IN THIS ISSUE:

Much research has been completed on infant volubility; however, limited research has been conducted on the volubility of five-month-old infants in varied interactive contexts. One could posit that lingering technological constraints have hindered such focused investigations; historically, communications researchers have had to rely on cumbersome floor microphones and other bulky electronic equipment when attempting to capture the dynamics of infant interactions.

Therefore, as a graduate student in the communications sciences department at Valdosta State University, I was excited to learn of the LENA Pro system. Using a lightweight, iPod-sized digital language processor positioned at a child's chest level in specially designed clothing, researchers now have the ability to unobtrusively gather and automatically process and analyze many hours of recording data. Once I realized the implications such a device could have on current and future communications research at Valdosta it was easy for me to convince my department to invest in LENA Pro.

With LENA I had a new research opportunity. I knew that a considerable amount of research had been done on the effect a mother has on her infant and the vocalizations the infant produces; and I knew that some research had been completed on the effect that peer infants have on an infant and the vocalizations the infant produces. Nevertheless, very little research had been done comparing the two types of interaction. As a result, I set out to study three 5-month-old infants with their mothers and then with each other as peer infants to figure out which environment produced more volubility.

Several characteristics of the LENA Pro system aided me in my pursuit. Foremost, the portability and versatility of the system greatly facilitated my ability to study infants. There was no need to set up, monitor, and disassemble unwieldy equipment or spend hours transcribing recordings or deciphering notes. Moreover, LENA Pro time-stamped all of the data and organized the data into specific categories, making it easy to pinpoint the utterances and vocalizations of all three study participants. However, I did face one challenge. After exporting LENA data to Microsoft Excel, I had trouble finding the data I needed on "Other Child" vocalizations. Fortunately, the foundation support team helped me navigate the Excel application and utilize special Excel formulas to obtain the information.

Ultimately, I discovered several things about infant volubility that surprised me. Like a mother's interactions with her infant, peer infant interactions with an infant may produce a great deal of infant volubility. When I averaged all of the infant manual volubility counts together for both contexts, the data revealed that 47 percent of the infant volubility was with the mother and that 53 percent of the infant volubility was with the peer infants. In addition, I learned that infant vocalizations are not just happy sounds but also upset or angry vocalizations that sound similar to cries.

I am quite pleased with these results—results that I might not have reached without LENA Pro and the wonderful support team at the LENA Foundation.

Babies May Pick Up Language Cues In Womb
By Nell Greenfieldboyce

A new study reveals that the melody of a newborn's cries seems to be influenced by the sound of the parents' native tongue. The findings suggest that crying infants may be imitating the patterns of the language they heard before they were born.
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A Powerful Identity, a Vanishing Diagnosis
By Claudia Wallis

It is one of the most intriguing labels in psychiatry. Children with Asperger's syndrome, a mild form of autism, are socially awkward and often physically clumsy, but many are verbal prodigies, speaking in complex sentences at early ages, reading newspapers fluently by age 5 or 6 and acquiring expertise in some preferred topic — stegosaurs, clipper ships, Interstate highways — that will astonish adults and bore their playmates to tears.
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Baby Einstein boasts prove not so smart for Disney
By Fionola Meredith

WHEN Baby Einstein videos were launched in 1997, they were sold as powerful brain-boosters for babies, combining "visual and linguistic experiences that facilitate the development of the brain" and "contributing to brain capacity". It seemed that all you had to do was sit your baby down in front of Baby Einstein, with its bright, colourful patterns and synthesizer versions of Mozart classics, and hey presto, you'd soon have a tiny prodigy on your hands.
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