlement south africa mothers infants aged 14 16 months recruited randomized either 8 weeks manualized training dialogic booksharing nointervention control group independent assessments made infant language attention baseline following training trial registered isrctn 39953901 results ninety one carerinfant dyads recruited randomized intervention group n 49 control group n 42 82 90 available followup assessments standardized carer report infant vocabulary compared control group carers received intervention reported significantly greater increase number words understood infants well larger increase number words infant understood could vocalize intervention group children also showed substantially greater gains measure sustained attention conclusions line evidence hic dialogic booksharing programme delivered impoverished south african sample shown considerable benefit development child language focussed attention training programme simple inexpensive deliver potential benefit child cognitive development lmic contexts development commonly compromised