Can you hear me?

For children within 1 month of turning 3 years old (2 years and 11 months - 4 years and 11 months) with typical hearing

Your child will watch several pairs of short videos showing two objects on screen at a time. For each pair of videos, in the first video they will hear a voice directing their attention to one of the items shown on the screen, while another voice plays simultaneously in the background. In the second video, they will hear only one voice without the overlapping speaker. We are interested in which object your child chooses to look at based on what they hear. After your child finishes watching the short videos, you will be prompted to complete a 15-minute survey to provide useful information about your child’s language background.

Para una explicacion de este estudio en Español, por favor use este link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jZRC7NLk7i0ypspo0XURIYep93naRcT4YGaOKds9Vs8/edit

How we choose where to pay attention to language is super important for your child’s development! Paying attention to one thing while filtering out sounds in the background is known as "selective attention." When we pay attention to multiple things at the same time, it is considered "distributed attention." Adults seem to be better at selective attention than children. On the other hand, children seem to be better than adults at distributing their attention. Rather than focusing on age, we are interested in seeing whether children's language background (bilingual or monolingual) impacts how they pay attention to overlapping language they hear in their environment. When your child hears two voices at the same time talking about the objects shown on the screen, what do they pay attention to? Do they listen to the main speaker instead of the background speaker? Do they listen to both speakers at once? And how might a child’s language background influence what they choose to listen to and look at?

20 minutes

Families will receive a $5 USD credit on Tango (tangocard.com) for participating, which is redeemable for a gift card from your choice of a variety of major retailers. To be eligible for the $5 credit, your child must be in the age range for this study, you need to submit a valid consent statement, and we need to see that there is a child with you. You will receive your Tango credit via email within 10 days of participation.